Feb 8, 2018, 12:08 am
ANA RTW Award Booking Reports/Discussion
Apr 25, 2018, 9:28 am
#16
Join Date: Aug 2012
Posts: 544
I'm sitting on a boatload of AMEX points, and my ideal use would be ANA RTW tickets in J, but we're a family of four. We live near DC and would ideally start with IAD-NRT. I've checked a little, and never see more than 2 seats in J (and often not even that). Am I correct to just accept that we'll never ever see 4 seats in J on the IAD-NRT flight? If so, then the next decision is whether to just resign ourselves to Y or try to get more creative. Thanks for any insight!
Apr 28, 2018, 11:02 am
#18
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: SEA
Posts: 311
I'm sitting on a boatload of AMEX points, and my ideal use would be ANA RTW tickets in J, but we're a family of four. We live near DC and would ideally start with IAD-NRT. I've checked a little, and never see more than 2 seats in J (and often not even that). Am I correct to just accept that we'll never ever see 4 seats in J on the IAD-NRT flight? If so, then the next decision is whether to just resign ourselves to Y or try to get more creative. Thanks for any insight!
Apr 28, 2018, 4:17 pm
#19
Join Date: Apr 2010
Location: SFO
Programs: Marriott LT Plat; WoH Exp; AS Gold; AA Plat
Posts: 369
Availability of 4 J seats on NH on their NA routes can be difficult to find, though not impossible; e.g. LAX has 3 flights daily to TYO and offers the best probability. Sometimes there are 2 F & 2 J seats available on the same flight too. But having recently booked RTW for 4J seats, I found better availability on other *A partners viz. Eva & Asiana for TPAC.
Jun 8, 2018, 2:00 pm
#20
Join Date: Apr 2017
Location: Central Wisconsin, USA
Posts: 189
Just booked ATW with ANA
So I finally booked my family around the world tickets on ANA. We are a family of three people and have a cruise in SIN. We also wanted to visit Munich to visit some friends. The trip is in Feb/Mar of 2019. We were open to traveling either east or west as long as we were in SIN on the dates we needed. Here are a few details and thoughts about my experience booking.
- Set up family plan with ANA early. I put 3,000 points into my ANA mileage account but they only took out 1,000 for the registration cost not 1,000 per person
- I started a master spreadsheet of availability as I needed to get 3 in business class for our flights.
- I started my searches mostly with expert flier and tracked what was open not just ideal flights but alternatives as well.
- I then used the ANA award booking engine under the "multi cities/mixed classes" tab. This seemed to verify expert flier pretty well except for domestic united flights that would show up on one but not the other.
- My tracking excel sheet included airplane specs on business class seats and wifi etc.
- As I narrowed down my choices I was having a hard time getting a good flight from Europe to SIN or BKK for all three of us so I had some expert flier alerts made.
- To estimate fuel service charges (different by airline and how ANA handles each one) and taxes departure fees etc. (different by city). I used a couple great tools to estimate this:
- To verify out of pocket when I had it narrowed down I ran the trip through here... Round The World - Star Alliance ....and left out the fuel surcharges and flight insurance and added that manually from my charts above. When I finally booked my estimate was within $30 of actual.
- I had never transferred AMEX points over the phone. I learned one big lesson. They have the power to take your "pending" MR points and make them active! We had to buy some extra points and before you can do that amex makes you transfer everything you have including pending (rounded down to 1,000). I felt stupid I had waited for a big batch of my pending points to post. I could have booked 3 weeks earlier.
- On my wife's amex account I transferred everything except 1,000 points. This strategy paid off. I was on the fence about the trip's total distance ANA award level. In the end I had to come up with 30,000 more points as the trip went over 20,000 miles. If I had I drained my (wife's) MR points to zero I could not have purchased more points until next statement.
- Amex MR points transferred FAST. Within 24 hours not the 5-7 business days the Amex agent suggested it might take
- When I went to book I lost one of three seats on ZRH to BKK but I had my back ups ready and the process went quick. I was on hold for 30 minutes on the front end but then once with the agent she had everything set up and off the phone in 25 minutes.
