Originally Posted by
pandaperth
OK, I will get the discussion going.
It is great news that the ‘legacy’ wording is being removed – see post# 347 upthread where this was first raised (in this thread that is)
So from now on, the AA Pricing Department (or whatever its correct name is) should have no reason to disallow inter-zone segments in Europe/Middle East
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But the cynic in me says AA will just find some other (mis)interpretation of the rules to make life difficult for us.
I predict the misinterpretation will be over the words “travel to/from Europe in both directions” in order to disallow itineraries that include South Africa and/or Mauritius. I had already given my view on clause 4(e)3 - see post#336 upthread.
What clause 4(e) says is:
I’m interested in what others think the words “to/from Europe in both directions” mean in practice. Here’s what I think they mean.
- A flight TO Europe is a direct flight from an airport in Africa to an airport in the Europe Zone. In practice this currently means a direct flight to either MAD (flying IB), LHR or LGW (flying BA). AB used to have flights from WDH to Germany and may do so again, and AY to my knowledge has never flown to Africa but of course might choose to do so in the future
x
- A flight FROM Europe is a direct flight from an airport in the Europe zone to an airport in Africa
x
- A journey from an airport in Africa to an airport in Europe VIA DOHA is NOT a flight “to Europe” for the purpose of this rule and a journey from an airport in Europe to an airport in Africa VIA DOHA is NOT a flight “from Europe” for the purpose of this rule.
x
I have used DOHA in this example because currently QR is the only Middle East carrier flying to Africa; RJ used to fly there and of course may choose to do so again in the future
What do others think?
I think that the wording remains needlessly opaque.
I believe that I agree with your interpretation. The purpose of the clause “to/from Europe in both directions” can only serve to qualify the permitted routes on the left-hand-side of the table. It is to take pressure off the highly popular routes from Europe to South Africa and Mauritius; routing via DOH is probably what is intended.
LHR-JNB is one of BA's most profitable routes, even given the long downtime at JNB (which actually BA often use for cheap maintenance). LHR-CPT is also very lucrative for BA. Thus, I suspect that the true purpose of the clause is to reduce the capacity BA must make available to xONEx tickets, for which it would receive a sharply reduced revenue compared to ordinary return tickets bought on that city pair.