A virgin AONE4 itinerary (for my 40th)! - tips and pointers please?
 

Hi All,

Have been poking around here and on the OW booking tool for a few weeks now, and here's what I have as a VERY prelim. itin. for Dec 2010 (based on Dec 09 and Jan 10), ex-JFK (intending to start and end in YYZ with a cheapo AA rtn to JFK):

JFK - YVR (CX F, 777) [>24 hrs]
YVR - DFW (AA J, 757) [>24 hrs]
DFW - LAX (AA F, 767) [>24 hrs]*
LAX - SFO (AA F, MD 80) [>24 hrs, next day]*
SFO - NRT (JL F, 744)
NRT - (HND) - HKG (JL J, MD 90; CX F, 777)**
HKG - SIN (CX F, 744)**
SIN - SYD (BA codeshare, QF F, A380)***
SYD - (HKG) - LHR (QF F, 744; BA F, 744)****
LHR - MCT (BA F, 777)*****
MCT - (LHR) - MIA (BA F, 777; BA F, 744)
MIA - JFK (AA F, 767)

*LAX could be eliminated; there was no good flights to NRT when I looked besides this routing; in exchange, I'd put in BUD or such in Europe to make up 16 segments.

** Q1. What's the trend with CX - will they eliminate all intra-Asia F flights?

*** Q2. In Dec 10 and Jan 11 (and when I actually book 11 months out), QF should have more A380 availability in A, I hope?

**** Q3. Quite like this combination of different carriers. If BA's new F is good, I'll want to keep this. If not, is it possible to change a booking like this to CX after the AONE4 ticket is issued?

***** Never been to the ME, and saw the debate between DXB or MCT on another thread, hence this routing ^

Q4. Am a BAEC member, and hope to maximise TPs and mileage gains from this itin. Don't really see myself flying with AA much, or CX for that matter. Should I reconsider and enrol in AAdvantage or AsiaMiles?

Q5. Taxes and surcharges 1: Is there any difference whether I book an AONE4 as a BAEC member, ex-JFK, paying in USD, using a Canadian credit card (Royal Bank of Canada BA Visa), or as an AAdv / CX AM member, ex-YYZ, paying in CAD?

Q6. Taxes and surcharges 2: I get a sense from other posts that CX and QF flights tend to incur higher taxes and surcharges. If I maximise BA codeshare flights, then I should be able to reduce those, and increase BAEC points earning, shouldn't I?

Any other expert tips and suggestions are much appreciated! Thanks very much in advance :)

PS: Have a few BA-specific questions, which I posted here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/briti...ec-2010-a.html

A little advice: if BA and CX is serving the same route then always opt for CX. They have a better First class seat.

Q1: I don't think CX will eliminate regional F altogether. But at the moment there is no guarantee that there will be F on your routes. They seem to turn F on and off with very short notice.

Q2: Maybe yes, maybe no. It might also be that the economy has picked up and that there will be no A availability all together. But many people had their A waitlists cleared in the past.

Q3: Yes, you can change carriers free of charge as long as the routing stays the same. Routing change costs $125 plus taxes etc.

Q4: No, stick to BA. You are aware that this itinerary is not maximizing mileage?

Q5: Your FFP membership will have nothing to do with the price. Normally, if you ticket a flight in one country but start from another, the higher of the two prices will be charged. However, for tickets sold in Canada the lower price will be charged. Canada is currently CAD 12,330 and US currently USD 11,250.

Q6: No, the taxes and surcharges depend more on the issuing carrier than on who operates the flight. So this is why ticketing through AA is much cheaper than ticketing through BA for example.

Thanks very much for the clarification.

How can I max the mileage? Is there something fundamental I'm not doing properly?

This dummy itin. will net me about 57000 miles and 1800 TPs (with various BAEC status factors on top of actual flown mileage) - any suggestion I can do better?

Thanks a heap!!^

Clearly you could do a load better on miles.

