My experience in planning Skyteam RTW Award Travel in J for 2 Pax
Jan 21, 2013, 9:01 pm
#121
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Oklahoma City, OK,USA
Programs: DL Plat,AA Plat,UA 1Peon,SW(WN) Passing Grade
Posts: 902
All your info is VERY helpful..... we are contemplating a USA-Japan round trip that is consuming at least 220K Skymiles.....so it makes sense to opt-up to RTW to add more stops! thanks!
Here are my tips on booking a trip:
The rules are as they are posted here and elsewhere and they are very strict:
-One direction of travel (backtracking is allowed with connections only but distance is not a factor; they allowed HAN-CDG-DEL as a connection)
-6 maximum stopovers with no more than 3 on any one continent
-16 maximum segments, and overland segments count toward that total
-Any layover more than 24 hours is considered a stopover. This is the same for domestic and international stops.
-Overland segments must be in the same direction of travel of the overall trip
-Longitude of the airport is used to determine east/west direction between stopovers
-No maximum on total distance (unlike a RTW revenue ticket although these are more flexible in many ways)
-Just like other award travel, PM and DM get unlimited changes up until 72 hours before departure. I do not know what happens if I need to make changes after I depart.
In summer, the most difficult legs to find availability are the transatlantic and transpacific legs. So, I first found those and that determined the direction of my trip (I'm leaving from New York and traveling west with my first stop NRT). Then I filled in the middle stopovers.
In terms of finding availability, it definitely depends on what agent you get. If an agent seems like they just don't care, hang up and try again. There are some great ones and they appreciate the "Job Well Done" certs. For some agents I just don't understand what they are doing. At one point I could clearly see low availability for GRU-DTW on Delta.com, but the agent insisted it did not exist. I had to hang up and call back to get someone else and of course they saw it right away. Perhaps they were looking at the wrong month or year or something.
Hold times for the RTW desk can vary considerably from instantly picking up to waiting for 45 minutes or more on hold to get an agent. Weekends seem to be better than weekdays. The direct number on the first page of this thread does not get you to the RTW desk anymore but rather to customer service in SLC. They can patch you over to RTW but it's really no faster that calling the standard Skymiles numbers.
The RTW desk is open 7am-8pm eastern time for award travel (and till 11pm eastern time for revenue travel). The good news is that once you have the agent they will stay on the phone until you are satisfied. I once got one at 3 minutes til 8pm and she helped me for 3+ hours.
I could not find a single agent that could book any travel on AZ even when it showed availability on EF, so I just had to give up. This was for FCO-GIG or FCO-GRU.
Flyingblue will show you lots of "Classic" availability on KQ that just does not exist to Delta. Delta says those flights have been "cancelled" on their system. This was for BKK-NBO and CDG-NBO. This is also the case for CZ as it exists in EF but the agents can't seem to see it. I gave up.
My current itinerary stands at:
JFK-NRT-ICN(DL)-HAN(VN)
HAN-CDG(VN)-TNR(AF)
TNR-NBO(KQ)
NBO-AMS(KQ)-VCE(KL)
VCE-CDG-CMN(AF)
CMN-CDG-GRU(AF)
GRU-DTW-ATL-JFK(DL)
All in business class. 280,000 miles plus $599 in taxes.
That's 41,000 miles with one stop in Asia and South America, and three stops in Africa.
It's only 15 segments and 16 are allowed. I can get it down to 13 segment by going NRT-HAN direct in coach, and DTW-JFK direct in coach but for me part of the fun is the travel.
Leaving it short a few segments will also give me the flexibility to add in some overland segments (eg., GIG-GRU, VCE-FCO, etc.) if availability opens up. One thing to note is that overland segments must also be in the direction of travel (since I'm going on a westerly RTW trip, I cannot have FCO-VCE, or GRU-GIG as overland segments).
I appreciate any comments or suggestions on improving this trip.
The rules are as they are posted here and elsewhere and they are very strict:
-One direction of travel (backtracking is allowed with connections only but distance is not a factor; they allowed HAN-CDG-DEL as a connection)
-6 maximum stopovers with no more than 3 on any one continent
-16 maximum segments, and overland segments count toward that total
-Any layover more than 24 hours is considered a stopover. This is the same for domestic and international stops.
-Overland segments must be in the same direction of travel of the overall trip
-Longitude of the airport is used to determine east/west direction between stopovers
-No maximum on total distance (unlike a RTW revenue ticket although these are more flexible in many ways)
-Just like other award travel, PM and DM get unlimited changes up until 72 hours before departure. I do not know what happens if I need to make changes after I depart.
In summer, the most difficult legs to find availability are the transatlantic and transpacific legs. So, I first found those and that determined the direction of my trip (I'm leaving from New York and traveling west with my first stop NRT). Then I filled in the middle stopovers.
