Has anybody here been sucessful in obtaining seats in First Class on Quantas from the US to Australia using OnePass miles? My mom and I are saving miles to try and do this in the summer of 2003, but I was wondering if this is one of those rewards that is impossible to get. I am willing to call the 330 days in advance of the date we would like to leave, but I would hate to have spent all this time saving miles to find we can't get the seats!

tvelinsk: It's not impossible at all. I was able to secure both FC and BC seats on Qantas for a trip in April 2000.

Of course, there's no guarantee that CO and QF will still be partners by 2003. That's a long time off and anything can happen.

When you say you want to go in summer, I assume you mean Jun-Sep, i.e., our summer, their winter. It would certainly be easier to get seats then, than in the busy winter months, when it is warm in Australia.

Here's the drill:

(1) Call the CO partner rewards desk and give them possibilities for your itineraries.

(2) Wait 10 days.

(3) They call you back and let you know if anything's available. If not, repeat steps (2) and (3) until you get want you want.

I have no idea what's up with the ten day wait. I was recently able to get an award on AF from DL without this kind of nonsense. But on both occasions I've tried to get awards on CO partners, I've been able to.

I booked a FC trip on QF for July this year by calling last October.

Some things to remember:
- The award includes a continuing segment from the arrival city in Australia and you don't have to return from that city. So you can fly into SYD on, say, 8/1, then go to CNS on 8/5, then return from MEL on 8/10.

- You can lock in FC seats on QF well ahead of time, but seats for domestic U.S. portion don't open up until a couple months before the flight.

- You'll need to call QF to get specific seat assignments, after your flight is confirmed.

The reason you have to wait up to 10 days to get a response is because CO does not have direct access to QF's reservations system. You call the CO rep, he calls the QF rep, who checks on the computer. Usually, the turnaround is only 2-3 days.

After you get a reply, you have 14 days to lock in the flight offered.

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He who dies with the most miles ... is dead.

If your outbound and return flights have an interval of 2 months in between (i.e. leaving December and coming back on February), can you lock on the outbound flight first when the seats are opened while leaving the return flight open until the seat is open two months later so that you can finalize the whole transaction?

Has anybody tried the 10,000(economy) or 20,000(business) miles per stopover within Australia? Does it need to be booked separately or can it be on a same award?

I booked a QF business class award via OnePass spring 2000 and it went pretty much as described above. Added tidbits:

** For some (high season) months out of the year QF allocates CO no premium class award seats at all -- you can't even request them. We had thought that the post-Olympic period (October and November) would be easy pickings. In fact there was nothing at all to be had. Don't know if that was a special Olympic year condition or a routine blackout for high season, but be forewarned.

** Things go better if you provide a choice of outbound and return dates.

** You may get a stopover you hadn't planned on. We wanted a SEA-SYD roundtrip, and the outbound was a simple SEA-LAX-SYD connection on AS/QF, but the return was SYD-MEL-AKL-LAX-SEA. Best they could do for a QF return. We made the best of it; they let us move the SYD-MEL segment 24 hours earlier so we had a no-fuss stopover in Melbourne.

I was able to take a FC trip on QF in Feb. 2000. The booking process with CO is tedious to say the least. QF is also a partner with USAir and award travel can be booked on the phone immediately, no waiting.
Good luck and I must say that FC on QF in that bedseat is heavely.

I booked using CO miles on QF in first class in June of 2000 successfully. The routing was a bit of a pain though. The outbound was ok - they got me the non-stop LAX-Sydney without a problem. The return they could only give me AUS-PHX-SYD-MEL-AKL-LAX-PHX-AUS, with a 10 hour layover in AKL. They did let me turn MEL into a weekend layover similar to what BearX did. And I booked a private guide in AKL for a quick tour of Auckland during the layover. Overall it was ok. This June I booked using AA miles on QF and it was a much easier experience. They were able to confirm the booking immediately on the phone and provided direct routings that were much more favorable: AUS-LAX-SYD and MEL-LAX-AUS. Since Qantas is also a Oneworld alliance partner there is a slightly better chance of them still working with AA in the future I think.

Enjoy Australia! It is a fabulous place!

Cheers!


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Fly Airlines of the Web http://flyaow.com/
(My links to everything that flies on the web)

I requested 2 first class award tickets on QF for peak season (Dec 2000/Jan 2001) just inside the 330 day window. The agent actually laughed when I requested first but said business shouldn't be too tough to get. After a few iterations of the 5-7 day waiting game, I was able to get basically the itinerary I wanted in business class.

I agree with the observation that getting an award in F through a Oneworld affiliate may be easier. With only 14 seats up there to divide among revenue pax, QF FFs, and Oneworld, there probably aren't going to be many left for Onepass awards.

Thanks for all the replies, they are helpful and much appreciated.

Seeing those successful examples, it is encouraging to see. I plan to go in December 2002~February 2003, using CO miles from my AMEX account (just to burn those points). I have AA miles if that's necessary but I rather not use them b/c I can't replicate them through credit cards that I have.

But, there seems to be a consensus here that awards on Qantas using CO miles can be quite tedious and it seems also almost all(if not all) of you have to do some turning and twistings in your plan to come back (i.e. reroute via MEL or AKL with weird layovers). My plan is to go: JFK-SYD stop there and go to AKL later, then come back to SYD, then to JFK direct. In sum: JFK-SYD-AKL-SYD-JFK with a stop in SYD prior turning to AKL. I would like to book a separate stopover at Cairns from SYD at the cost of 20,000 miles as states in CO website. Though my dates are flexible, I would want to take exactly these flights.

Do you think my chance would be good if I call 355 days in advance, which is when the seats are first released according to Qantas? How far in advance did you call to make your reservations?

Well, our situation is similar, I guess I'll give Continental a call Monday, if they basically say don't bother try in asking for F seats in December and February, then I'll simply go to American and save my AMEX points for using it on Singapore Airlines instead. But I would still prefer to use it now though. Thanks for sharing your experience, it may have saved me lots of time and some unneccessary hassles.

Unless you need to return to SYD, you can avoid that extra leg as QF has a nonstop AKL-LAX. The loads on that flight have in my experience been a little lighter (even in the premium classes) than SYD-LAX. For what it's worth, I've also found that the CO Partner rewards desk is usually pretty helpful in offering opinions as to availability, etc.

To answer your question of how far in advance....When I booked the trip using CO miles I booked 2 months in advance. When I booked using AA miles I booked 1 month in advance.

Hope that helps!

Cheers!

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Fly Airlines of the Web http://flyaow.com/
(My links to everything that flies on the web)