Here is one post discussing LPs:
https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/35223293-post1297.html
But, your question is about earning in the AAdvantage program so is probably best addressed in the AA forum.

AT is between 1) and 2) as it is 200% plus status bonus and UL does not have a cabin bonus for D class so just 100% + status bonus

That is interesting. Just FYI for full disclosure for you, when I changed the flight times around to get the stopovers vs transits correct, and changed the DEL-LHR-AMM on BA to DEL-DOH-AMM on QR, I was able to reduce the surcharges a bit. The full final prices was $6,383 ($4,700 base fare plus $1,683 taxes/charges).

I possibly could have moved a few other flights around to reduce the surcharges a bit more, but I ended up booking this when EUR-USD rate was briefly up over 1.10 USD to 1 EUR, so I got a decent deal I think.

Good note there that you got lower fees on QR than BA (though a lot fewer miles flown if that were a goal) and BA flies an A320 from LHR-AMM, not a premium experience, LOL. I did that flight CAI-LHR and then back again later and awesome crew on both flights, quite decent food, but the plane is just any ordinary Euro business cabin and BA's legroom is even more pathetic than most European carriers.

I just went back to my card statement from the DONE5 from last year, it was 991,280 JPY ex-TYO when ticketed, that was at the time $6740. I did some changes during an involuntary change by QR and shifted some other non-related flights at the same time. During that I changed one set of flights CGK-BKK from MH via KUL to CX via HKG, that should have upped my total price a bit as CX has higher fees than MH but they didn't charge me for it since I had it processed together with the invol. Looks like in terms of JPY a DONE5 is coming out nearly exactly the same now (~960,000 - 1,010,000 JPY) but the exchange rate has been unstable, today it's fairy close to my previous ticket but with the 1 year validity it's too early for me to ticket to take advantage of the current rate. This could easily swing up (or down) another $500 or so before I'm within range of when I want to ticket. I think November will be ideal but may get tempted a bit sooner if the JPY rate gets more favorable to USD, plus I think if I find the TPAC QF flight I want with D availability that may force my hand regardless because it's seemingly so rare to find.

On the subject of "pricing", I also tried to figure out the oneworld xONEx online booking tool (which I determined that it was almost totally useless). That said, I worked on a simple 7 segment ex-HND DONE3.

I found out some interesting "fees, surcharges, taxes and whatnots). Below is a screen shot. Note US & UK. I only transit LHR (less than 24 hours) once. When I tried to remove LHR and put in DUB, the tool went wonky.


https://photos.smugmug.com/Assets/Fo...%20Fees-X2.png

Yeah, you shouldn't be getting UK APD if it's not a stopover to the best of my understanding. That's what's throwing it so far out of balance, your airline YQ/YR only appears to be 24,400 JPY which is pretty good. I had an overnight stop in April at LHR and certainly didn't have APD on my ticket (BA issued).

In the other cryptic fees, it looks like you might be getting hit with Qatar's passenger service charge twice, but maybe a travel agent can pipe in on that. I was able to find a list of all of those codes before to make sense of them but I can't find it now.

Note that 24,400 JPY in YQ/YR is for 7 segments only, not 16.
How can one eliminate UK APD (less than 24 hr layover)?
If you found them, please post here!

[deleted]
 

--deleted--

I've been in email dialogue with a senior oneworld representative over the oneworld Explorer ticket 'mileage issue' with their online booking engine. Problem statement and accompanying screen shots of the errors have been supplied and hopefully it is rectified.

On another matter, I bit the bullet and contacted Qantas yesterday on trying to book a DONE4 ex-CAI with CAI-DOH on QR the first sector. Yeah, I know....I'm a sucker for punishment. You all can guess how that is going. Been approx 4 hours over various agents on and off, multiple ticketing fare senior reps involved, etc. They don't know why their QF system will not allow the ticket to be verified if CAI-DOH the first sector. The first sector can be booked though. I'm going to try and stick it out I want to see how this ends (though I know the result).

btw I contacted QF as I noticed the ex-CAI base DONE4 fare for the oneworld online booking portal in many situations (BA, RJ, etc) was approx $1000 AUD more than that quoted on ExpertFlyer.

Good job getting dialogue going with someone at OneWorld over the booking tool issues. Next step, allow us to choose the ticketing carrier, LOL! Wouldn't that be great.

