ckpeter

That is my understanding as well.

Shortening a stopover and making it a connection is fine, but adding a stopover by increasing the connection time may not be acceptable.

sellouts

The original stopover was over 6 hours but less than 24. However there was an available flight (AA 79) that I could have legally connected to and taken but did not, which made the original booking a stopover and not a connection despite being less than 24 hours.

TheBOSman

Sounds about right then, and that would be why you got charged that $240, but were able to extend the stopover. That APD is a real pain, even if you can avoid the BA surcharges, going to London can be expensive. Enjoy your flights though!

sellouts

Thanks and thanks for the explanation! This routing is still far cheaper than BA. Even before the APD during the 5 day hold taking the BA LHR-DFW flight resulted in the ticket being over 700 dollars more expensive. With the APD I imagine it'd be 1000+ more. Very happy that AA made their inventory available for me to switch to before I had to ticket it.

guv1976

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

If your time in LON is < 24 hours, it does not matter whether AA considers it a connection or a stopover for purposes of the Explorer award ticketing rules: it is not a stopover for APD purposes under the rules published by Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs.

A call to AA would be in order to make sure that the distinction is recognized by AA's Rate/Tariff Desk, so that the APD is not assessed on the revised award itinerary.

TheBOSman

Unfortunately, OP did switch from a <24 hours stopover to a >24 hours stopover. HMRC and AA are quite correct to add the APD in this case.

sellouts

That's correct, I did extend it past 24 hours and AA let me off the phone for all of 30 seconds before calling me back and asking me for payment of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs most gracious APD

pandaperth

I expect She is amused

cbjmh

I am totally new to FT and this is my first time to plan a long haul itinerary. I need all the help that I need. My husband and I plan to use AAdvantage award miles to travel around the world using oneworld. We would like to go from New York to: SFO, HKG, DPS, CNS, SYD, MNL, FRA, MUC, DME, LED, BCN, MAD, then back to JFK. HKG has to be the first stop; the rest of the cities can be in any orders.
We plan to use one world 3 continents for this trip using one ticket. We plan to travel to Asia and South West Pacific during Oct/Nov 2013. We would pay our own ways back to JFK from FRA in Dec. And pay our own ways back to MUC in May 2014 for the second part of the trip to see the white night at St. Petersburg.
1) Please help me with the routing with less distance traveled to save our AA award miles.
2) I am not allow to book the ticket beyond 365 days (the end of the whole trip should end in July 2014), should I wait until August to book one ticket or I should book two separate tickets? I need to book early and be flexible with the dates. Book for Oct now and then book another one for May 2014 later on. Since we are going to pay round trip inbound and outbound from Germany. One ticket or two tickets; which method uses fewer miles?
3) Or should I use global explorer instead of oneworld? Thanks

sellouts

You don't ever mention what cabin you want to redeem in.

The cheapest way to redeem this itinerary is with the AA Explorer award. But I think you will run into a problem with this itinerary and segment # limitations. Not sure how you want to route it. You might also have issues with availability waiting until August 2013 to book the start in October.

If you have to travel during a specific time you should book what you can today. It'll cost you miles but you'll feel more comfortable knowing you are traveling when you need to instead of waiting 6 months until August to try to book everything at once. You can always cancel and redeposit those tickets (unless they're Explorer tickets) if you decide to try to book an AA explorer award later on.

iridge

If you are using AA miles for the Explorer award that is a very different product from Oneworld's paid RTW options. Different rules, limitations etc. I suggest you read the AA Explorer award sticky first to familiarize yourself with all the intricacies of the product. It is mileage based rather than continent based. Stopover and direction of travel rules are also different.

Once you decide which option fits your needs better the details will depend on that. Good luck!

Unterwegs

In the past i tried to book this type of award. Even with a lot of flexibility I never found availability for all the legs at the same time and such was never able to book one. The level of miles necessary is very attractive, but you need to find flights. And even if one flight disappears before you can finalize the booking you cannot.
Most likely you are better off with either a paid RTW (they are much cheaper than the usual OW or RT tickets) or use miles for the long haul and then find low cost carriers for the shorter distances.

kebosabi

For FRA-MUC, and BCN-MAD, I suggest don't even wasting your miles for these short distances and opt to looking at using high-speed rail instead. Usually you get there faster by rail than doing the air route.

ilovetofly

Has a routing including a BA flight and got this from ITA. Should YQ be included for OW award?

South Africa Passenger Service Charge (ZA) $13.50
South Africa Passenger Safety Charge (EV) $1.80
South Africa Passenger Services and Security Charge (UM) $2.20
BA YQ surcharge (YQ) $50.00
(YR) $145.50

rrgg

For BA, yes. They started doing this at the same time started to allow US-UK award redemption on BA.