Mar 30, 2014, 12:53 pm
Last edit by: JDiver
WIKI POST: Using US Dividend Miles for oneworld Award Flights
As further details become available, please fill in this wikipost.
As further details become available, please fill in this wikipost.
N.B. Booking opportunities for new Dividend Miles awards of all kinds ended 11:59 PM Wednesday, 25 March 2015. Please continue using this thread for trips booked or in progress through 24 March 2016.
Changes on USDM oneworld award tickets
This is the only official statement about changing issued USDM award tickets:
If I need to make changes to a Dividend Miles award reservation, which program’s rules will apply?
Minor changes such as date/time can be made provided seats are available without requiring a new award to be claimed. More substantive changes such as changes to stopovers or origin/destination may result in the need to reinstate the previously claimed Dividend Miles award, then claiming a new AAdvantage award under the existing AAdvantage program rules.
The old membership rules do 'generally' still appy to USDM tickets.
For awards ticketed / reticketed on 001- ticket stock, go to the AA Refunds site with your ticket number at hand (unsure if it works with 037- stock at this time)to:
- Print a receipt with ticket number (instead of Request a refund)
- See total fees, taxes, etc. attached to your ticket
- See applicable detailed fare rules
- Request a refund (may not be useful for awards)
- Some were able to change their ticket without beeing charged the USD 150.- changing fee.
- No chance to change a ticket after the first flight segment has been flown.
- ...
Old stuff
oneworld member airlines - airberlin, American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Finnair, Iberia, Japan Airlines, LAN, Malaysia Airlines, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Royal Jordanian, S7 Airlines (Sibir), SriLankan Airlines, TAM Airlines, US Airways and their affiliates.
Award Chart for oneworld awards using US Dividend Miles:
http://shopping.usairways.com/en-US/...wardtravel.pdf
You can use the American Airlines, British Airways, JAL, or Qantas sites to search for oneworld award inventory. AA and QF also allows you to search for award inventory using a handy 30 day calendar view. However, availability on the calendar is dependent on site coverage (e.g. QF does not include JL or MH, AA does not include CX and others). Also, the calendar view may not be completely accurate on all partners, so use it as a guide but do not rely on it fully.
One of the easiest ways to search for oneworld availability is through the use of an outside tool such as Award Nexus, ExpertFlyer, KVS Tool, or The Wandering Aramean oneworld Search.
Award Nexus has a free community membership for flyertalk members, and award email alert with premium membership. ExpertFlyer has email alerts and direct GDS access to select oneworld award inventories, such as AA, QF, and US. ExpertFlyer can also search J class certificate upgrade inventory. With KVS Tool, you can search QF, BA, JL and CX's search engines, in addition to other alliances, on your PC (Mac / Linux with CrossOver). You can also set up an alert via The Wandering Aramean oneworld Search. This tool will automatically search on QF for your alert once per day with a free account and four times per day with a paid account.
N.B. With all of the above tools, it is best to search one segment at a time. Most oneworld search engines have difficulty marrying segments.
For route searching with itinerary information, use the interactive oneworld map and timetable.
For searching Intra-North America availability, the best tool is AA.com. Unlike the other oneworld engines, AA is pretty good at marrying segments, so you can search origin to destination.
Regarding availability, the strategy that has been most effective for people looking to book award travel on oneworld is to start searching right at 330 days prior to departure. This is generally when availability is at its best. After that, availability tends to be sporadic until starting 8 weeks prior to departure where some airlines open up availability, and will vary all the way up until the day of departure.
If you're having trouble finding availability, it may be best to look at alternate airports (JL, for example, serves SAN, YVR, and BOS, in addition to the larger markets of SFO, LAX, YYZ, ORD, and JFK).
(N.B. Although US was not adding fuel surcharges to awards, there are reports that they have started doing this for awards containing BA flights.) With the exception of BA & IB, no oneworld carriers require you to pay a fuel surcharge for awards. With BA, be aware that you may have to pay both a fuel surcharge as well as the UK Air Passenger Duty departure tax for intercontinental J and F flights out of UK. These fees vary with class of service and length of flight and are determined by BA; the Air Passenger Duty (see specific thread) is due for all UK departures not under 24 hour connecting flights. APD applies to coach tickets, too, but at a reduced rate. The fuel /YQ surcharge with IB is generally considered minimal.