1) Use all 16 segments (some error regarding Tokyo. CX only flies scheduled flights from NRT)
2) Fly to the opposite sides of the US - so do East Coast to Asia and from LHR to West Coast.
3) Don't use two segments to get SWP-Eur, use one (enter SWP from as far north in Asia as possible: HKG, or even NRT)
4) Try to avoid very short segments like LAX-SFO

To take part of it as an example:

SFO-NRT-HKG-SIN-SYD is 12461 flight miles
SFO-HKG-SIN-NRT-SYD is 16684.

Here is some food for thought as I see it.

You could alter the tail end to go LHR-LAX-DFW-JFK.

Also note that you can finish in YYZ if you wish with the last sector (YYZ-JFK) being a surface sector.

from rule sheet on oneworld.com

If you don't want to go to LAX why not a direct DFW-SFO sector instead. Or you could score a few more miles by going to NRT via ORD instead. DFW-SFO-ORD-NRT. Of course it all depends on how much time you want to spend flying for miles rather than getting from A to B.

CX in Asia is a real crap shoot at the moment and who knows what it will be like 12 months from now. F completely disappeared from HKG-SIN late last year but came back on a limited basis recently. Now it seems HKG-NRT is devoid of any flights with F. Perhaps if the global economy picks up things might change.
In Asia the big money spinner for TPs is NRT-SIN as it is over the magic 2000 miles marker. However it does not look like JL are flying F on that route at the moment. Still it is 120 TP for one sector rather than using 2 at 60 a piece in F.

Confused
 

I'm confused, but hopeful. I saw a similar itinerary on the "longest 16 segment" thread (post # 24) in the sticky re useful links , and now this one. The one in the sticky actually had the MM "valid itin" message, and neither that trip, nor this one, has been contradicted so far. I thought you could only have a maximum of two stopovers in continent of origen, one leaving, one returning. Not so? If this works, sign me up!

There seems to be some confusion over a relatively new line in the fare rules. You are allowed two stopovers (> 24h) in the continent of origin, always have been. For stopovers in the country of origin, there's now a maximum of one outgoing and one incoming. This would apply mainly in countries like the US or Oz where internal flights are often taken prior to leaving the country of origin for the first time, or where more than one internal flight might occur upon returning to that country at the end of the trip. But the rule regarding timing of the stopovers only applies to the country of origin, not the continent.

The itinerary currently is 47,000 BIS miles and would only get the 1800 TPs if you actually get A on each flight (which you won't as AA flight between Canada and the US have only J).

In terms of TP earning you can do much better by selecting flights which are over 2000 miles even so they are not F. Also, look for "freaky" single flight number flights ex LAX/SFO/SEA/PHX/LAS with more than 2000 miles. As an example I have included LAX-RDU which does exist at certain times.

So an itinerary like

JFK-YVR-DFW-NRT-CGK-NRT-SIN-SYD-MEL-LHR-MCT-LHR-LAX-RDU-LAX-DFW-JFK

would give you 55800 BIS seat miles and more than 2100 TPs. This is not totally optimized as it allows for CX JFK-YVR and QF A380 SIN-SYD. The big problem is that it is very uncertain which routes will have F at the end of next year.

[QUOTE=Capricorn70;12702012]Hi All,

JFK - YVR (CX F, 777) [>24 hrs]
YVR - DFW (AA J, 757) [>24 hrs]
DFW - LAX (AA F, 767) [>24 hrs]*
LAX - SFO (AA F, MD 80) [>24 hrs, next day]*
SFO - NRT (JL F, 744)
NRT - (HND) - HKG (JL J, MD 90; CX F, 777)**
HKG - SIN (CX F, 744)**
SIN - SYD (BA codeshare, QF F, A380)***
SYD - (HKG) - LHR (QF F, 744; BA F, 744)****
LHR - MCT (BA F, 777)*****
MCT - (LHR) - MIA (BA F, 777; BA F, 744)
MIA - JFK (AA F, 767)
QUOTE]

Ok, but OP is planning 4 stopovers in NA prior to departing SFO. (>24h, I'm assuming, is "greater than 24 hours") I may still not be clear, but I'm thinking the YVR stopover would be OK, and any ONE of the outbound stops in the US could be a stopover?

