So I had asked Dushanthi at Carsons Travel in Colombo about the SkyTeam RTW, stating I had the following prices (from a RTW spreadsheet I found on FlyerTalk), updated 08 August 2007: 29,000 miles = US$2,102 equivalent; 34,000 miles = $2,416; 39,000 miles = $2,837.

See her response below, which I suppose answers the question I originally posed once and for all regarding ex-CMB SkyTeam RTW tickets.

"Hi Robert

The “world traveller” and the sky team RTW prices have been common rated and the only difference is that if you choose sky team , you can use only sky team partners and then there are no airlines that can take you in and out of cmb and mle , and if you choose the “world traveller” you can travel in and out of CMB and MLE.

I don’t know from where you have got the rates but we don’t have that in our system. So price wise you are not gaining anything by choosing skyteam RTW.

It will be good to buy a skyteam only if are departing from one the destination of the online carriers of skyteam.

Hope I have answered all the questions

Brgds

Dushanthi"

Therefore, the apparently new prices for SkyTeam tickets ex-CMB are supposedly approximately the same as World Traveller tickets (my previous post), but as she points out, there is no way to transit CMB or MLE. Well, I can forsee transiting via Europe, but that is the only option and eats up quite a few miles. And if what Dushanthi says is true, there is no price advantage for doing so.

So I guess that I'll have to use the "new" pricings for the closest Skyteam equivalent, which are World Traveller tickets. Oddly, Maldives are cheaper than CMB but still quite expensive in my mind. I'll try to stop by the Male' Malaysia Airlines office and see if they have cheaper tickets. I've never flown these RTW tickets before and my only RTW experience has been with Star Alliance, but since I am planning extensive Micronesian travel and the price of dedicated Micronesia-area tickets alone would exceed a RTW ticket, it seems I'll be stuck with the World Traveller prices ex-MLE

40,000 fare (YRWWJ40) USD4103

35,000 fare (YRWWJ35) USD3494

30,000 fare (YRWWJ30) USD3041

25,000 fare (YRWWJ25) USD2747

This is steeper than I had hoped, but like I said, Micronesia is very expensive to travel through so this may be the only option. I'll now work tonight to finalize my routing, a lot of stops of which will be taken up in Micronesia. I'll post my planned itinerary tomorrow if I can. Hope all these details help others besides myself!