Yeah, good luck with QF on that one. From other posts I've been reading also seems CX is pretty good for these, if you have any CX segments in your itinerary. Just from other people's posts I think I'm comfortable giving them a try on my next one, but there too I'll have to intentionally put in some CX segments which I hadn't planned on otherwise. I actually wouldn't mind using them TPAC but their D availability is pretty scarce, seems as bad as QF's.

Thx.

I might try CX in parallel, good heads up...thanks.

Note that this data point was from my experience pre-pandemic. Things might have changed.

I had an ex-HND DONE3 that was ticketed by CX. I did have a CX long haul (HKG-JFK). I recall I didn't have any hassle in the process.

Further, on a different DONEx ticket that I needed to change dates right after the First Flight, when I was [MENTION=295191]HKG[/MENTION]. While relaxing in the Wing First (a pre-designed a longer layover to accommodate the time it may take to get ticket re-issued). I handed my new itinerary (EF sanctified) to an agent inside the lounge. That agent accompanied me to another agent who became my interface person during the time I was in the lounge. Long story short, she coordinated with agent in an office in the city. About 3h35m later (and 1 interaction in between), my ticket was re-issued. I was pleasantly surprised!

If things have not changed much today, I'd use CX to issue my RTW tickets and any later re-issues.

Note the QR base fare is in USD while other oneworld airlines publishing a fare are using EGP. This leads to a discrepancy that may be around 1000AUD. Even if you use another airline's ticket plate, the base fare may potentially be calculated using the QR fare if the first inter-TC flight (Europe/ME to Americas or Europe/ME to Asia/Australia) is on QR.

No more xONEx from CAI on AA?
 

Wanting to purchase travel insurance, I searched for my ticket confirmation and receipt email from AA for my DONE3 and could not find it. I had a couple "your trip has changed" emails with the whole itinerary. Tripit also noticed the no confirmation and sent me an email saying so when they got the same trip change notifications. Anyway, that's just a preamble to why I called the RTW desk today after many dead ends with AA. And during our conversation the agent mentioned they would no longer be ticketing trips from Cairo. As of this moment Expert Flyer is pricing the trip at $4213.82 with AA as selected carrier. QR $4810, QF $4213.82. BA has no fare listed for this itinerary. So, darn, glad I found out before investing hours in finding flights.

Funny you mention this, I started seeing today, while researching, the oneworld online tool stating no flights could be found out of CAI as the starting point for a xDONEx. Yesterday I had many options.

Update: seems to be playing ball again ex-CAI (hopefully was just a glitch in the Matrix)

Did you have an existing ex-CAI DONE3 ticket?

I'm assuming the AA agent mentioned this in passing?

Yes, I'd called because they never sent a confirmation and receipt email and I couldn't find what I recalled might be a matching amount on any of the three credit cards I would have been likely to use. I actually have 5 ticket numbers and they submitted 5 separate payments that totaled the price I was quoted! I haven't run them through American's "find your receipt" in the FAQs, but I trust they are there now. I mentioned I'm considering booking another for the trip home and that's when she said she'd heard they aren't offering any ex Cairo Explorer fares. I don't know why since, with the carrier imposed fees it brings it up to close to ex Tokyo. The oneworld carriers serving Cairo are, Royal Air Maroc, Qatar, British Airlways, and Royal Jordanian. According to Expert Flyer, BA and AT do not offer the fare, Qatar is a little higher than the others, and RJ is the same as the two other OW carriers I plugged in just for interest, AA and QF at just over $4K. So, Expert Flyer hasn't stopped pricing for American so far, FWIW.

Hi all

I was hoping to get a bit of help on a DONEx journey. I have received conflicting info from the AA RTW desk and my usual TA, so grateful for any guidance that you experts can provide!

In short, I want to be able to get two(ish) holidays out of a DONEx fare. First portion would be travel in May 2024, second portion would be in Nov/Dec 2024. Ideally, my routing would be as follows:

• May 2024: OSL-ATL-LAX-BNE-HTI-BNE-SYD-HKG-CDG
• [Stopover in CDG]
• Nov/Dec 2024: CDG-CPT-LHR
• [Stopover in LHR]
• Jan 2025: LHR-OSL

Is this possible provided OSL-ATL is just a transit in LHR (or HEL-JFK), so that I leave two stopovers in reserve for CDG and LHR? Or does it breach the no South Africa visit sub-rule as my starting / end point is in Europe? If so, any workarounds that you guys and gals can think of (e.g. transit point somewhere else that isn't CDG)? Ideally, I'd like to keep the cost of re-positioning from home base in LON to a minimum, hence avoiding a flight eastwards to HKG simply to get back on another westwards to get to SA!

