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Oneworld Explorer Rule Changes that we would like to see

I have an expectation (or maybe it is just a hope) that a new version of the rule sheet will be published in September.
Why? Because JJ commences GRU-JNB services, thus making possible 3-continent itineraries that start in the southern hemisphere continents (for example SYD-SCL-GRU-JNB-SYD).

So I expect the following words to be removed from Rule 0 (zero):

* 3 Continent Fare is only offered for travel originating in Asia, Europe/Middle East and North America

(and I further expect 3-continent fares to be published for countries in the southern hemisphere continents).

Just in case there IS a lurker who reads this forum (either from Oneworld itself or from one of the airlines), what rule changes would WE like to see? We can list them here in this thread, and who knows….

So, I will go first

Minor changes:

Renumber the clauses!

They are numbered 0, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 26
Would it be too hard to number them 1 to 17?

Rule 4(h)

Remove the word free from this “Free flight segments within each continent are limited as follows:”
In the past we could purchase additional segments within a continent, but that ability was removed some time ago. So now the only flight segments allowed are the free segments, so the word ‘free’ is superfluous.

Also unbold the word flight.

Rule 15

Has the following sentence:

Quote:

When travel originates in a country for which a specific local currency fares is published and the ticket is sold in another country, the fare will be that published for the country of origin converted to the currency of the country of sale at the bank selling rate.

I am unsure what the words “for which a specific local currency fares is published” are meant to convey, but if they are necessary then I suggest the wording be changed to
- Either “for which a specific local currency fare is published”
- Or “for which specific local currency fares are published”

But my view is the words are unnecessary, and the following wording would suffice:

Quote:

When travel originates in one country and the ticket is sold in another country, the fare will be that published for the country of origin converted to the currency of the country of sale at the bank selling rate.

Middling change:

Re-write (yet again!) the backtrack rules in 4(e).

What is there is still unnecessarily complex IMHO. I suggest the following wording:

4(e) Only one intercontinental departure and one intercontinental arrival permitted in each continent except as follows:

Two permitted in North America when one is a transfer without stopover
Two permitted in Asia when one is a transfer without stopover
Two permitted in Europe/Middle East when one is a transfer without stopover. Note only one flight segment allowed between United Kingdom and South Africa/Mauritius

Perhaps words such as the following might need to be added at the end (but not in my opinion): “Note a direct single plane service between two continents that transits one of the above continents is considered a transfer without stopover”.

With the change to the rule for two visits to Europe/Middle East, remove the Zones from the definition of the continent Europe/Middle East. In other words, change:

The continent of Europe-Middle East consists of 2 zones:

Europe (including Algeria, Morocco, Russia west of the Urals & Tunisia)
Middle East (including Egypt, Libya and Sudan)

To
The continent of Europe-Middle East consists of Europe, including Russia West of the Urals, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Middle East including Egypt, Libya and Sudan

Major changes

Make rule 4(e) more complex!

This is a Southie versus Northie thing. As it stands the rule only allows backtracks of northern hemisphere continents. I think they should allow backtracks of southern hemisphere continents as well or instead.
My suggested wording:

Quote:

4(e) Only one intercontinental departure and one intercontinental arrival permitted in each continent except as follows:

Either Two permitted in North America when one is a transfer without stopover
Or Two permitted in South America when one is a transfer without stopover
Either Two permitted in Asia when one is a transfer without stopover
Or Two permitted in South West Pacific when one is a transfer without stopover
Either Two permitted in Europe/Middle East when one is a transfer without stopover
Or Two permitted in Africa when one is a transfer without stopover. Note only one flight segment allowed between United Kingdom and South Africa/Mauritius.

I was once looking at an itinerary that in summary went JNB-SYD-SCL-EZE-LHR-JNB. At the start I needed to fly from Africa straight to Australia because of time constraints. I would have liked to include Asia after SWP, but to do so would have required the inclusion of North America (in order to get from Asia to Sth America). If I had been allowed to revisit the SWP as a transfer without stopover then I could have done it (for example HKG-xAKL-SCL).

Remove the following words from Rule 0:

* Travel between South West Pacific and Europe/Middle East on a single flight number/or by surface eg LON-SYD/MELvv, DXB-SYD/MELvv, DOH-ADL/MEL/PER/SYDvv, is considered travelling via Asia. Continents South West Pacific, Asia and Europe/Middle East must each be counted.

