Help Changes to OW ticket before departure
 

Help from the experts.

I have a OW Award ticket using 180K miles for FC. I am on a Qantas flight BUT... the CX flight I want has opened up on the same route...was told tonight I cannot switch airlines on a OW Award ticket. I cannot believe it....I was originally told no routing changes but nothing about no carrier changes. The reason I originally took the Qantas flight was because CX was not available but I prefer CX.

Is there anything I can do to get the CX flight I want and dump the Qantas flight? Can't I just go to the airport and reissue the ticket. Geez louise, how many more restrictions do we have to tolerate.
Thanks

If this is a MPC/AsiaMiles award then I would be very surprised if CX would not accept it on their flight. I've always found MPC very felxible when it comes to award flights / cancellations / rebookings / etc.

JHIN seems to be based in Seattle so I would assume that he redeemed mileage with AAdvantage and not with Asiamiles. If he was with Asiamiles, he would have been able to waitlist for the CX portion of the flight, which he hadn't!

For changes, you would need to contact the airline who issued your award ticket. If they said no changes, then no changes irrespective of routings or flights. If changes of flights are permitted you would most likely need to reissue your entire ticket.

Correct I am using AAdvantage miles...and why do they make such a big deal of reissuing the ticket? It is a 20 minute trip to the airport...and afterall if I made last minute award travel plans they would still have the ticket issued at the airport...for a fee granted but customer service would be the key in my mind.

The problem with Oneworld award tickets is that the "fare" has to be allocated and sent to the various airlines doing the flying on your ticket ... this process occurs when you redeem the miles, hence the restriction against switching airlines or routings which change the payment allocation to the other airlines. AA and the other OW airlines do disclose this fact before you redeem, though the significance may not sink in. You can cancel, redeposit the miles and reissue the ticket in entirety, but this is inefficient and high risk (chances are you won't get all the sectors again). There is no escalation possible to fix your problem, as the mechanism to reproportion your "fare" just does not exist.

I certainly can live with the situation and it is not that bad...but curiously...isn't OW about convenience? Hardly seems this way with the restrictions, rules etc.

Thanks for everyones input and assistance. The bummer is not being on Cathay for a leg but as someone pointed out Qantas is second to CX and will offer a nice comparison.