In terms of finding availability, it definitely depends on what agent you get. If an agent seems like they just don't care, hang up and try again. There are some great ones and they appreciate the "Job Well Done" certs. For some agents I just don't understand what they are doing. At one point I could clearly see low availability for GRU-DTW on Delta.com, but the agent insisted it did not exist. I had to hang up and call back to get someone else and of course they saw it right away. Perhaps they were looking at the wrong month or year or something.
Hold times for the RTW desk can vary considerably from instantly picking up to waiting for 45 minutes or more on hold to get an agent. Weekends seem to be better than weekdays. The direct number on the first page of this thread does not get you to the RTW desk anymore but rather to customer service in SLC. They can patch you over to RTW but it's really no faster that calling the standard Skymiles numbers.
The RTW desk is open 7am-8pm eastern time for award travel (and till 11pm eastern time for revenue travel). The good news is that once you have the agent they will stay on the phone until you are satisfied. I once got one at 3 minutes til 8pm and she helped me for 3+ hours.
I could not find a single agent that could book any travel on AZ even when it showed availability on EF, so I just had to give up. This was for FCO-GIG or FCO-GRU.
Flyingblue will show you lots of "Classic" availability on KQ that just does not exist to Delta. Delta says those flights have been "cancelled" on their system. This was for BKK-NBO and CDG-NBO. This is also the case for CZ as it exists in EF but the agents can't seem to see it. I gave up.
My current itinerary stands at:
JFK-NRT-ICN(DL)-HAN(VN)
HAN-CDG(VN)-TNR(AF)
TNR-NBO(KQ)
NBO-AMS(KQ)-VCE(KL)
VCE-CDG-CMN(AF)
CMN-CDG-GRU(AF)
GRU-DTW-ATL-JFK(DL)
All in business class. 280,000 miles plus $599 in taxes.
That's 41,000 miles with one stop in Asia and South America, and three stops in Africa.
It's only 15 segments and 16 are allowed. I can get it down to 13 segment by going NRT-HAN direct in coach, and DTW-JFK direct in coach but for me part of the fun is the travel.
Leaving it short a few segments will also give me the flexibility to add in some overland segments (eg., GIG-GRU, VCE-FCO, etc.) if availability opens up. One thing to note is that overland segments must also be in the direction of travel (since I'm going on a westerly RTW trip, I cannot have FCO-VCE, or GRU-GIG as overland segments).
I appreciate any comments or suggestions on improving this trip.
Mar 19, 2013, 4:45 pm
#123
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: TUL
Programs: AA Plat, DL FO/1MM, UA Silver, Marriott Titanium, National Exec Elite
Posts: 2,102
Aug 14, 2013, 6:53 pm
#125
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: TUL
Programs: AA Plat, DL FO/1MM, UA Silver, Marriott Titanium, National Exec Elite
Posts: 2,102
JFK-BRU-FCO
FCO-CDG-JNB
JNB-CDG-AMM
DXB-NBO-SEZ
SEZ-NBO-BKK
BKK-CAN-AKL
AKL-CAN-PVG-JFK
Sep 4, 2013, 1:50 pm
#126
Join Date: Jun 2010
Programs: DL Diamond MM, SPG Platinum, Skywards Silver
Posts: 319
Revenue $$?
Before I start a new thread I thought I would ask. Does anyone have any current figures on how a revenue RTW ticket is priced? What type of flexibility does it have after ticketing? Are the fare classes different? Any idea on cost? For some reason I thought I remember around $8000 for J floating around a while back...thanks!
Sep 20, 2013, 11:13 am
#127
Join Date: Mar 2011
Location: Luxembourg
Programs: HH Dia, AClub Plat, Hyatt Dia, FB Gold, LH SEN, TK *G
Posts: 655
I tried to have an itinerary for August '14 with AF miles so I mailed FB with a one week range for each flight. They just answered. No availability, sorry.
Basically it meant: "fail, try again" but not offer to help and on the phone, they told me to go through the email address... AMAZING SERVICE, right?
Basically it meant: "fail, try again" but not offer to help and on the phone, they told me to go through the email address... AMAZING SERVICE, right?
Sep 20, 2013, 11:31 am
#128
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: SEA - DL DM/2MM, *A Gold, SPG Lifetime Plat, some other car and hotel stuff
Posts: 5,649
I tried to have an itinerary for August '14 with AF miles so I mailed FB with a one week range for each flight. They just answered. No availability, sorry.
Basically it meant: "fail, try again" but not offer to help and on the phone, they told me to go through the email address... AMAZING SERVICE, right?
Basically it meant: "fail, try again" but not offer to help and on the phone, they told me to go through the email address... AMAZING SERVICE, right?
Oct 16, 2014, 8:44 pm
#129
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Houston
Programs: UA
Posts: 289
Just booked a RTW for myself and have a few questions.
How easy is to make changes to these tickets? Will they need to spend a ton of time recalculating taxes and all that? And if you make the change within 24hrs of ticketing is it free?
How easy is to make changes to these tickets? Will they need to spend a ton of time recalculating taxes and all that? And if you make the change within 24hrs of ticketing is it free?