dealbuster

I am planning a trip in Business from London to Brazil and then London to NY for 4 people.

I am trying to avoid the high fees that comes with flying Business out of London, as well as trying to avoid the high fees with BA.

So far I have:

MAD-GRU - IB
GRU-LHR - BA
MAD-JFK- IB
JFK-MAD - IB

Problems:

1. For some reason, although fees MAD-GRU is $60, and GRU-LHR is $40, MAD-GRU-LHR fees is $377!
2. I need to fly three extra trips 1)LON-MAD 2)LHR-MAD 3)MAD-LHR

lcrall

I am planning on booking an explorer award for next 2013. I was wondering when would Malaysia airlines be joining one world alliance?

Austinrunner

Sometime before 1 January 2013, according to current public pronouncements.

azgirlnnyc

New to this...haven't called airline yet as I wanted to check with forum to see if this itinerary works for the Explorer ticket. Hoping to do in economy class. RTW trip over the next year.

Great circle mapper says this is 16 segments and 44657 miles.

NYC-LHR-AMM-DXB-LHR (connect)-JNB-HKG-SIN-DPS-SYD-MEL-SYD-SCL-EZE-GYE-LIM-SFO (edited after austinrunner's comments below)

Does this work??? I know I'm not using all of my miles. Planning stopovers in all locations, except where connection noted. Just figured I'd catch budget airlines back to original destination where I would have otherwise travelled overland and used an open-jaw

Of course still need to check availability...

Thanks for your help!

Austinrunner

How are you getting from LHR to AQJ -or- AQJ to DXB -or- DPS to BME -or- EZE to UIO -or- UIO to CCS? No oneworld airline flies those routes nonstop.

You will pay a rather large fuel surcharge for each BA flight you book.

MisterSelfish

Looking at doing a RTW trip with the wife over the course of 9 months, but figured I'd check with folks here as a sanity check.

The routing I'm looking at is:

IAD-JFK-LHR-SIN-HKG-SHA/PEK (Open Jaw)-NRT-SYD-MEL-AKL-SCL-AEP-SAO-MIA-IAD

According to Great Circle Mapper the total distance is 34481, so we'd have enough to do it in 1st, though barely.

One thing that concerns me is the timing of the trip. We're trying to spend New Year's in London, so booking sooner than later seems like a good idea . I'm also trying to go through NYC, since AA's new 777's start flying direct to LHR in December, which would mean avoiding BA's fuel surcharges.

My question is this: if we're planning on ending the trip in August 2013 does it make sense to book the flights in August 2012 and book dummy dates for the last legs of the trip that I would change later (given the 335 day limit)? Or does it make more sense to wait until the beginning of October and book the whole trip with "real" dates so I only have to do it once, but risk having a hard time getting the flights for the beginning of the trip?

Thanks all! Hard to imagine less than a year ago that this would have even been possible. Fortunately I stumbled on this crazy forum.

3544quebec

Be aware that a 1st class award will only get you better than a Business award on the following segments of your trip:
JFK-LHR-SIN and GRU-MIA
and maybe on SIN-HKG-SHA.
Also a minor point : you will need to do SCL-EZE-GRU as LAN no longer is allowed to fly AEP-GRU (and as you have one open jaw already you can't do SCL-AEP//EZE-GRU)
On a positive note you have overestimated your mileage ? by including the surface sector in your calculations.
You could actually stay under the 35000 miles and fly HKG-PEK//NRT-HKG-SYD giving yourself another 2 1st class sectors

azgirlnnyc

Thanks for pointing out - had been looking at AQB, but didn't realize it connected through Amman. Changed original thread to show new routing. So hard to think that far out!

And, as far as avoiding BA surcharges, was hoping to fly to LHR on AA. Is there a way to estimate tax for the Dubai-Johannesburg leg? If I just connect in LHR, would I still get hit with the taxes? Is there any other way to get to South Africa? Another thought was to have open jaw between Dubai and JNB and get there on my own using Star Alliance miles to hit Maldives, Seychelles and/or Mauritius. Assuming the open jaw there, how would I calculate the milage/segments? Do i understand rules correctly that I'd still burn one "segment", but would also be saving a segment and all those miles by not having to connect through London again?

Thanks again!

3544quebec

The only one of those that has a direct Oneworld flight is EZE-UIO

LA 1442 EZE 5:10PM GYE 9:25PM 6h 15m Airbus A320
GYE 10:15PM UIO 11:10PM 0h 55m Airbus A320

All the others involve connecting flights and using two (at least) of your allotted segments eg UIO-CCS on LAN involves a connection in LIM

Austinrunner

You will be allowed to stopover in SYD only 1 time. Instead of DPS -> SYD -> MEL -> SYD, do
DPS -> MEL (QF codeshare on JQ-operated flight) -> SYD (QF).

Please don't change your prior posts. Just add a new one.

The first post in this thread has lots of valuable information, including how to estimate taxes and a great desktop program that will let you visualize all flights worldwide.

If you want to avoid LHR the second time and avoid BA's fuel surcharge, you could do this for around 1,300 more flown miles: DXB -> HKG -> JNB -> HKG.

If you have an open jaw in the middle of your itinerary, then you will have to end it in NYC. You cannot have more than 1 open jaw. An open jaw in the middle counts as a segment.

azgirlnnyc

I'm still a little confused about how open jaw miles are calculated.

If I do the following, for example: LHR-DXB (open jaw)- JNB - HKG, does DXB-JNB count as one segment, even if I go "overland", getting from Dubai to J'burg via other airlines? And, do the miles in between cities count...or not?

Sorry - I know this is probably very basic, but confused on rules despite reading this entire thread.

Thanks again!

Austinrunner

You don't need to read the entire thread. Just read post #1. The issue you're asking about is covered clearly there. An open jaw counts as a segment. But the miles of the open jaw don't count.

MisterSelfish

@3544quebec

Thanks for the advice! Looks like I'll change the Asian & South American portions of my trip around. Between the need for another open-jaw, and Sao Paulo's reputation looks like we'll head to Ecuador instead to hit up the Galapagos.

On a side note, rather peculiar that there are no 1st class flights between NRT-SYD, AKL-SCL. Feels like someone could win a lot more business that way!

UncleDude

I understood you cannot have OW Awards on a JQ operated Flight it has to be QF Metal please correct me if I am wrong.

Austinrunner

A QF flight number on a JQ-operated flight is the one exception to the Explorer rule against codeshares. This is covered in the first post of this thread (and at the website linked in my signature), along with the appropriate links.