Known Problems / Workaround:
- Dep 00:00AM : Some agents have difficulty finding flights leaving between midnight and 2 AM. This is because the US systems show it leaving the day before. If the agent cannot find it, please ask to look at the day before. > source <
- LA : Flights put on hold will be cancelled after 24h. Workaround: Issue the ticket immediately. > source <
- JL : US Rep cannot find available seats. Workaround: "Always have to remind Rep to open JL reservations on a new screen". > source <
- MH : US Rep cannot find awards in First Class. Workaround: First class needs to be booked in P-cl instead of Z-cl (as on most other OW carriers). > source < booking classes: > KVS <
- All : If you are booking outbound flights at the US Air 335 day window US Air will often allow you to put your reservation on a longer than 3 day hold to capture the return seats once they open up at T+335. There is a report of this for 30 days here, and FT user beofotch was successful in getting a 13 day hold here. Workaround: Huaca until you get an agent who is competent enough to do this. It may help to act naive and ask for your return flight on your preferred date even if it is after T+335 days. Once they get an error from the computer may be a good time to bring it up.
- ...
Fixed Problems:
- CX : US Rep cannot find seats on flight CX 645 HKG-DOH. Workaround: none so far, search for different routing/carrier (CMB/DXB/...?)... > source < > fixed <
> fixed < - CX : US Rep cannot find seats on flight CX 640 DOH-HKG. They admit, the flight exists, but are unable to book <source>. Workaround: none so far, search for different routing/carrier
> fixed < - BA/Comair : US rep could not see / or unable to book intra-South Africa flights in BA flight number operated by Comair despite AA treats Comair a full fledged oneworld member under BA, in the same context as KA under CX. Only one reported success booking - poster reported agent had trouble at first but on consulting a supervisor was told "where to look"; the agent did not give any further information. Most everyone else reported unable to book Comair flights.
> fixed < - IB : Flights will be cancelled after ticket issued. Workaround: None yet... > source <
> fixed <
LUS: USDM oneworld Award Bookings - (Closed to new bookings) [Master FAQ and Help]
Nov 13, 2014, 6:52 pm
#2506
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Jan 2002
Posts: 44,624
Actually I disagree. Technically that is the rule, however given PER-LHR is actually shorter than PER-LAX or PER-JFK, technically this would be a trip Australia - USA with a stop in LHR. At least that's how I understand it. Whether your USA-LHR-PER routing comes within the MPM+25% of USA-PER is a different story.
goodo
goodo
PER-JFK via HKG and London is also a shorter journey than PER-LHR via HKG and JFK and fits in the MPM plus also does not breach the explicit USDM restriction that prohibits what the person wishes to do
Nov 13, 2014, 7:13 pm
#2507
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: AU
Programs: former Olympic Airways Gold (yeah - still proud of that!)
Posts: 14,408
Actually I disagree. Technically that is the rule, however given PER-LHR is actually shorter than PER-LAX or PER-JFK, technically this would be a trip Australia - USA with a stop in LHR. At least that's how I understand it. Whether your USA-LHR-PER routing comes within the MPM+25% of USA-PER is a different story.
goodo
goodo
PER-LHR-LAX is outside MPM. you cannot reach LAX without buying a separate ticket to complete your journey.
Also, Australia-USA-Europe is not allowed.
As for pricing, provided there was no stopover in London (or Europe) it will price (for cities within MPM) as an Australia-USA award. (For example PER-LHR-JFK with a transit only in London would be 110K in biz class and 140K in F)
Nov 13, 2014, 7:51 pm
#2508
Join Date: Jan 2009
Programs: Hilton Diamond, IHG Spire Ambassador, Radisson Gold, Hyatt Discoverist
Posts: 3,623
Ok, here's my "Is this valid" question. I'd like to do a South Asia to US award as follows:
BKK-AMM-TLV (stopover) -LHR-ORD-LAS on outbound
LAS-LAX-NRT-BKK on return.
TLV appears to be a US airways gateway, so a valid place for a stopover.
Agent told me last night that the computer was rejecting the routing as invalid. She discussed with her supervisor, they agreed it was invalid. She started reading off rules regarding IATA areas. Something like "You can't go from area 2 to 1 via 3" (which I'm not doing). Ultimately, she kind of settled on, "the computer is rejecting it because you're going around the world, you have to go back through London."