- She worked well with three digit codes and seemed to want route, airline, date in that order. When we booked my flights separate from wife and daughter she seemed to be able to copy route from first set I booked. Nothing to do with seat selection with ANA I did that after on airline websites directly.
My wife and daughter are flying some earlier dates them me so they ended up...
ORD to CPH to MUC on SAS
Then my first leg is ORD to MUC on Lufthansa
Together we are flying:
ZRH-SIN on Swiss
Sin to KIX on Singapore
bullet train to Tokyo for the experience
HND to ORD on ANA
All of this is in Business class on full lay flat seats and on airplanes that have wifi. (except cph to muc). 20,500 miles. two segments are over 6,300 miles and 11 hours in the air. Most of the segments are overnight flights so we don't waste entire days traveling.
Cost to us was 125,000 points each. Fuel and taxes were just over $400 each but most of that was from having to fly SWISS from Europe to SIN. Their fuel surcharge alone was $187 per ticket for the one leg. We could have saved some of that flying THAI airlines in a 747 but the business class did not look very good for an eleven hour flight.
Value... If I take full retail cost, deduct fuel SC and taxes and then divide by points we got between $.085 - $.172 value depending on where you calculate the retail purchase of all of our flights individually. Google has it at $22,000 cost but star alliance website had it at $11,000. No matter what, considering one economy ticket ORD to SIN would have been as expensive as the surcharges on three business class around the world tickets I think we are getting our value.
- Set up family plan with ANA early. I put 3,000 points into my ANA mileage account but they only took out 1,000 for the registration cost not 1,000 per person
- I started a master spreadsheet of availability as I needed to get 3 in business class for our flights.
- I started my searches mostly with expert flier and tracked what was open not just ideal flights but alternatives as well.
- I then used the ANA award booking engine under the "multi cities/mixed classes" tab. This seemed to verify expert flier pretty well except for domestic united flights that would show up on one but not the other.
- My tracking excel sheet included airplane specs on business class seats and wifi etc.
- As I narrowed down my choices I was having a hard time getting a good flight from Europe to SIN or BKK for all three of us so I had some expert flier alerts made.
- To estimate fuel service charges (different by airline and how ANA handles each one) and taxes departure fees etc. (different by city). I used a couple great tools to estimate this:
___1. For fuel charges by airline I made a reference table in my excel based on chart here... https://www.pointswithacrew.com/ana-...hensive-guide/
___2. For European taxes and fees by airport I referenced here https://www.pointswithacrew.com/comp...rt-taxes-fees/
___2. For European taxes and fees by airport I referenced here https://www.pointswithacrew.com/comp...rt-taxes-fees/
- To verify out of pocket when I had it narrowed down I ran the trip through here... Round The World - Star Alliance ....and left out the fuel surcharges and flight insurance and added that manually from my charts above. When I finally booked my estimate was within $30 of actual.
- I had never transferred AMEX points over the phone. I learned one big lesson. They have the power to take your "pending" MR points and make them active! We had to buy some extra points and before you can do that amex makes you transfer everything you have including pending (rounded down to 1,000). I felt stupid I had waited for a big batch of my pending points to post. I could have booked 3 weeks earlier.
- On my wife's amex account I transferred everything except 1,000 points. This strategy paid off. I was on the fence about the trip's total distance ANA award level. In the end I had to come up with 30,000 more points as the trip went over 20,000 miles. If I had I drained my (wife's) MR points to zero I could not have purchased more points until next statement.
- Amex MR points transferred FAST. Within 24 hours not the 5-7 business days the Amex agent suggested it might take
- When I went to book I lost one of three seats on ZRH to BKK but I had my back ups ready and the process went quick. I was on hold for 30 minutes on the front end but then once with the agent she had everything set up and off the phone in 25 minutes.
- She worked well with three digit codes and seemed to want route, airline, date in that order. When we booked my flights separate from wife and daughter she seemed to be able to copy route from first set I booked. Nothing to do with seat selection with ANA I did that after on airline websites directly.
My wife and daughter are flying some earlier dates them me so they ended up...
