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 programs 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]
Dec 30, 2014, 10:52 am
#2911
Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: Sweden
Posts: 2,044
MPM must be calculated one way basis. Therefore MPM between Bangkok-Tokyo is 3.442 miles and MPM+25% is 4.302 miles each way.
Your routing Bangkok-Kuala Lumpur-Jakarta-Tokyo (5.073 miles) exceeds MPM+25% (4.302 miles), therefore you are not allowed to book this award as single award.
Dec 30, 2014, 11:55 am
#2912
Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: PHX
Programs: AA EXP
Posts: 1,377
KUL is your destination. MXP is your stopover. The farthest point is always the destination.
http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=phx-kul,phx-mxp
http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=phx-kul,phx-mxp
Dec 30, 2014, 3:49 pm
#2913
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: Dallas, TX
Programs: AA EX Plat. Hyatt Glob
Posts: 106
110k in business, and US sometimes charges the higher prices for a stopover (so F to North Asia with Europe stopover will sometimes be charged 125k).
OP- is one leg in J, one in F? That would explain the 115k (60k for F, 55k for C, this split pricing is new the last few months)...
OP- is one leg in J, one in F? That would explain the 115k (60k for F, 55k for C, this split pricing is new the last few months)...
Dec 30, 2014, 4:16 pm
#2914
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: SIN
Programs: SQ, UA, Delta, BMI(RIP), Marriott Lifetime Titanium, Hilton Diamond (Thanks Amex) Hyatt Discov
Posts: 1,942
Dec 30, 2014, 4:50 pm
#2916
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: ZRH/SFO
Programs: A3*G - AZ CFP- HH DIA
Posts: 3,666
Dec 30, 2014, 6:42 pm
#2917
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 60
Qatar availability - not showing as a bookable flight
Hi all
I'm booking a round trip award YUL-DOH-GOI and checking availability on BA.com.....I've moved things around to make dates work and the USDM agent seems to be able to find availability (consistent with BA.com) on 3 of 4sectors.
For some reason GOI-DOH is not showing up as a bookable flight option on my day of travel or even the day before and after (6/7/8 May). In fact the agent tried several other days with no luck. Tried hanging up politely and calling again. The second agent who seemed more seasoned was just as puzzled. She tried to book a revenue ticket one way GOI-DOH and that did not come up either until she keyed in hte flight number....this did not work however for award seats. Anyone else have recent experiences with QR availability where the flight does not even show up as a bookable award option for USDM even though BA.com is showing availability?
Any help/advice appreciated.
I'm booking a round trip award YUL-DOH-GOI and checking availability on BA.com.....I've moved things around to make dates work and the USDM agent seems to be able to find availability (consistent with BA.com) on 3 of 4sectors.
For some reason GOI-DOH is not showing up as a bookable flight option on my day of travel or even the day before and after (6/7/8 May). In fact the agent tried several other days with no luck. Tried hanging up politely and calling again. The second agent who seemed more seasoned was just as puzzled. She tried to book a revenue ticket one way GOI-DOH and that did not come up either until she keyed in hte flight number....this did not work however for award seats. Anyone else have recent experiences with QR availability where the flight does not even show up as a bookable award option for USDM even though BA.com is showing availability?
Any help/advice appreciated.
Dec 30, 2014, 7:01 pm
#2918
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: ZRH/SFO
Programs: A3*G - AZ CFP- HH DIA
Posts: 3,666
BA.com tends to show phantom availability and US tends to not see available award seats in the system... Nothing you can do about... Check alternative availabilities for your award!
Dec 30, 2014, 7:31 pm
#2919
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: SIN
Programs: SQ, UA, Delta, BMI(RIP), Marriott Lifetime Titanium, Hilton Diamond (Thanks Amex) Hyatt Discov
Posts: 1,942
Dec 30, 2014, 8:36 pm
#2920
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: SEA, but up and down the coast a lot
Programs: Oceanic Airlines Gold Elite
Posts: 20,395
I wish AA was as sensible about this as US is.
Dec 30, 2014, 9:20 pm
#2921
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Jan 2002
Posts: 44,620
For much of US's customer base on the east coast of the USA, an Atlantic routing to Asia can be LESS mileage than a Pacific routing.
I wish AA was as sensible about this as US is.
I wish AA was as sensible about this as US is.
[1] must be a fare published for the itinerary
[2] except for a few exceptions, no transit through another region
There are not that many times when transitting another region will be the shortest routing and I wouldn't be certain that the example routing given would be permitted based on fares listed for CLT-KUL.
The only CLT-KUL fare I can see that owuld be useable seems to be on MH and even that seems iffy since that is constructed from a LAX-KUL fare plus a CLT-LAX fare
US is just a lot more generous in what it allows over AA
Dec 30, 2014, 11:45 pm
#2922
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: SEA, but up and down the coast a lot
Programs: Oceanic Airlines Gold Elite
Posts: 20,395
AS doesn't have those sorts of garbage rules (they probably couldn't; could you imagine EK publishing a JNU-SEZ fare? Heck, they might not publish a JNU-DXB fare that isn't constructed). AA's restrictions are pretty lame. I'm not aware of any USA-based carrier that has a "must be a published fare" restriction on awards.
And really, what you're saying is "You might have to burn two awards to get from a soon to be AA hub (CLT) to a OW hub (KUL), that transits only OW hubs (LAX, NRT, HKG), and takes a TPAC routing to Asia 2 and only transits Asia 1, which is within AA's rules". Sounds pretty insensible and ridiculous to me...
And really, what you're saying is "You might have to burn two awards to get from a soon to be AA hub (CLT) to a OW hub (KUL), that transits only OW hubs (LAX, NRT, HKG), and takes a TPAC routing to Asia 2 and only transits Asia 1, which is within AA's rules". Sounds pretty insensible and ridiculous to me...
Last edited by eponymous_coward; Dec 30, 2014 at 11:52 pm
Dec 30, 2014, 11:51 pm
#2923
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Jan 2002
Posts: 44,620
They are fairly logical and reasonably understandable
Although not as generous, it seems to make more sense rules wise, that for something such as SYD-ORD, that travel via Asia and Europe is not permitted nor that one can have a stopover at a spot where it would be more expensive just to have an award flight to on its own
Great to be able to take advantage of the laxness of the US rules for now though
You may not like the AA rules, but I suspect in the next few months will have to choose to accept them or change schemes
Dec 30, 2014, 11:57 pm
#2924
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: SEA, but up and down the coast a lot
Programs: Oceanic Airlines Gold Elite
Posts: 20,395
Although not as generous, it seems to make more sense rules wise, that for something such as SYD-ORD, that travel via Asia and Europe is not permitted nor that one can have a stopover at a spot where it would be more expensive just to have an award flight to on its own
And really, for someplace like West Coast USA to India, forcing TATL instead of TPAC, using CX or JL is two awards? The logic is pretty much " 'cuz we said so, so THERE!", it's not particularly based in any kind of logic based on flight distances.
Dec 31, 2014, 1:02 am
#2925
Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: Sweden
Posts: 2,044
Routing was AXT-ICN (Seoul, South Korea)-URC (Urumqi, China)-KHG
The Delta agent told me that there is no published fare by "IATA (YY) or Skyteam carrier
" between AXT and KHG therefore I had to book it as two awards (AXT-ICN-URC and URC-KHG), if I wanted.