On the topic of exJapan... I thought I read that taxes & surcharges are lower vs other starting points, possibly depending on which carrier tickets. Did I make that up? If not, can someone point me to the post(s) or outline the details? I can't find it...

It does seem Japan has some sort of legal cap on surcharges but it is unclear how that would apply to a rtw.

Taxes are going to be the same, but the fuel surcharges out of Japan tend to be a lot less for whatever reason.

None of the pricing has changed Norway/Japan, but the Yen has appreciated, bring them into close parity.

[QUOTE=SNA_Flyer;36531005]Taxes are going to be the same, but the fuel surcharges out of Japan tend to be a lot less for whatever reason./QUOTE]

Some jurisdictions - but I'm not sure if Japan is one - have fuel surcharges regulated by the authorities. At least JAL is transparent about their fuel surcharges, see the link:

https://www.jal.co.jp/jp/en/inter/fare/fuel/detail.html

Yep, I could have been clearer I was asking about the surcharges part of the taxes and fuel surcharges addition to the base fare.

Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism regulates fuel surcharges for exJapan tickets based on actual fuel prices with airlines having to regularly apply for permission to charge at a given rate. JAL issues a press release every two months about it, e.g. most recently: https://press.jal.co.jp/en/release/202408/008257.html

What's murky is how this works in practice for xONEx tickets given the caps assume . I believe that's been discussed on flytertalk with (from memory) it varying based on ticketing carrier.

I wonder if there's a connection between the government regulating fuel surcharges for ex-JPN tickets and the idea of carriers limiting availability for those tickets.
Probably not common knowledge.. only someone in rev mgmt can confirm.

I believe that all fare categories except full (F, J, and Y) are generally limited as to the number of seats on a flight.

Yes, but within those fare buckets may be other limits...

I don't understand. You mean, for example, within D there may be sub-fare classes?

Interesting. I knew there was some kind of limit or regulation, but didn't know the exact details. I like how they actually have to justify them directly to fuel costs.

Not talking about fare classes.
Nevermind.

Sorry. Mistake. Too many flights this year and one RTW blurred into the other!

The post should have read: HND-BKK-DOH.....and ending with LAX-KIX-xBKK-HND. KIX is transit.

Have been in Yellowstone Nat Park with very limited phone & internet so didn't see this post until now

Thanks for clarifying. Hope you enjoyed Yellowstone. :tu:

I'm still surprised that you were allowed the transit through KIX. It contravenes this rule:
I only recall one other instance of a pax being allowed to transit the country of origin. And that was early in the global shutdown due to the pandemic with so many flights cancelled it was the only way the pax could get home.

AA RTW desk ticketed it so perhaps they are interpreting the rule to mean transit isn't an actual arrival or departure in the country. Since you don't go through immigration in most countries, AA maybe views that as not being in the country? US and a few others unfortunately don't fit that classification. Perhaps others can further test this if booking through AA.

Yellowstone was great, but even in Sep some areas were crowded. Also spent 2 days in Grand Tetons. Used this RTW to fly MCO-DFW-JAC-DFW-MCO in AA first. It's an expensive flight. The DFW-JAC flight has only 8 seats up front. Great views of the Teton mountains when flying into Jackson Hole. This RTW checked off 2 more bucket list trips (Iguazu Falls and Yellowstone).

Seeking Advice on My First Oneworld Explorer Ticket (ex-TYO DONE4)
 

Hi, newbie here. I’ve been reading the RTW related posts for the past few weeks and I'm excited to book my very first xONEx ticket :D It’s going to be an ex-TYO DONE4 and I plan to book it with the AA RTW desk. I’m based in SFO and will likely credit the miles to AS. The tentative itinerary is:

• JL NRT-TPE
• CX TPE-xHKG-MAD
• QR MAD-DOH-LHR
• BA+QR LHR-xDXB-xDOH-SFO
• AA SFO-xDFW-GIG-xDFW-SFO
• AS SFO-CUN-SFO
• AA SFO-JFK
• JL JFK-HND (considering AA codeshare in case intercontinental flights between North America and South America don’t meet AA’s ticketing requirements)

Questions:

1. I think the short haul DXB-DOH in A class should grant me access to the first class lounge in DOH. Can I use Al Safwa even with a next-day connection for DOH-SFO? It's going to be a 15+ hour transit.
   