ORD to CPH to MUC on SAS
Then my first leg is ORD to MUC on Lufthansa
Together we are flying:
ZRH-SIN on Swiss
Sin to KIX on Singapore
bullet train to Tokyo for the experience
HND to ORD on ANA
All of this is in Business class on full lay flat seats and on airplanes that have wifi. (except cph to muc). 20,500 miles. two segments are over 6,300 miles and 11 hours in the air. Most of the segments are overnight flights so we don't waste entire days traveling.
Cost to us was 125,000 points each. Fuel and taxes were just over $400 each but most of that was from having to fly SWISS from Europe to SIN. Their fuel surcharge alone was $187 per ticket for the one leg. We could have saved some of that flying THAI airlines in a 747 but the business class did not look very good for an eleven hour flight.
Value... If I take full retail cost, deduct fuel SC and taxes and then divide by points we got between $.085 - $.172 value depending on where you calculate the retail purchase of all of our flights individually. Google has it at $22,000 cost but star alliance website had it at $11,000. No matter what, considering one economy ticket ORD to SIN would have been as expensive as the surcharges on three business class around the world tickets I think we are getting our value.
Last edited by john c wisconsin; Jun 8, 2018 at 3:23 pm
Jun 12, 2018, 3:48 pm
#23
Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 64
Need help clarifying the ANA RTW terms!
This sticky has been incredibly helpful for me in planning my upcoming RTW that I hope to book with ANA. I have a 3 month sabbatical coming up where I plan to use an ANA RNW as the 'spine' of the trip for getting me across the Atlantic and Pacific and then book cheap short hauls with cash or other mileage currencies (e.g. Avios).
I do have a few *dumb* questions about the ANA T&C that I'm hoping I could get some help with from you experts! Here goes:
1). How does ANA define a 'segment'? I ask because I'm hoping that a segment is not the same thing as a connection since we only get 12 of them. For example, if I want to get from LIS to VFA, which requires brief layovers in MAD and ADD, does that count as 1 segment or 3?
2). I understand that the overall direction of travel must be east to west or west to east. I plan to travel east. My question is if ANA restricts me from backtracking even for connections. For instance, if I'm trying to get from NOS to ERB, which requires connecting slightly west in ADD, is that considered backtracking even though my final stopover destination is east of my origin?
3). Extra dumb question - what's the difference between a 'ground transfer' and an open jaw on a RTW? If I do a stopover on my itinerary at VFA and then pick up the itinerary again at NOS with all the intermediate travel arranged separately, is that an open jaw or a ground transfer? How many stopovers does that count as: 1 or 2?
4). On a related note, do ground transfers have to stay within the same ANA-defined region? For instance, could I do a stopover in SIN (Asia) and then pick up my itinerary again in SYD (Oceania)?
5). Does anyone know if Ethiopian Air charges significant fuel taxes?
In case anyone is curious, my overall plan for this itinerary is to start with a quick stop in Europe to explore the Azores. I've already done most of the rest of the continent. Next, I'm headed to Africa for my honeymoon in South Africa, Namibia, Madagascar, and Reunion. Post honeymoon I'm traveling solo to Kurdistan (!) and then want to make my way east to India, Bali, Australia, potentially a south pacific island, and finally back to the US. I know It's ambitious and not all of it will fit into this ANA itinerary given the number of restrictions.
THANK YOU IN ADVANCE FOR ANY HELP!
I do have a few *dumb* questions about the ANA T&C that I'm hoping I could get some help with from you experts! Here goes:
1). How does ANA define a 'segment'? I ask because I'm hoping that a segment is not the same thing as a connection since we only get 12 of them. For example, if I want to get from LIS to VFA, which requires brief layovers in MAD and ADD, does that count as 1 segment or 3?
2). I understand that the overall direction of travel must be east to west or west to east. I plan to travel east. My question is if ANA restricts me from backtracking even for connections. For instance, if I'm trying to get from NOS to ERB, which requires connecting slightly west in ADD, is that considered backtracking even though my final stopover destination is east of my origin?
3). Extra dumb question - what's the difference between a 'ground transfer' and an open jaw on a RTW? If I do a stopover on my itinerary at VFA and then pick up the itinerary again at NOS with all the intermediate travel arranged separately, is that an open jaw or a ground transfer? How many stopovers does that count as: 1 or 2?
