QF flies twice daily LHR-DXB using A380s
Transit UK so no APD tax
Fly QF so no hefty BA YQ

Departures are 1 hour apart at 2130 and 2230.
QF still has a large YQ charge...

If the goal is to end up in London, I'd willingly pay the $125 itinerary change fee to fly XXX - xLHR - Middle East, but since I had no interest in taking that last segment, I'd choose the one with the least YQ (i.e. a non-BA flight). When I last checked (now a year or so ago), the RJ flight from LHR - AMM had very little YQ, and therefore might be worth investigating. NB Do not forget that you're looking for an overnight (but <24 hour) connection at LHR.

I know that simply changing dates/times doesn't trigger a ticket re-issue. What about the following situations?

1. Booked on an AA flight on BA metal, want to change to AA flight with AA metal

2. Booked on an AA 2-class (Y/F) transcontinental flight, want to change to a 3-class flight (DONE4; so First will need to move back to Business)

So neither of the scenarios should incur a USD125 fee ...

Thanks, although I'm not talking about the $150 fee.

I was under the impression that some changes would require a re-issue of the ticket, although AA will not charge a fee for this unless outside the parameters you just listed. Obviously, with KRT tickets, such a re-issue prior to commencement of the first leg would be problematic.

If it is simply a Date/Time, Carrier or class of service change, then the ticket can simply be 'revalidated' - no USD125 fee is assessable.

As far as AA goes, they appear to have a policy of re-issuing for each and every change rather than just revalidate. Not all one-world airlines do this.

Ok, interesting.

I've made a few changes to my DONE4 ex-KRT... all simple date and/or time changes. I called up in the last couple of days to make a few more changes, all of which have since been processed with the exception of changes relating to the above 2 scenarios. Was thinking that perhaps they didn't make those changes because it would cause the ticket to be re-issued and thus re-priced at the new ex-KRT fare?

But if the ticket was issued by AA, and I suspect it was
then AA does collect QF's YQ whereas it does collect BA's

AA recently (3 weeks ago) made date / time / flight # changes to a couple of xCIRC29SA tickets of mine - without reissuing (ie the ticket number remained the same after the change). This included the first segment.

FYI - Have spoken with the RTW desk again and all changes made.

Must admit that the AA RTW desk is great, excellent and attitudes and customer service. In the last week I've been on the phone to the AA AU, SQ AU, Emirates AU & Off-shore, and Qantas AU call centres and the AA RTW desk wins hands down.

Back in December,uproared wrote (my emphasis)
Just an FYI for you all

Last week we made major changes to our ex-KRT DONE4s, we used the AA RTW desk to do this
And as I expected there was NO assertion that the ticket price needed adjusting (upwards)

All was done very efficiently, and the recomputed taxes came to within a few dollars of what I had calculating using itasoftware (and the differences are I am sure due to differing exchange rates used)

Also there was no issue with our two European stopovers – there had been involuntary changes earlier, due to re-scheduled RJ flights (details below for those that are interested)

So the bottom line is that we are very happy with the service provided by AA’s RTW desk in getting the changes made
__________________________________
Details (for those that are interested in such things):

We purchased the tickets in October 2012 – just before the big price rise on ex-Sudan tickets that happened on 1 November.
At that time S7 had not loaded its schedules for this northern summer, so we were unable to include the IKT-DME segment that we wanted.
The ticket showed us having a long inter-continental surface segment (XIY-DME).
Our intention was to add the segment AFTER we had flown the first few flights (and so pay only the USD125 change fee plus new taxes).
Once the price rise came in we decided we’d also change our final destination to somewhere else in the Middle East (no point in returning to KRT!).

Then between purchase and first flight RJ made some changes to its schedules.

Our first two flights were KRT-xAMM-JFK, with just a couple of hours in AMM – because we wanted to have our two allowed European stopovers at the end of the itinerary.

The first itinerary change was that RJ dropped its Friday AMM-JFK flight – so we changed the first two flights to Thursday. Even though this was a change to first segment, and under the rules might have triggered a re-price, AA accepted that it was involuntary and therefore would not be re-priced.

The second change was just before we flew; RJ dropped its Thursday KRT-AMM service. So we were rescheduled KRT-AMM on Friday and AMM-JFK on Saturday – with more than 24hrs in Amman.
We discussed this with the friendly RJ staff in their office in beautiful downtown Khartoum and they assured us that it was recorded as an involuntary change and so should not affect our later re-schedule to have two European stopovers at the end of the itinerary.

When last week we changed the ticket, AA did not raise the earlier >2hr4 stop in AMM and so we now have our two European stopovers.

And finally a BTW – our last two segments are now BUD-xLHR-DXB
We will have about 10hrs in London – long enough for a long lazy lunch/afternoon tea with #3 sister and her #2 husband. Then back to the airport for our 10:30pm Qantas flight to DXB (so not BA and its GBP159.50 YQ surcharge:D)

We will fly home to PER from DXB on Emirates; this is a Qantas frequent flyer redemption – I’m about to post on this in Qantas forum (Mrs pandaperth, the birthday girl, will be in a 1st class suite on this flight)

Next two flights are this weekend – PER-DRW-PER (gotta use all 16 segments!)

No need to be shy about taking advantage of a 23:59 non-stopover in London. When we're passing through we sometimes overnight, if flight timings work and gives us a practical chunk of time.

Not being shy at all:D
We decided to fly Qantas LHR-DXB rather than BA (with its hefty fuel surcharges)
And Qantas flies overnight - so we save on a London Hotel bill too

It will actually be a bit over 12hrs in London - so plenty of time to catch up with my sister and brother-in-law (they're both retired and so can get cheap train tickets down to London from 'Up North')

Or even a 24:00 hour transit -LHR/LGW- as booked by the AA ATW desk a year or so ago.