Also, my TA tells me that OW has started charging for date changes (subject to the USD 125 change fee) even if ticketed point does not change. Is that right or wrong?

Many thanks in anticipation!

The rule regarding more than one departure and one arrival to a continent is:Therefore, either your flight CDG-CPT or your flight CPT-LHR (or both flights) must be via the Middle East
So CDG-xDOH-CPT-LHR or CDG-xLHR-CPT-DOH-LHR or CDG-xDOH-CPT-xDOH-LHR

The rule regarding changes is:Therefore date/time/carrier changes are free of charge.

I see the guru of oneworld has already replied.

Ahh, thank you so much - you are indeed the guru (or font of wisdom if you prefer)!

So my TA sad that stopover via DOH is not possible as it breaches the no backtrack rule, but glad to know that they are wrong.

On date change, do you suggest waiting until I've flown the first sector before rebooking the Dec sectors for the correct dates? Or is change of date (but not ticketed point) also free of charge before departure (that is my read of the OW rules but my TA insists that I'm wrong...)?

Finally, if I wanted to squeeze in an added return sector from London to, say, somewhere in Italy in the European summer (i.e. between the first May trip and the last Nov/Dec trip), am I better off re-positioning HKG to LHR (rather than CDG), albeit at the cost of being slugged with additional APD on all UK departures? I wanted to go via CDG originally as it's much lower taxes, but am I right in thinking that leaving the CDG-xDOH-CPT sector intact would result in one of my 16 sectors being used up as a surface sector?

I ended up giving up on Qantas trying to sort out the ex-CAI using QR, after 3+ days of multiple QF people scratching their heads and 'logging an issue' with QR. I did find out a bit of info that was a tad concerning during this process, QF agents regularly in the background use the Oneworld online booking engine for itinerary validation if they run into a booking issue themselves. This is concerning as we are all aware how buggy the online engine is - I'm sure other airline agents would be doing the same.

As my travel needs are quite soon I was able to get online a working DONE4 ex-CAI for $8800 AUD (10 flights, I'll fill out the rest later). First sector CAI-LHR-CPH on BA. Surcharges were actually ok (LHR transit only). What I did find interesting is that QF was the ticketing airline for the DONE4, not BA. My receipt clearly stated Qantas was the ticketing airline (which I'm actually ok with in this instance, there are some good QF agents, though rare now).

That's ridiculous if the online tool still ticketed on QF with your first flights on BA. One more data point supporting to never use that site for booking again. I think the only way that site will ever be useful again is if it starts allowing the customer to chose the ticketing carrier from a list of valid carriers on their itinerary.

You may find yourself hating life until this ticket is completed, especially since you've making it more complex by planning to fill in remaining flights later. No one at a QF call center is going to know how to do that based on my own terrible experiences with them. Your best best as I learned very late into mine is use their social media team. Twitter DM or Facebook Messenger. It's slow, at times several days, but they do know the correct people to reach out to within QF to get things done. Just watch out, they tried to charge me $125 for a date change with no other changes to airline or airports. Had to remind them that's a free change and quoted them the fare rules from EF. Finally it got done with no charge. I expect that if you attempt the call center for any of these adds (or changes if needed) you're going to be met with the same incompetence you already experienced with them trying to buy your ticket.

[QUOTE=dvs7310;35362631... Just watch out, they tried to charge me $125 for a date change with no other changes to airline or airports. Had to remind them that's a free change and quoted them the fare rules from EF. Finally it got done with no charge. I expect that if you attempt the call center for any of these adds (or changes if needed) you're going to be met with the same incompetence you already experienced with them trying to buy your ticket.[/QUOTE]

Carriers are free to charge their own service fees for making changes. Qantas is the type of airline I would think likely to do just that.