I think it should price out as 160k in F, what do you guys think? I still have part of it on hold, would like to try again.
Any strategies for what to do when the agent/supervisor says "the computer is rejecting it?"
Thanks.
BKK-AMM-TLV (stopover) -LHR-ORD-LAS on outbound
LAS-LAX-NRT-BKK on return.
TLV appears to be a US airways gateway, so a valid place for a stopover.
Agent told me last night that the computer was rejecting the routing as invalid. She discussed with her supervisor, they agreed it was invalid. She started reading off rules regarding IATA areas. Something like "You can't go from area 2 to 1 via 3" (which I'm not doing). Ultimately, she kind of settled on, "the computer is rejecting it because you're going around the world, you have to go back through London."
I think it should price out as 160k in F, what do you guys think? I still have part of it on hold, would like to try again.
Any strategies for what to do when the agent/supervisor says "the computer is rejecting it?"
Thanks.
Nov 13, 2014, 8:00 pm
#2509
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Programs: Flying: VA; Buying: AA, AS, AV, BA, UA!
Posts: 2,349
Nov 13, 2014, 8:04 pm
#2510
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: AU
Programs: former Olympic Airways Gold (yeah - still proud of that!)
Posts: 14,408
Ok, here's my "Is this valid" question. I'd like to do a South Asia to US award as follows:
BKK-AMM-TLV (stopover) -LHR-ORD-LAS on outbound
LAS-LAX-NRT-BKK on return.
TLV appears to be a US airways gateway, so a valid place for a stopover.
Agent told me last night that the computer was rejecting the routing as invalid. She discussed with her supervisor, they agreed it was invalid. She started reading off rules regarding IATA areas. Something like "You can't go from area 2 to 1 via 3" (which I'm not doing). Ultimately, she kind of settled on, "the computer is rejecting it because you're going around the world, you have to go back through London."
I think it should price out as 160k in F, what do you guys think? I still have part of it on hold, would like to try again.
Any strategies for what to do when the agent/supervisor says "the computer is rejecting it?"
Thanks.
BKK-AMM-TLV (stopover) -LHR-ORD-LAS on outbound
LAS-LAX-NRT-BKK on return.
TLV appears to be a US airways gateway, so a valid place for a stopover.
Agent told me last night that the computer was rejecting the routing as invalid. She discussed with her supervisor, they agreed it was invalid. She started reading off rules regarding IATA areas. Something like "You can't go from area 2 to 1 via 3" (which I'm not doing). Ultimately, she kind of settled on, "the computer is rejecting it because you're going around the world, you have to go back through London."
I think it should price out as 160k in F, what do you guys think? I still have part of it on hold, would like to try again.
Any strategies for what to do when the agent/supervisor says "the computer is rejecting it?"
Thanks.
The RTW itinerary is fine in itself. Plenty have had similar itineraries (crossing both oceans).
They might be rejecting on the basis that the stopover is not on the most direct route - which would probably be something like BKK-HKG-LAX-LAS? I'm not sure what the MPM BKK-LAS is.
Nov 13, 2014, 8:10 pm
#2511
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Programs: Flying: VA; Buying: AA, AS, AV, BA, UA!
Posts: 2,349
Nov 13, 2014, 8:21 pm
#2512
Join Date: Jan 2009
Programs: Hilton Diamond, IHG Spire Ambassador, Radisson Gold, Hyatt Discoverist
Posts: 3,623
What they were telling me is "the computer" was rejecting it, giving them an "invalid" report. They didn't seem to know specifically what was invalid about it. She started reading off a bunch of rules, some of which clearly didn't apply, like "maximum 3/4 segments within any continent/region" but she was relying mostly on IATA areas, "You can't go from 1 to 3, you can't go from 1 to 3, you can't go in both directions," and "you can't go around the world."
Bangkok to Las Vegas via Tel Aviv and London is pretty darn direct if crossing the Atlantic
Bangkok to Las Vegas via Tel Aviv and London is pretty darn direct if crossing the Atlantic
Nov 14, 2014, 3:28 am
#2513
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Perth, Australia
Programs: QFF, USDM, AAdvantadge, Velocity
Posts: 5
True - however on the US award mileage chart - "travel to/from europe must operate via atlantic ocean" is this a deep enough loop hole?
Nov 14, 2014, 3:45 am
#2514
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: AU
Programs: former Olympic Airways Gold (yeah - still proud of that!)