2. For TPE-xHKG-MAD on CX I prefer longer transit times, and there are many TPE-HKG flights daily with D class available when searched individually. However, when searching TPE-MAD on EF it only shows flight combinations with short connection time in HKG. The longer connection options are not D0; they just don’t show up in the search results. But when I search TPE-MAD on ITA matrix, the longer connection combinations do show up as available. Are these married segments, and should I be concerned about transit flight availability in this case? The same issue happens to xDXB-xDOH-SFO on QR.
   
3. These flights should be more than enough to qualify me for AS MVP Gold. Since I value AA miles more than AS miles, I would like to credit the exceeding segments (definitely not those AA flights) to AA. Can I change the FFP for certain segments by putting the desired FFP at check-in for those flights?
   
4. Any tips or suggestions on reducing the fees? I know I should avoid a stopover in the UK, but I need to stay in London for a while and don’t have any remaining segments to make it an open jaw, so the UK APD is likely unavoidable. Regarding carrier-imposed surcharges, I read on this thread that ex-Japan xONEx tickets don’t have YQ, only YR. So I should be fine flying BA (plus a lot of QR’s), and should use BA codeshare as much as possible given that I don’t need to worry about the high fees associated with BA and BA has the best earning rate on AS. Am I correct?

Thanks in advance and any feedback or comments on my itinerary is appreciated!

Purchased DONE4 out of HND ticketed by AA a few weeks ago. About $1350 add to base split @ 50 / 50 between taxes and carrier imposed fees. Used all 16 segments

Would you mind sharing the routing?

I'm not sure which thread is best for trying to get your head round how booking/routing impacts surcharges? Some info I pulled from https://rtw.oneworld.com/rtw

* NRT-xHKG-JNB-xDOH-LHR-HEL-JFK-NRT is ~$500 in taxes and surcharges if flying AA on the last segment (taxes are ~40% of it)
* Ending JFK-NRT on JL instead of AA adds ~$245
* Dropping HEL (so going LHR-JFK) adds $180 if flying AA or $360 if flying BA
* JNB-xDOH-LHR is $315 less than JNB-LHR (on BA) [possibly only if already flying QR on other segments]
* Adding DOH-CDG-DOH adds $200 [possibly only if already flying QR on other segments] of which ~$80 seems taxes

Just adding a data point for people as I ticketed a DONE4 ex Oslo yesterday, booked through the AA RTW desk.

Total price per person was €6,092 made up of €4,966 base fare and €1,126 taxes and charges. Airline surcharges were €557 and the balance was taxes.

Routing and carrier was as follows:

OSL-xDOH-JNB on Qatar
JNB-DOH on Qatar
DOH-ICN on Qatar
Surface segment ICN to HKG
HKG-CTS on Cathay
CTS-HKG on Cathay
HKG-DPS on Cathay
DPS-xHKG-YYZ on Cathay
YYZ-SEA on Alaska
SEA-CUN on Alaska
CUN-JFK on American
JFK-LAS on American
LAS-xLHR-OSL on American codeshare (BA metal)

Good datapoint showing AA is happy to ticket even if there's no AA metal - just a codeshare flight number.

Lots of backtracking on this routing - I assume it's also aiming to maximize mileage/status earned?

Originally when I was booking, the agent insisted that my JFK to LHR flight be on American metal. Then I made a couple of tweaks and added on Las Vegas, and the person making the changes didn't question it being AA metal - codeshare was good enough.

Yeah, bit of backtracking - combination of maximising tier points for status, but also this is part of long term travel so these are all places we wanted to go anyway. So I just routed them to suit the time of year we are going to each place, and also maximise status earned - worked out pretty well for us.