I get what the purpose is – there are some very long flights possible here and the airlines want more money. But:

The longest of the flights, which is LHR-SYD is only 600 or so miles longer than SYD-JFK and it seems unreasonable to me to charge whole continent for that
It is very unreasonable to charge a whole continent for the shortest possible flight, which is DOH-PER at 5,800 miles and so is a similar distance to other inter-continental flights

Finally, I have been mulling the implications of a change to the definitions of the continents of Africa and Europe/Middle East -changing them to Europe and Africa/Middle East. But I will leave that for another post:D

Edited to add;
I realized I have left the words "Middle East" out my proposed definition of the continent Europe/Middle East:o
and I remembered I had intended to add these words at the end of my post

I obviously have way too much time on my hands:)

Quote:

Originally Posted by pandaperth (Post 27013444)

* 3 Continent Fare is only offered for travel originating in Asia, Europe/Middle East and North America

(and I further expect 3-continent fares to be published for countries in the southern hemisphere continents).

I too expect we'll see Southern Hemisphere *ONE3s - what do we think might happen the Africa backtracking rules now that there would be a S. Atlantic 'escape route' - would we see the removal of the extra Europe-Middle East arrival/departure - or the addition of an extra S. America arrival/departure? (when one is a transfer without stopover).

Quote:

Minor changes:

Renumber the clauses!

They are numbered 0, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 26
Would it be too hard to number them 1 to 17?

I can answer this one! These are industry standard ATPCo fare category numbers - when the fares are filed in ATPCo, each rule type goes into a certain paragraph, for example, penalties are always filed in 'paragraph 16' - across airlines and alliances. Fares without any penalty simply won't have a category 16, just like the *ONEx fares don't have a category 1 (which is always 'eligibility' - anyone can buy a *ONEx fare but for other fares you must be a Government employee, or a senior citizen, or... etc.,)

Have a look here to see all the category numbers - scroll down to category: http://www.atpco.net/glossary/c

In fact, in Sabre and Apollo, to display the penalties paragraph of a fare, the category numbers are used, so RD1*16 to display the penalties of the first fare from a fare display in Sabre and $V7/16 to display the fees for the 7th fare displayed in Apollo.

There, useless information - you're welcome!

it is not.clear gru jnb hkg syd will stick...

Quote:

Originally Posted by pbd456 (Post 27014544)

it is not.clear gru jnb hkg syd will stick...

:confused:What do you mean?

Quote:

Originally Posted by JAXBA (Post 27014502)

Quote:

Minor changes:

Renumber the clauses!
They are numbered 0, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 26
Would it be too hard to number them 1 to 17?

Not useless at all, and thank you - I have learnt something new today:D

As for the other part of your post, namely:

Quote:

It's too late in the day here (ZNZ), and I've had too many beers to think about this now - so manyana, OK?

I've remembered another change I would like to see

Minor Change

Right at the top of the Rule Sheet it says:

Quote:

0. APPLICATION AND OTHER CONDITIONS
First / Business / Economy RTW / Open Jaw travel via AA/AB/AY/BA/CX/HG/IB/JJ/JL/KA/LA/MH/NU/QF/QR/RJ/S7/UL/XL/4M operated services worldwide.

Then Clause 4(c) says:

Quote:

(c) Travel may originate at any point for which fares are published and must terminate at the same point, except that origin-destination surface segments are permitted as follows
(a) within the country of origin
(b) within the Middle East
(c) between the United States and Canada
(d) between HKG and China
(e) between Malaysia and SIN
(f) within Africa
(g) between Maldives & Sri Lanka/India

Now to my mind - if you do not return to your point of origin, then you have an open jaw between your origin and your destination, not a surface segment.
So why is 4(e) worded the way it is? Surely it would be more accurate/appropriate to have the wording:

Quote:

(c) Travel may originate at any point for which fares are published and must terminate at the same point, except that an origin-destination open jaw is permitted as follows
(a) within the country of origin
(b) within the Middle East
(c) between the United States and Canada
(d) between HKG and China
(e) between Malaysia and SIN
(f) within Africa
(g) between Maldives & Sri Lanka/India

I have never heard of an airline saying "Mmm, you have 16 flight segments and then a surface segment between your origin and your destination, that makes 17 segments in all which is one too many". But ya neva no!

4 (c)(d) Between HKG and China

Is of course redundant now since that is covered by 4 (c)(a)

Although whether an open-jaw between HKG and TPE would be permitted is an interesting question!

Quote:

Originally Posted by christep (Post 27018384)

4 (c)(d) Between HKG and China

Is of course redundant now since that is covered by 4 (c)(a)

Although whether an open-jaw between HKG and TPE would be permitted is an interesting question!