4). On a related note, do ground transfers have to stay within the same ANA-defined region? For instance, could I do a stopover in SIN (Asia) and then pick up my itinerary again in SYD (Oceania)?
5). Does anyone know if Ethiopian Air charges significant fuel taxes?
In case anyone is curious, my overall plan for this itinerary is to start with a quick stop in Europe to explore the Azores. I've already done most of the rest of the continent. Next, I'm headed to Africa for my honeymoon in South Africa, Namibia, Madagascar, and Reunion. Post honeymoon I'm traveling solo to Kurdistan (!) and then want to make my way east to India, Bali, Australia, potentially a south pacific island, and finally back to the US. I know It's ambitious and not all of it will fit into this ANA itinerary given the number of restrictions.
THANK YOU IN ADVANCE FOR ANY HELP!
Jun 16, 2018, 9:30 am
#24
Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 64
I'd REALLY love some help with even 1 of these questions if you happen to know the answer. The make or break question is how ANA defines a 'segment.'
Also just to add one more question - I understand that ANA requires re-ticketing for a change in dates or airlines. However, when if I simply want to change cabins? For instance, if only Y is available now, can I book that and then 'upgrade' into Business if it opens up and I've ticketed a business class RTW?
again - thank you for the help!
Also just to add one more question - I understand that ANA requires re-ticketing for a change in dates or airlines. However, when if I simply want to change cabins? For instance, if only Y is available now, can I book that and then 'upgrade' into Business if it opens up and I've ticketed a business class RTW?
again - thank you for the help!
Jun 16, 2018, 1:19 pm
#25
Join Date: Apr 2017
Location: Central Wisconsin, USA
Posts: 189
... ANA defines a 'segment.'
Also just to add one more question - I understand that ANA requires re-ticketing for a change in dates or airlines. However, when if I simply want to change cabins? For instance, if only Y is available now, can I book that and then 'upgrade' into Business if it opens up and I've ticketed a business class RTW?
again - thank you for the help!
Also just to add one more question - I understand that ANA requires re-ticketing for a change in dates or airlines. However, when if I simply want to change cabins? For instance, if only Y is available now, can I book that and then 'upgrade' into Business if it opens up and I've ticketed a business class RTW?
again - thank you for the help!
I will try my best. First a change in dates on the exact same flights on an ATW ticket does NOT incur any charges. Changes in carriers, flights etc actually require you to cancel it and rebook. From how it was described and this would incur 3,000 point fee. What I don;t know is if you cancel and re-book the entire ticket as needed is there a guarantee that a segment seat will come back up as available as you released it from your cancel.
When you are booking it on business level and a segment only has economy and then later the business opens up I believe you can call and switch to business as you "paid" the business level. I know you wait list on ANA metal flights for this. I have also read that you take priority over other upgrades the day of flight even above frequent flier levels as you technically booked the business ticket not sure how this applies in real world.
I believe their definition of a segment is any flight. So your example would be 3 segments not one but I do not see this in writing just gleaming from descriptions on their web site and others who have written about this.
Backtracking seems to be somewhat flexible. For example I am have a ATW ticket that flies ORD-MUC and then next segment out of ZRH-SIN. Technically ZRH is west of MUC and I am traveling East. I suspect it is relative in distance and if you are flying it or open jaw. I doubt you can fly the same routes backwards So SEA-DEN-SEA-JFK would not work.
Jun 16, 2018, 9:06 pm
#26
Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 64
I will try my best. First a change in dates on the exact same flights on an ATW ticket does NOT incur any charges. Changes in carriers, flights etc actually require you to cancel it and rebook. From how it was described and this would incur 3,000 point fee. What I don;t know is if you cancel and re-book the entire ticket as needed is there a guarantee that a segment seat will come back up as available as you released it from your cancel.
When you are booking it on business level and a segment only has economy and then later the business opens up I believe you can call and switch to business as you "paid" the business level. I know you wait list on ANA metal flights for this. I have also read that you take priority over other upgrades the day of flight even above frequent flier levels as you technically booked the business ticket not sure how this applies in real world.
