Don't expect airline reservation agents to know any country's entry requirements - that's the job of the airline's staff at airport ticket counters and departure gates. It is airport staff who are responsible for assessing whether each traveler is eligible to travel their desired itinerary - it is futile to make such requests of any airline's telephone reservation agents - they simply won't know the correct answer.

I am planning a rewards flight LAX - NRT UA business class in Aug with the hopes of Japan opening up for tourism sometime in the next few months. However if it does not open by then I am planning on booking a separate flight NRT - BKK on a different carrier (JAL) the same day 3 hours after arrival in Tokyo. I understand international to international transfer is allowed but are you able to stay airside without going thru customs for lets say arrival NRT in terminal 1 and lets say departure Terminal 2 or 3 or you restricted to terminal 1 departures

Carry on bags would probably be required as checked bags would have to be picked up after customs and not possible with current restrictions

There is an airside bus between T1 and T2, so that is fine. T3 is only low cost carriers, so you'd need to go land side to get to their check in counters. Checked luggage would depend on the carrier of the first flight, and their rules. But UA to JL is rather unlikely to happen.

I don't know how UA works and what your status is (I'm with American airlines), but I had the same plan a few months ago, with a flight from LAX-TYO that I already had booked.

Since I can cancel without fee, I cancelled my RT to Tokyo and I booked a through flight to bkk and two return flights, one from BKK and one from TYO. Figured if Japan opened, I would miss my onward flight to bkk and stay in Japan then cancel the return flight from bkk. Obviously Japan didn't open, so I just cancelled my to flight back to LAX. Just a thought.

This saved me a bunch of mileo and made my flight much less complicated.

Luckily UA has a pretty flexible cancellation and change policy right now

I think we are in the same boat. Trying to save our flights booked in F/J as well. Have you found a workable solution to get to Seoul?

I've been trying to figure this out myself and as far as I can tell there are no easy options since there aren't any HND-GMP flights and the flights getting into NRT all arrive too late to take a same-day connection to ICN. Only workable option seemed to be to add some other stop in between Tokyo and Seoul (Singapore for example) but then I was getting into like a three-day-long flight which makes two-day windows for pre-arrival PCR tests in Korea a challenge.

Nothing for Seoul. I had to move my trip to mid-July so I could take my kids to a concert on 7/2, so I had to cancel the LAX-HND-GMP flight I booked, and there was nothing else open in J/F for my new dates through AA. I'm still deciding if I just want to give up for July on Japan and confirm travel to Seoul instead since I have another flight to Japan in November. I was doing my above method with two booked flights, but I'm getting low on extra points with the lack of work travel these days, so it's much harder for me to make two RT J/F flights work.

I've booked NRT-MNL-ICN leaving 5:15pm arriving around 5am, but I'm really hoping some evening NRT-ICN flights will open up soon so I can change it. Otherwise this detour promises to be a bit of a nightmare.

Korea is one of the few countries that aren’t exempt from quarantine in Japan, so understandably the volume is low. Add on to that the 2020 initial pandemic response of having all flights from Korea and China land at NRT or KIX, and you’ve got a recipe for hardly any flights to Korea.

That's one of the weird rules that I really can't understand why it is being kept. The NRT/KIX limitation on flights arriving from China and Korea. But there we are, it does make connecting through Japan to Korea troublesome....

I can land in HND, but the HND-GMP route is currently suspended (although there might be glimmer of hope it will be reinstated by June?). I can land in NRT, but there are no overnight stays allowed (all the flights out of NRT to ICN occur before I even land). Or if I can transit to another Japanese airport, there might be flights that work. I just need at least one of the airport rules to get dropped or changed, otherwise, the combination is making for impossible connection to Korea from the US. Or maybe that was the plan?

Japan Layover
 

Aloha, I'm looking to book a flight from HNL to BKK via Narita on JAL. HNL flight arrives into NRT at 4:25 PM and departs technically the next day at 12:05 AM. About a 5 hour layover but the language on the JAL and the airport website says:

Customers Connecting in Japan between International Flights

Travelers who are not entering Japan and transferring directly to a third country by transit, are not required to submit any documents and undergo inspections in Japan. Nonetheless, travelers are still subject to the travel/entry restrictions and requirements of their final destination.
However, the following cases require entry into Japan. Please be informed that foreign nationals arriving from prohibited countries will not be allowed to enter Japan.

• Transferring between Tokyo International Airport (Haneda Airport) and Narita International Airport
• Travelers with a connecting flight out of Narita International Airport the following day

Does this mean a transit passenger would not be permitted since the departing flight is at 12:05 AM? Not sure how strict Japan is on 5 minutes.

Mahalo! P

Boarding for your flight would be before midnight when the international terminal closes (which happens right at midnight), so you'll be on your plane and I think you should be good. Basically, once the terminal closes for the night, nobody is allowed to be in the international terminal until it opens the next morning, so your only choice is to be on a flight at that time or enter Japan, which you can't do. So that flight is still considered the same day as your arrival. If there's an issue with the flight, then it won't just be you stuck there waiting for another flight, but everyone else on the plane who can't enter Japan. CPH-Flyer is the transit expert, though so I'm sure he'll respond if there's any other considerations you need to take in to account.

There might be the glimmer of hope that JAL from June and forward has not yet flat out cancelled the Seoul routes, but has them as 確定次第お知らせいたします in the latest update on the schedule. Which I guess is progress....