Have several data points where AA marketed BA metal was fine for AA.

For those people who are maximizing AA marketed flights, I even found a routing from Asia to Europe on AA numbers.
Not via US obviously.

As do I for AA marketed QR metal.

Hi,

From the RTW tool, I found the price ex-OSLO on Economy seems cheaper compare to other
3 Continents: NOK17,243.00 = 1641 USD
4 Continents: NOK20,430.00
5 Continents: NOK23,699.00
6 Continents: NOK26,967.00

While for Business class, it's about same with ex-Tokyo or ex-Columbo

I am trying to build a LONE3 ex-OSLO to see what's the final price the tool would quote.
Unfortunately, I always got stuck at the first segment, regardless of what city i change, it always said cant find flight, anyone has similar experience?

My trial and error route, making it as simple as possible
OSL - MAD/LHR/HEL/CDG (tried all these)
MAD/LHR/HEL/CDG - DOH
DOH - Tokyo
Tokyo - KUL
KUL - HKG
HKG - JFK
JFK - LAX
LAX - OSL
anything I did wrong?

The online tool is known for errors and bugs.
There's no reason to believe what it's telling you.

Also, given all the complaints you've had with QF agents, I can't imagine why you are using the tool again.

If it prices then nothing I've seen suggests you can't trust that *price*. So it's a useful way to get input on likely taxes & surcharges for a given routing. This info likely takes days to get otherwise and is then still awkward to get for multiple similar routings which is what you need to get a sense of what changes hit taxes and surcharges non trivially.

I suspect the ticketing carrier matters on occasion too but there seems no easy way to find info on this. Maybe this recent sharing trend will lead to that. I very much welcome people sharing pricing info so we get a better sense of *ticketed* costs in various situations. Plus it may spark routing ideas. Please don't anyone be discouraged!

It would be nice to have more of it one currency mind, usd seems the obvious one. And yes, I would also strongly encourage people to consider the aa rtw desk to be their default for actual ticketing unless they really know what they are doing. The ease difference is generally enormous.

It takes <24 hours to get a rate back from AA if you use the AA RTW desk. Sometimes it will be a bit more if you book on a Friday or the weekend.

Yep, and good for people to know. I'd add that you can get priced while you wait (often a good while) on the phone if you fly soon (more likely for a change to an existing ticket of course).

When pricing to explore the impact of routings I looked up a dozen similar routes. Maybe it's just me but I would not feel comfortable asking for those at the same time, or even one after the other as edits which would take a fortnight elapsed but would at least save the hour-ish on phone set up from scratch can take.

If you have your route nailed, or nearly so, and are focused on ticketing then I would certainly say call AA unless you know what you're doing and have a good reason to ticket elsewhere.

I'm not planning on booking any of the routings shared by others or even (exactly) my pricing experiment routes. I'm finding them useful to see them priced though and hope people keep sharing.

No first flight either
 

Yes, I had trouble with my first flight too. Sometimes no flight, sometimes no business class.

After reading through most? of this thread. I think I want to use QR for some flights.

For example, OSL DFW. To use the OneWorld RTW too,l how do you get routing through DOH??

Agree that I like to play with the tool, then call AA RTW desk when I only have a couple of options to price.

I am in the middle of one RTW but playing with the tool see what I might want to do at the end of this one in OSL.

You don't. The tool does not allow the first segment to be on QR.

I think flyhurl's itinerary is ending in OSL and they are already partially though it.

You have to force it most of the time, so you'd put in DFW-DOH and DOH-OSL separately but have your departure date the same date as arrival (or less than 24 hours), that usually works in the OW tool.