I believe their definition of a segment is any flight. So your example would be 3 segments not one but I do not see this in writing just gleaming from descriptions on their web site and others who have written about this.
Backtracking seems to be somewhat flexible. For example I am have a ATW ticket that flies ORD-MUC and then next segment out of ZRH-SIN. Technically ZRH is west of MUC and I am traveling East. I suspect it is relative in distance and if you are flying it or open jaw. I doubt you can fly the same routes backwards So SEA-DEN-SEA-JFK would not work.
When you are booking it on business level and a segment only has economy and then later the business opens up I believe you can call and switch to business as you "paid" the business level. I know you wait list on ANA metal flights for this. I have also read that you take priority over other upgrades the day of flight even above frequent flier levels as you technically booked the business ticket not sure how this applies in real world.
I believe their definition of a segment is any flight. So your example would be 3 segments not one but I do not see this in writing just gleaming from descriptions on their web site and others who have written about this.
Backtracking seems to be somewhat flexible. For example I am have a ATW ticket that flies ORD-MUC and then next segment out of ZRH-SIN. Technically ZRH is west of MUC and I am traveling East. I suspect it is relative in distance and if you are flying it or open jaw. I doubt you can fly the same routes backwards So SEA-DEN-SEA-JFK would not work.
Thank you! I'll post tomorrow when I learn more from ANA.
Jun 20, 2018, 2:03 pm
#27
Join Date: Jun 2018
Location: Las Vegas
Posts: 30
First time posting but I just wanted to share the RTW booking I just made on ANA
1.Los Angelas to Tokyo on ANA
Tokyo to Perth over land, I plan to travel from Tokyo to hong kong and then try and book a Cathay award with Alaska from Hong Kong to Sydney or Brisbane and again travel on my own across Australia
2. Perth to Singapore on Singapore
3. Singapore to Mumbai on Singapore
4. Mumbai to Muscat on Air India
Muscat to Addis Ababa over land on my own
5. Addis Ababa to Madrid on Ethopian
6. Madrid to Bogata on Avianca
7. Bogata to Miami on Avianca
All on this is in Business class, mostly all lie flats other then one Singapore flight(angle flat) and the Air India one(very short flight). It cost me 250,000 miles(125,000/ticket)I transferred from amex as well as about $980 in taxes and fees.
1.Los Angelas to Tokyo on ANA
Tokyo to Perth over land, I plan to travel from Tokyo to hong kong and then try and book a Cathay award with Alaska from Hong Kong to Sydney or Brisbane and again travel on my own across Australia
2. Perth to Singapore on Singapore
3. Singapore to Mumbai on Singapore
4. Mumbai to Muscat on Air India
Muscat to Addis Ababa over land on my own
5. Addis Ababa to Madrid on Ethopian
6. Madrid to Bogata on Avianca
7. Bogata to Miami on Avianca
All on this is in Business class, mostly all lie flats other then one Singapore flight(angle flat) and the Air India one(very short flight). It cost me 250,000 miles(125,000/ticket)I transferred from amex as well as about $980 in taxes and fees.
Jun 25, 2018, 11:07 pm
#28
Join Date: Feb 2014
Location: BNA
Programs: AA CK, SPG Plat, IHG Plat
Posts: 273
-Is it possible to call ANA to put an itinerary on hold, then transfer the points when I know for sure all of the space I want is available?
-Do they have any leeway with the total flown mileage? As in, I have a rough itinerary that uses only 10 or 12 available segments, but is 4000 miles over what they say is allowed.
-Do they have any leeway with the total flown mileage? As in, I have a rough itinerary that uses only 10 or 12 available segments, but is 4000 miles over what they say is allowed.
Jun 30, 2018, 1:31 pm
#30
Join Date: Apr 2017
Location: Central Wisconsin, USA
Posts: 189
Amex, Marriott, and SPG but not chase. If you have not seen this chart before its a big help...
https://siriolabs.github.io/Wings-of-the-Points/index.html
https://siriolabs.github.io/Wings-of-the-Points/index.html