If anyone happens to know I would appreciate it. Either for MPM or published routings as a way of getting from AKL - YYZ on a reward ticket?

AKL - HNL - LAX - YYZ

One other question, I see that AKL - HNL on Air New Zealand is on a 763 and the HNL - LAX on United is on a 763 as well.

It looks like the AKL - HNL Business class has recliner seats for 763 business (no pods or lie flats) but United has 2 configurations for the 763, one for internatonal with lie flat for business and pods for first class and the other for domestic with recliners for first and then no business, only economy plus or economy. Does anyone know which configuration runs from HNL - LAX? I am looking at booking reward ticket in business and would like to have lie flats at least for one of the legs.

The domestic config. It is not all that great up front. Certainly better than whY, but not a proper long-haul C/F product.

Thanks for letting me know. Alas after looking into it more there is only one reward seat available on the AKL-HNL leg and I need 2. Would still like to know if it falls within MPM in case the availability changes (and no economy availability for a second seat either) , I am pretty sure it would but would be good to know if anyone knows the answer.

Given the config will not be my preferred route but would take it if seats open up it is all I can get versus economy the whole way.

Yes, AKL-HNL-LAX-YYZ is a valid option.

I'm trying to find 2 seats back from AKL on Jan 4th myself. Right now I'm on the AKL-LAX (with 2 stops in Tonga and ... I don't recall the other place)

Thank you, have not looked for anything through Tonga or other spots. Mainly been looking at AKL-SFO, AKL-LAX, AKL-HNL-LAX, and AKL-YVR. have also been looking at options out of Australia but seems like a better chance of getting something via AKL.

Any other routes you know of worth checking? FWIW I am not looking for Jan. 4 so we are not fighting for the same spots.

Thanks

UA definitely permits that routing as valid on their revenue sales. And NZ permits stopovers in both HNL and LAX on their AKL-YYZ fares. It is only 5.8% longer than a non-stop routing so I'd think it would be fine.

Thanks to all who helped. I finally did book everything in business class but went a completely different route.

Am now going outbound YYZ - LHR (on AC) - ZRH (on LX) - BKK (onTG) - SYD (on TG) and return SYD - BKK (on TG) - ARN (on TG) - LHR (on SK) - YYZ (on AC) , all business class.

The only thing I would have preferred is some better planes on some routes for business class, but did not want to spend the extra 80K miles to upgrade a few segments to first. Seemed like every other route, including LHR-BKK only had economy available for some of the longer segments.

Will be nice, have a stopover in ARN on the way back to get a massage and a little break on the way back.

Any advice on lounges / transferring in any of those airports? No real long layovers, all between 2 and 3 hours.

I have a similar type question but no reply. If I am not supposed to post here and should start a new thread, my apologies and please tell me. I had one Aeroplan rep who was nice to answer my queries but the second time I called a different rep refused to spend time because I was not booking. I can't book if I don't know what I am or am not allowed!

Business class on Aeroplan allows 2 stopovers AND (not "OR" I think) one open-jaw. I presume destination city does not count as one of these 3, correct? So, is this route valid?

YVR-LHR (stopover) - AMS (stopover) - ZRH (destination) - FCO (open jaw) - YVR (home)

Is there a restriction in terms of direction?- I read somewhere you can only fly east to west or north to south but not both or backtrack.

And do you have to do the whole trip with one airline only?
The rep also mentioned something about having to calculate the total miles to determine what is acceptable or not. How do I do this? Thank you for your help.

I cannot answer all of your questions but can give some advice

1) Would start a new thread specific to your question. Will get seen by more people

2) Check out other threads about stopover / open jaw rules as well as point of turnaround, allowed direction and MPM vs. published routings. There is a lot of info, I cannot say I understand all of it, but there is lot of information if you search through this forum.

3) I think you get either 2 stopovers or 1 stopover and and open jaw, but not sure. Would check to be sure yo ucould be right you get 2 stopovers and an open jaw, I am confused by that myself.

4) MPM is the maximum permitted miles. If you find a website with the Great Circle Map it will tell you the mileage between 2 cities, MPM is the max amount of miles you can take to get there using connections and is some percentage over the actual mileage, I think roughly 25%. Beyond that and you are over MPM

5) Published routings are valid connections between cities, no clue how one can see a list, but maybe KVS will show them.

6) Once you figure out all the rules, apparently if you find something that works but is outside of a rule, like over MPM or an invalid route. Then you can try to call repeatedly and get different agents and you may find one who will give it to you. Seems to be a common thing and some agents will help more and some rules seem so arcane that many agents do not know them all, and may prevent you from booking a valid route or they could book an invalid route for you. What I do know is once your tickets are issued, they are official and cannot be revoked if someone later finds out it was invalid. Caveat to that is if you try to change them, they can be invalidated at the change request time as that agent will revalidate the entire ticket.

7) Does not have to be one airline, any * Alliance airline is fine with Aeroplan. the ANA tool is good for this.

It does sound like you got a rep who was unwilling to help, most reps will stay on the phone and work through options with you. If a rep is unhelpful or says they can only talk to you if you are booking, just hang up and call again.

IMHO it was good that you used this tread as I think there are often too many similar threads started for people basically asking the same question.