It tends to throw errors before ticketing if you do that with certain airlines, but many of them will work, and you should at least be able to get availability that way if nothing else. But QR most definitely goes by married segment logic, and in the tool that will break a married segment. If there is no availability on the married segment then you still can't book it, you need Expertflyer to check that. (Enter DFW-OSL, with connection in DOH), you need D on that, it doesn't matter if DFW-DOH and DOH-OSL have it separately. If there's no married segment availability then you need over 24 hours in DOH to break it.

Yes. I do have a current RTW ticket that I just changed the last leg (to be taken in March) to be HKG DOH OSL.

But now I am looking at starting new RTW ticket next fall and may want OSL DOH DFW as the first leg. So all the answers have been helpful. If I don't force routing, the Oneworld tool still throws out no business class available on the first flight if it is OSL DFW but is ok if the first flight is HEL DFW or OSL LON. But with the information provided, I have been able to work around enough for my research.

Thanks.

TYO Price increase
 

It may have been mentioned elsewhere , but it appears there has been a fairly large price increase for TYO RTW effective 10/1/2024 . DONE4 780400 JPY TO 936500 JPY

Bummer :td:
According to EF, BA and CX are yet to update their fares - so if you are quick...

ETA
Quick check in EF, prices ex-Norway are unchanged :tu:

ETA
To be fair, these fares had been unchanged since at least March 2012
(the rule sheet for that month included the base fares for all countries - I kept a copy)

Was comparing OSL to TYO and saw the TYO increase. I had not checked OSL for a while , so it is good to know they are unchanged.

Does anyone have a phone number to book with BA?

ETA: So ex-Japan, EF now showing USD 5,429.14 base fare for a DONE3 ticketed by AA. Still pretty much a bargain for what you get. Just checked, and my itineraries run around USD 700-750 in taxes and fees. So a total of a little under $6,200. That's at the low end of what I would have to pay for BKK-BOS roundtrip in business, so no complaints here. I just priced out a BKK-BOS roundtrip for the dates I want for my next trip, and it's USD 7,843 on QR. So I'll still buy the DONE3 tickets, -- even at the new price it's still a bargain for me, plus the extra stops I get to make are essentially free.

Ok, that makes sense then, the OW tool doesn't allow QR to be the first carrier. You have to book that with AA or another carrier directly, not in the OW tool.

I suspect that's more to do with the long term weakening of the Yen than anything else. The J-gov has had plenty of opportunities to reverse course but doesn't want to and the new PM just appointed sent it back the wrong direction again making public statements that he doesn't want BOJ to raise rates again this year. The Yen carry trade is very profitable at the moment and keeps the Yen suppressed, but all it would take is a couple more rate increases from the BOJ and a couple more decreases by the US Fed to squeeze the carry traders out and put the Yen back to normal levels, but of course these fares won't return to their old prices once that finally happens making the USD price far less competitive once the rate comes back down.

I'm not too excited about having to position to OSL for my next one, but we'll see where things stand at the time. It seems the ex-Japan price increase is about $1000 at current rates, which still may be ok considering the lack of YQ. I know it's not everyone's cup of tea but ex-Pakistan is also quite competitive, I've seen one or two people talk about using that one (believe on a UL booking). ex-CMB appears to be decent too if you can't position to Europe cheaply.

From what I saw on Expertflyer, the base fare for DONE3 ex-Tokyo is 4563USD through AA.

Screenshot just now.

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...45dff194ae.png

Yeah, since my current one ends in November at NRT, repositioning to OSL would not be my first choice, either. OSL is at USD 4956.67 according to EF, and CMB is USD 5372.00 for an IONE3. I use CMB as the western end of my intra-Asian MRs, so I'd have to completely rejig that part of my itineraries (because I would be limited by the one international arrival and one international departure rule).

KHI is cheap enough, listed in EF at USD 4591 for an IONE3. I have a friend here (Thailand) who is from Pakistan, his family still lives there. In the past, he has said that he would not want me to go to KHI even for a transit because it can get really crazy at the airport. He carries a hangun whenever he's in-country, and hired two armed guards for his Thai girlfriend when she visited earlier this year. Just sent him an email to see what his current assessment is.