Genius! Now, re stopovers in continent of origen, how many could OP do on the back end? Would s/he have to limit to <24 hours, or do only one stopover first part of trip, thus saving one >24 h from among LAX, RDU, DFW? Those last 5 segments would be pretty grueling without a break, although, I suppose, there's plenty of time for dinner and a night in a hotel after any or all of them.

Ah, OK - I think there's probably confusion on ">" vs. "<". Two stopovers 24+ hrs in the continent of origin, of which only 1 could be in the country of origin before an intercontinental flight, and of which only 1 could be in the country of origin upon re-entering the continent of origin at the end of the circle.

I don't think LAX-RDU-LAX is possible in a turnaround; indeed I don't see RDU-LAX in the AA timetable at all; perhaps DownUnderFlyer could mention the dates. These "direct" flights come and go and are typically asymmetrical (e.g. LAX-RDU, RDU-SEA.) When the OP goes to ticketing if they're not there in the time frame for the RTW they won't be allowed.

They were meant as a place holder and to explain the principal. The OP will need to puzzle the real flights together once ticketing time comes. And even then there is a chance that those flights won't be there when the OP actually flies so AA would need to accommodate him somehow.
AA timetable currently shows LAX-RDU-SAN as a possibility (also the flights don't come up in Sabre) but this is a moot points as they will be gone by the time the OP tickets the DONE4.

Thanks everyone for your ideas!^ I've certainly learned a few things about including as many 2000+ segments (sector? I can never remember which is which) as I can, and am redesigning the itin.

I like the 2100 TPs and 55800 miles (could easily get an extra 30+% with status)

I do want to include at least a ride on the A380, and a proper LH F on CX metal. I don't have to do CX between JFK-YVR.

My modified routing, for research purposes, is as follows:

ORD - (MIA) - JFK (-24 hrs)[AA A, 757; 767]
JKF - HKG [CX F, 777]
HKG - KIX [CX F, 744]
KIX - BKK [JL D, 777]
BKK - NRT [JL D, 777]
NRT - SIN [JL D, 777]
SIN - SYD [QF A, 380]
SYD - (HKG) - LHR [QF A, 744; CX A, 744]
LHR - MCT [BA A, 777]
MCT - (LHR) - IST [BA A, 777; BA D, 320]
IST - (LHR) - SFO [BA D, 320; A, 744]
SFO - BOS [AA A, 757]

Not entirely happy with the intra-Asia segments, esp only on JL D class! I'd like to work in a proper JL F segment - ex-JFK or ORD? I hope more availability will come up.

Is this itin. better for maximising miles and TPs?

Thanks again!

A good indication is always to put your itinerary into Mileage Monkey. So what you now have is 53650 miles and 2060 TPs.

What do you mean by "hoping that more JL availability comes up"? You mean more F routes? Or more availability in F? And if the latter, how can you check, since Dec 2010 is too far away.

JL seem reluctant to offer A availability until closer to the flight date. I gather they think they can sell high fares. You could take the risk of routing via ORD or JFK to NRT on AA and hope that JL opens up closer to your travel dates. You could change to the JL flights without any change fee being required (unless the ticketing agent charges their own).

You might also have some fun on the IST legs as I have noticed that BA don't always have D open on those sectors and you can't waitlist D with BA.

As you are planning this so far in advance there is a risk that anything could happen re routing and A availability on any carrier.

You might just have to get the best you can for now and take a hit on the 125 US change fee and alter your routing after you have begun the trip to get what you really want.

Sounds like a fun trip.