Posts: 14,408
Nov 14, 2014, 3:53 am
#2515
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Jan 2002
Posts: 44,624
Anyway it also states
•US Airways is the final authority in choosing the routing and Dividend Miles partner for award travel based on the desired origin and destination
Nov 14, 2014, 7:06 am
#2516
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: SEA, but up and down the coast a lot
Programs: Oceanic Airlines Gold Elite
Posts: 20,397
You can't do PER-Europe-West Coast of the USA-PER and be within 125 MPM. Sorry.
Nov 14, 2014, 7:11 pm
#2517
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Perth, Australia
Programs: QFF, USDM, AAdvantadge, Velocity
Posts: 5
Ok West coast out of the question, But PER - LHR - JFK seems possible?
Nov 14, 2014, 7:26 pm
#2518
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: AU
Programs: former Olympic Airways Gold (yeah - still proud of that!)
Posts: 14,408
Nov 15, 2014, 3:18 am
#2519
Join Date: Jan 2009
Programs: Hilton Diamond, IHG Spire Ambassador, Radisson Gold, Hyatt Discoverist
Posts: 3,623
After playing some agent roulette, I was finally able to book this award in F:
March 2015 outbound: BKK-AMM-TLV (3 day stopover in Israel)-LHR-PHL-LAS
June 2015 return: LAS-LAX-NRT-BKK
One agent said the JL first class award seats that were showing as available on BA.com were not available for booking by US Airways. I explained that there was a known issue with US agents having to open new screen or use new booking code for JL award seats. She consulted her supervisor and reiterated that the seats could not be booked. She cited the 90 day rule for booking JL award seats, which only applies to domestic segments. Then she started reading a script that said just because award seats are available on other oneworld airlines doesn't mean they are available to US Airways.
I called back, the next agent consulted her supervisor, who found the JL seats with little difficulty. However, the agent told me that "the system" was rejecting my award as an invalid routing. The supervisor agrees it's invalid. Agent starts reading a bunch of routing rules about IATA areas, you can't go from area 1 to 3, or from 3 to 2, or something, and tells me that because I am flying BKK to LAS over the Atlantic I can't return to BKK over the Pacific, because that makes it an invalid RTW routing.
I called back and finally got a helpful agent who could find the JL seats without consulting a supervisor and who booked the ticket without any inkling of the routing being rejected by "the system."
I'm pleased with the award, looking forward to flying first class on JL, but the total taxes and fees exceed $900 due to BA fuel surcharges and Heathrow fees flying TLV-LHR-PHL. I've set an alert for availability on the direct TLV-PHL flight and if that opens up I might change to avoid BA/Heathrow.
March 2015 outbound: BKK-AMM-TLV (3 day stopover in Israel)-LHR-PHL-LAS
June 2015 return: LAS-LAX-NRT-BKK
One agent said the JL first class award seats that were showing as available on BA.com were not available for booking by US Airways. I explained that there was a known issue with US agents having to open new screen or use new booking code for JL award seats. She consulted her supervisor and reiterated that the seats could not be booked. She cited the 90 day rule for booking JL award seats, which only applies to domestic segments. Then she started reading a script that said just because award seats are available on other oneworld airlines doesn't mean they are available to US Airways.
I called back, the next agent consulted her supervisor, who found the JL seats with little difficulty. However, the agent told me that "the system" was rejecting my award as an invalid routing. The supervisor agrees it's invalid. Agent starts reading a bunch of routing rules about IATA areas, you can't go from area 1 to 3, or from 3 to 2, or something, and tells me that because I am flying BKK to LAS over the Atlantic I can't return to BKK over the Pacific, because that makes it an invalid RTW routing.
I called back and finally got a helpful agent who could find the JL seats without consulting a supervisor and who booked the ticket without any inkling of the routing being rejected by "the system."
I'm pleased with the award, looking forward to flying first class on JL, but the total taxes and fees exceed $900 due to BA fuel surcharges and Heathrow fees flying TLV-LHR-PHL. I've set an alert for availability on the direct TLV-PHL flight and if that opens up I might change to avoid BA/Heathrow.
Nov 15, 2014, 5:22 am
#2520
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: ZRH/SFO
Programs: A3*G - AZ CFP- HH DIA
Posts: 3,666
The 90 days restriction was once printed on the award charts for a short time, now this remark has disappeared again...