Happy

2A is for bassinet.

1A is blocked for OneWorld Emeralds. Some how the block does not transfer to QR system on the F cabin. However the Row 11 being blocked for OneWorld Emerald IS transferred to QR system - you could not get Row 11 on CX unless the PNR has your OneWorld Elite credential. However you can get 1A from QR site.

CDKing

Interesting.

I decided to pull seat ma up on EF and all but the middles are marked as Premium only incl row 2

Happy

Here is something even more interesting.

We have a flight HKG-LAX-MIA on AA miles in J.

For whatever reasons CX has NOT blocked Row 11 on this flight so we were able to select 11A and 12A - we prefer our own window seats versus sitting in the middle.

What happened that follows is it has caused a "people traveled not matched with seats" on AA site - I could not get AA seat assignment whether on QR site or AA site on the LAX-MIA leg - it kept giving me a system error to tell me try again.

Finally I called AA - the first agent tried and could NOT assign us the seats on AA segment then she found out the above error message on her screen - she said AA only saw one person is assigned on Row 12, the other person who had Row 11 is not showing up in AA system at all - hence the system thinks the number of passengers traveling does not match with the connecting flight! She told me to call CX to attach Row 11 to the passenger and sent the information to AA before AA could assign seats on the LAX-MIA leg.

By now I figured out I had to remove our CX seat assignments from the mini cabin to the main J cabin before AA could see it then once AA assigned us seats both on the CX segment and on the AA segment. After that I could go back to CX to re-select our Row 11 and 12 seats. I decided to call AA again hoping to find another agent who would go along with my experiment. The 2nd agent was more helpful and was willing to go along with me in the process. Once she assigned us to the CX main cabin, magically AA system allowed her to assign us to the Row 2 A&C on the LAX-MIA segment. I thanked her and hang up, returned to CX site and moved us back to the Row 11 and 12. Now everything is in order.

It is a surreal experience. It also tells me that CX indeed has had some updates on its seat assignment system now it is based on Elite status but the restriction in F cabin, can be bypassed from going thru QR. However there is no go around for Row 11 in the J mini cabin. Further more, if you have connecting flight on AA, you need to take care the AA seat assignment first before tackle the CX seat assignment. Else you have my surreal experience and take a good bit of efforts to find out why and how to fix it.

Finally telling my experiences on AA forum in the hope that might help others who might encounter the same issues are a waste of my effort because in AA forum many are EXPs who dont see any problem due to their OW Emerald status. Yet they did not factor this important info into the situation but kept telling others there shouldn't be any issue - WRONG. Finally a couple Plats chimed in to report they, too, also had issues. Of course lowly Gold and Peons all would have same issues which as for now if you are in F you could use QR to take care of it but if you are in J and want to get Row 11 - there is nothing you could do unless CX does not block it. And you need to be mindful on your connecting flights' seat assignments.

LHR/MEL/Europe FF

2A and 2K are blocked for bassinet seats.

CDKing

i remember that before. I guess its both now. Baby Elites

nevansm

I have an itinerary with US-HKG-TPE (Stopover) TPE-HKG-SGN. Having trouble getting tpe-hkg-sgn in j or f though BA and QF show availability. Can't search in JL right now. Has anyone seen the disparity between BA/QF and AS before? I am confirmed in Y but would really prefer J. Is there any way for the agent to force sell the segments?

CDKing

all CX tickets are manual sells if I understand correctly.

Have you checked each leg individually to make sure space is available? Some of these sites give false positives on a O/D search basis

nevansm

Good info. Yes I have confirmed that each segment is available (though one is F, one is J). I asked several agents to check each segment each time saying it wasn't available. Tweeted AS to see if they can help. Sometimes it just takes a different touch.

Lumpylump76

Is this an Award using AS miles? If so, isn't the only stopover allowed in HKG? In your case, US-HKG-TPE would be an award, then TPE-HKG-SGN would have to be a separate award.

nevansm

Yes. I know the normal process is stopover only in HKG but this was ticketed differently and allowed me to do the stopover in TPE. Don't know why and won't ask questions. I just want the last 2 segments in F/J.

Orwaid

Hi -

Slightly OT, but as another data point on stopovers -- I was able to use AS miles to ticket KUL-HKG-YVR (stopover)-JFK in J all on one redemption.

beckoa

Wirelessly posted (beckoa's BB: Mozilla/5.0 (BlackBerry; U; BlackBerry 9810; en-US) AppleWebKit/534.11+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/7.1.0.694 Mobile Safari/534.11+)

How long ago was this?

Orwaid

Hi -

I booked the TPAC legs August 2014 and the YVR-JFK leg early summer of 2015. Ticket was issued August 2014.

jamienbaker

Small point - when I've modified seat assignments using QR, my known traveler number falls out. Naturally, if originating on CX this won't matter, but if taking an AS (or AA) connecting flight, it means you don't get Pre. There's probably a way to reattached the KTN, and maybe this was just a fluke. But figured I'd mention it. BTW, 2A is the best CX seat as FAs will rarely walk by unless serving you. Problem with 1A is you might get somebody needy behind you, meaning there will be tons of foot traffic by your seat. IIRC, 2A also has an additional window?

nevansm

Just to loop back on this. Took a bit but I finally got it.

Called agent asking to book new TPE-(HKG)-SGN.
Agent: I see there's premium economy available on both flights
Me: Ok, out of curiosity, check just TPE HKG
A: Oh, wow, there's first class on that segment, why isn't it coming up. Give me a second. <types> Ok, there's first on the TPE HKG segment and business on the HKG SGN segment (respective front cabin on those flights).
M: Ok great, now let's do this. I already have a reservation, can you change the flights I have booked to those fare classes since you've confirmed they're available?
A: Yep.

Few minutes later, ticket reissued, everything looks good on CX website. Only thing I can think is that whatever they're using to find seats only finds routings with the same fare class availability and won't mix? Each flight had Y, and Premium Y. The first flight also had F available but no business and the second flight Business but not selling F.

Anyways, word to the wise, always feed segments one by one after finding them on other sources and you should be all set.