For intercontinental trips, you are allowed 2 stopovers plus point of turnaround. You can also substitute an open jaw for one of your stopovers (I believe this has to be at your furthest destination) - i.e 1 stopover plus 1 open jaw.

I'm confused by your routing, and it does not look like it would be legal since the open jaw is not at your furthest point (plus the "open" part of the jaw is your longest segment, which AFAIK causes other problems). It looks like you are essentially trying to get a one-way trip to Europe and stop in LHR, AMS, ZRH, and FCO, and then coming back by some other means. Is this correct? If so, might I suggest purchasing a one-way aeroplan award for your transatlantic, and then purchasing separate tickets intra-europe (i.e. *A Europe pass).

I think FCO should be your point of turnaround as it is furthest from YVR (see map). However, even if the ope jaw is permitted, you've still got 2 stopovers too many (LHR, AMS and ZRH).

Maximum Permitted Mileage (MPM) is one way of calculating the valitidy of awards (the other is specified routings). In your case, there will be a MPM published between your origin/destination city (YVR/ZRH). MPM is difficult to find, you usually need to look this up using a paid site such as expertflyer or KVS. If your requested routing (using great circle mapper, etc.), incluing all stopovers is less than the MPM, you are OK. I believe you are allowed to exceed the MPM by 25% on revenue bookings, but only 5% on award bookings.

If the validity is calculated via MPM I wouldn't be too concerned regarding backtracking. As long as you avoid going through the same city twice on your outbound or return portions you should be OK. For example, you could probably go YVR-LHR(stop)-AMS(stop)-ZRH(destination), but not YVR-LHR(stop)-AMS(stop)-LHR-ZRH (of course this ignores whether you can actually go LHR-AMS on a *A carrier).

You can use multiple *A airlines for your trip. This would be a *A award; you'll need to refer to the *A reward chart for applicable mileages.

Wowowow I can't begin to imagine how much the reward cost you...2 international segments on AC metal plus UK departure tax on a premium seat!

Thankyou everyone for your detailed answers and advice. I will stay on this thread until you tell me to stop. I found an old thread (July, 2010) whose member had the same problem I do. I don't think the members will re-visit that thread so I'll explain the common problem here. As she did, I had different agents tell me differently what is allowed: 1. 2 stopovers AND 1 open jaw IF booked through the Aeroplan Centre. 2. EITHER '2 stopovers' OR '1 stopover AND 1 open jaw'. I started my post after I was told of the first scenario, that is why I seem to have so many stops.

The Air Canada Reward Chart only has Scenario 2. But the Star Alliance Reward Chart seems to me to say Scenario 1 but I suppose you can interpret it differently. Here is what the Star Alliance Chart says:

"One stopover is permitted in addition to the point of turnaround for inter-continental travel only.
Two stopovers are permitted in addition to the point of turnaround for inter-continental travel only for bookings made through the Aeroplan Contact Centre.Maximum of 10 segments per reward on allowable routings.
Routing cannot include the same city more than once in each direction.
One open jaw per reward is permitted in addition to the allowable stopover."

What is your interpretation? And if it is Scenario 1, how do I get the agent to agree - they don't like being questioned.

I have searched the internet for days trying to find a definitive answer. I so hate phoning Aeroplan but it took me many many years to accumulate these points. I do appreciate you staying on this thread. Thank you again.

Hmmm, looking at my ticket it was an extra $220 per ticket which did not seem bad to me considering I got what worked best for me. I was previously booked going over the Pacific which included AC from YYZ - NRT and AC from SYD - YYZ and Air New Zealand going from NRT - AKL but I gave up on the hope I would ever get J class from SYD - YYZ so will gladly pay the money to go business class, I get to arrive earlier in Australia and effectively add a full day to my trip despite being in the air a little more, and also add in a stopover in Stockholm on the return which I did push out by 2 days, which is a bonus sidetrip for me. Maybe the AC taxes I already had were fairly close to the tax I incurred by changing to this trip.

Thanks for the advice though, in the future I will take a closer look at taxes when I am looking at other long haul rewards. Is there anyway once you have found a route to determine what the taxes are short of phoning Aeroplan and asking?

Stay on this thread it is, sounds good to me. Only reason I mentioned starting a new one was when I resurfaced an old thread and added a new comment it seemed to get lost so I started a new one and got my answer right away, but as you can see by my post count I will happily defer to the more senior posters here.

On stopovers / open jaws, I have been explicitly told either 2 stopovers or 1 stopover and an open jaw. However in reading through this forum i believe I have seen several people who have been issued reward tickets with 2 stopovers and an open jaw. I am still not sure which is right to be honest.

I know it is a point of contention that some people dislike the idea of continuing to phone Aeroplan over and over until you get what you want when you are dealing with a confusing rule (seems some agents err in your favour and some err against you on what are valid requests, mixed bag there, and I am sure some agents know every rule cold), but it does appear in some instances it works to play agent roulette with Aeroplan. It sounds like you did talk to one agent who told you that you could book 2 stopovers and an open jaw, what I would do when you find one who says the same is book your reward flight right then and there and hope the ticket gets validated and issued.

You sure the UK charges the departure tax on passengers in transit?