This may be because, according to Expert Flyer anyway, BA does not offer exCAI fares. Neither does Royal Air Maroc (AT). I didn't check every oneworld carrier, but AA, AY, IB, JL, CX, QF, MH do list the fare. For my current DONE3 AT was my first carrier, CAI-CMN, and at first the agent thought they weren't part of oneworld. When I produced an AA codeshare flight number, she booked that. Now I wonder if being the first carrier is why she didn't see the airline. Edited to add: knowing QR cannot be the first carrier, I just checked, and sure enough, they do not offer DONEx fares either.

My own data point on the BOLDED text above.
QR can be the first carrier. I had done ex-OSL DONE3 & DONE4 with QR being the first carrier (OSL-DOH). AA gladly ticketed both.
EF has a glitch when search with QR as ticketing airlines. I got 2 results. First the search resulted in NO PRICING. But immediately searched again, it showed DONE3 Base Fare as US$4,810. However, if I search with AA or CX, the DONE3 Base Fare is US$4,213. Date of this search was 21:00 PST June 26, 2023. A discrepancy of US$600!

Hi All

I'm part way through my trip and having a great time, but I've hit a snag, and wanted to check my thinking!

When I booked my trip, I got a seat from KIX-->HNL no problem. Now I need to change the dates, and I can't find a single D class seat available on this route in September or October.

I was thinking that I'll have to either change my flight into Japan into e.g. Tokyo to keep HNL in plan (I can see a few seats for HND --> HNL) or alternatively drop HNL and fly straight from KIX-->LAX

I think both options will incur a change fee, right? Any other issues I need to look out for?

Correct, either of those will incur the $125 change of ticketed points fee. That fee is per transaction not per change so if you have any other changes you want to make, do them all at once. If you've got the extra segments available, I'd just go via Tokyo, usually Class J is pretty widely available to HND, but you'll want the KIX flights if you only want to burn 1 extra segment (ITM would count as a ground segment if you arrived at KIX). I'm assuming you arrived via KIX?

[QUOTE=allset2travel;35365532
EF has a glitch when search with QR as ticketing airlines. I got 2 results. First the search resulted in NO PRICING. But immediately searched again, it showed DONE3 Base Fare as US$4,810. However, if I search with AA or CX, the DONE3 Base Fare is US$4,213. Date of this search was 21:00 PST June 26, 2023. A discrepancy of US$600![/QUOTE]

Good to hear. I'd recalled seeing QR pricing at substantially higher than the other ow carriers a week or so ago. Then when I went back to check using CAI-CAI (with no fare listed), then DOH-DOH and still no fare, I began to wonder about my mental capacity. Better a hole in the matrix than a hole in the gray matter.

thanks for this - I've not yet arrived in Japan, so I think I'll try and change my arrival point from KIX to HND then I can keep HNL in plan

Hi everyone - really sorry, I have another question!

I'm looking for seats in D class from HND-->HNL now.

Expert flyer tells me that there are no seats on any of the Japan Airlines flights e.g. JL74, but the Malaysia codeshare for the same flight e.g. MH9788 has 9 seats in D class.

Do you know if I can book onto the MH flight? Or does it have to be a JL flight if it's JL metal?

Sorry for so many questions - I just hadn't come across this one

Who's your ticketing airline / agent? If AA directly then I suspect you're out of luck. They don't see to be as flexible with codeshares. But a travel agent might be able to do it. I've only ever used the codeshares in conjunction with a connecting flight, not point to point, so not 100% sure it's possible but it is indeed showing up in EF when searching point to point.

Hi pandaperth (and all!)

I'd be really grateful for your thoughts on the updated situation.

My optimal itinerary is as follows:

• May/June 2024: OSL-xLHR-oATL-oLAX-oBNE-oSYD-oHKG-oLHR [Note, I've dropped BNE-oHTI-oBNE from before because this is operated by Alliance Air on behalf of QF which, I'm told by AA RTW desk, is not a permitted affiliated airline of QF despite bearing a full QF code on the flights]
• Summer 2024: LHR-oPMO-oLHR
• Dec 2024: CDG-xDOH-oCPT-xLHR-OSL

I've contacted the AA RTW desk and they've told me that (after they consulted the "rights desk" and OW) the ticket is invalid for the following two reasons:

1. I have too many stopovers in Europe - I am only allowed two stopovers in the continent of origin and, here, there are three stopovers (firstly, between landing at LHR in May and LHR-PMO, secondly, between PMO-LHR, and thirdly between LHR-CDG (which is a surface sector)). Is this true? If so, the quick fix would seem to be to ditch either LHR-PMO or PMO-LHR so that I am only left with two stopovers (being, firstly, between landing in LHR in May and PMO) and, secondly, PMO to CDG as a surface segment)?
2. My itinerary in Africa includes a trip to South Africa - AA is insisting that, even if I route my flight via Doha on QR metal, this is still deemed a trip "to/from Europe" and therefore this is invalid (I was told that I could alternatively choose a different African destination that is not in South Africa or Mauritius). This seems to contradict what pandaperth previously advised. Do you have any ideas on convincing them otherwise?

Many thanks - I really appreciate your help!

Anecdotally - I also tried to get CX to quote for me but CX told me that they won't issue RTW on CX stock unless the first sector is on CX metal. Not sure if this is a recent change of rule or not!

I confirm the same (No Fares showed) if my search was in EGP currency.
Changed the currency to US$, then the fares will show.

Ouch, that certainly throws a wrench into my own plans. I wanted to go HND-SYD-AKL on QF and then AKL-HKG-ORD on CX, but no reason to do that if CX wouldn't issue the ticket, might as well find a day that QF has availability either on AKL-JFK or one of the Australia-USA routes. AA typically has availability to LAX or DFW but don't want to risk getting stung by revenue based earnings on such a long segment.

Not a single D availability on CX from HND / NRT / KIX / CTS to HKG the week I want to go to AKL, though seems HKG-AKL is fine. Found a few from FUK, so that may have to be the new plan, not sure why CX is so stingy on D from the rest of Japan.

Long time lurker, first time poster. I'm about to fly DONE3 out of Tokyo and I have a quick question — in general which airline is a good choice to have ticket it? Must it be the first airline I fly (likely JL) or can I choose any airline in the itinerary? JL seems competent (if a little hard to reach), but they charge an additional US$50 fee to issue the ticket or do date changes, and it seems like at least AA does not.

Avoid QF ticketing it at all costs if you ever hope to make any changes. Aside from that, the other flights on the itinerary will determine your options and consideration of where you're crediting the miles to. Good to know about JL's $50 ticketing and change fee, one more reason to avoid ticketing with them. Seems CX may be trying to charge for date changes too now according to one report somewhere on FT.

As an example: AA would be the least advantageous to ticket with if you're trying to maximize AAdvantage miles earned. Any AA flights would almost certainly earn based on revenue (which is even more of a slap in the face on a RTW since they're only a small % of total mileage and therefore the % of the ticket price assigned), and AA won't ticket their own metal flights on partner codeshare, so you can't get around the revenue issue by booking AA flights on BA, IB, AY, QR, QF, etc. codes which are much better earners. But if you're crediting to any other program than AAdvantage then that issue doesn't matter nearly as much, if at all. I don't know yet how IB treats RTW tickets on IB flights since they are also revenue based now and presumably BA will go that way soon too, but for now at least BA still credits for miles flown.

Will the online tool or AA RTW desk allow to pay in Argentine pesos (official rate that will be converted to close to the blue rate from Visa) if originating out of EZE?

Note that EF would not even price out in ARS.
It does show base fares in US$. For a DONE$, Base Fare ex-EZE is US$10,229. I am looking at it now.

Same, AA doesn't have an ARS fare at all in EF. BA does so I built a sample itinerary with LHR as the first stopover to see how it would price but it still priced in USD on the OneWorld site. You'd have to talk with a local travel agent in Argentina to see what they come up with. The BA fare on EF is just the USD price converted to the official rate, so you could cut quite a few $$ off of that 'if' a local agent could actually issue the ticket in ARS. However a lot of points of origin with volatile currencies, the fare is actually priced in USD and I suspect Argentina could be the same, I couldn't find anything in the fare rules disallowing ARS but I think you'll need a travel agent to really dig into it.

BTW, even if you could get it priced in ARS and pay at the Visa pseudo-Blue rate you wouldn't have a significant savings over ex-TYO, CAI, and OSL. So while a good idea, the USD base price for ex-EZE is so exorbitant that it eats away at the potential savings.