Hi there


My LONE5 has been with AA Capetown for over a week for pricing as they made various mistakes such as trying to put me on a non-one world flight. I finally got a correct routing and pricing from them late yesterday evening. When I went to pay today they came back to me to say that they can't ticket the flight as I am within 7 days of departure as they 'will get in trouble with the other airlines for doing so'. They decided to tell me about this 7 day rule today for the first time.

Their suggestion is that I fly a day later (will cost me a substantial amount as I have positioning flights and accommodation booked) or go to an airline who are a more substantial part of the booking to ticket it, which I am very reluctant to do.

Please can someone advise if they are telling the truth about not being able to ticket or talking nonsense?

You say AA Capetown is doing the ticketing, but where does your itinerary start from?

If it starts in the Americas, then they are correct. If not, then they are wrong.
The rule regarding ticketing is

Quote:

5. RESERVATIONS AND TICKETING
(a) Reservations and Ticketing
For travel originating in TC1
Reservations for the first international flight and all preceding flights are required at least 7 days prior to departure of the first flight. Subsequent segments may be open-dated. Tickets must be issued at least 7 days in advance of the first flight.
Exception:
For economy class reservations made 22 or more days before departure, tickets must be issued at least 21 days before departure.
For travel originating in TC2/3
Reservations for the first international flight and all preceeding flights must be made prior to departure. Subsequent segments may be open-dated. Tickets may be issued up to one hour prior to departure

My bolding
TC1 = Nth & Sth America
TC2 = Europe & Africa
TC3 = Asia & Sth West Pacific

Thank you so much for that. I'm starting in TC2 - first leg is JNB-HK.

Did you make the rezzy with the AA RTW desk or Mindpearl? Mindpearl does not do the pricing; that is done by AA (formerly in Dublin, can't recall right now where they moved). Too late now, but next try the AA RTW desk. IME, consistently knowledgeable and friendly agents.

I went directly to Mindpearl, but thank you for the heads up re going directly to AA RTW. I will do that if there is a next time after the blips this time.

By the time I phoned them back with my newly acquired knowledge of the ticketing rules they had already decided it could be ticketed so they are doing that now and will hopefully phone me shortly to tell me that it has been done.