LOL:D

Quote:

Originally Posted by pandaperth (Post 27014589)

:confused:What do you mean?

neither the economy of brazil or south africa are.doing particularly well. do u think the route will survive?

the chance that anyone doing an open jaw between hkg tpe is minimal unless s/he is a mileage runner who need to fly tpe.hkg for another deal, there is no easy way to travel from taiwan to hk without flying.

Quote:

Originally Posted by pbd456 (Post 27014544)

it is not.clear gru jnb hkg syd will stick...

Quote:

Originally Posted by pandaperth (Post 27014589)

:confused:What do you mean?

Quote:

Originally Posted by pbd456 (Post 27018821)

neither the economy of brazil or south africa are.doing particularly well. do u think the route will survive?

So sorry that I did not understand the first time:rolleyes:

Quote:

Originally Posted by christep (Post 27018384)

4 (c)(d) Between HKG and China

Is of course redundant now since that is covered by 4 (c)(a)

Although whether an open-jaw between HKG and TPE would be permitted is an interesting question!

Quote:

Originally Posted by pandaperth (Post 27018461)

LOL:D

Quote:

Originally Posted by pbd456 (Post 27018831)

LOL (this laugh is called irony:))

Travel may originate at any point for which fares are published and must terminate at the same point, except that origin-destination surface segments are permitted as follows:

Add within Europe.

Countries that use the Euro have the same fare, so why not start in Germany and end in Spain. Also, many of the African fares are quoted in US $ and are the same. Why not Europe as well.

[

Quote:

Originally Posted by JAXBA (Post 27014502)

To address your second point initially:

What are you suggesting? That a backtrack from Africa to South America be allowed? Since South America is in TC1 and Africa in TC2, that would go against:

Quote:

4(a) Travel must be via the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and only one crossing of each ocean is permitted.
4(b) Travel must be in a continuous forward direction between TC1 - TC2 - TC3

So I’m both puzzled and intrigued by your words

OK, now to your first point

I do not think there will be any change to the backtrack rules for Africa (the backtracks being of course through Africa's northern neighbour Europe/Middle East).

Here's my thinking.

Africa has always been Oneworld's problem continent, because the alliance has so few intra-continental flights (only BA's subsidiary Comair with its small network in southern Africa) and poor connectivity to the continent from elsewhere.

In particular a swathe of countries in West, Central and East Africa only have Oneworld flights going North – to Europe/Middle East. They have no Oneworld connectivity going South to Southern Africa, or East or West out of Africa

JJ’s flights GRU-JNB will do nothing for this swathe of countries. They will still need backtracking.

(The alliance solved this problem for North Africa – by defining it to be part of Europe/Middle East! Maybe that’s the solution for West/Central/East Africa:D)

Quote:

Originally Posted by pandaperth (Post 27019780)

What are you suggesting? That a backtrack from Africa to South America be allowed? Since South America is in TC1 and Africa in TC2...

You're right, I hadn't thought of the progression of TCs. Duh.

Quote:

You're also right about the intra-Africa connectivity. I was simply thinking along the lines of that there used to be no African trans-Atlantic route - one had to pass through Eu/ME.

Now there is one, GRU-JNB, we might see a change to back track rules for Southern Africa (ZA and anything with a conx to JNB). Maybe not, as there's still no NA-Africa route, and while potential Southern hemisphere *ONE3s and above could avoid Eu/ME altogether, a N hemi+Africa RTW still cannot avoid Eu/ME. I don't think I even know what I meant myself anymore...

Let's have this discussion again when AA (or BA Comair!) starts US-Africa in 5/10/15 years... NA-AFR-AS-NA anyone?

The southern hemisphere xONE3 was mentioned, but the GRU-JNB flight disappearing would also eliminate the xONE4 that included north, south america, africa and (asia/swp)and require an xONE5 fare.

Happy wandering

Fred

OK let’s discuss the origin-destination open jaw rule, which is:

4(c) Travel may originate at any point for which fares are published and must terminate at the same point, except that origin-destination surface segments are permitted as follows

(a) within the country of origin
(b) within the Middle East
(c) between the United States and Canada
(d) between HKG and China
(e) between Malaysia and SIN
(f) within Africa
(g) between Maldives & Sri Lanka/India

My opinion is that it is very generous to some origins and stingy to others

Generous Examples:

(f) within Africa – lots of us have taken advantage of this for our ex-MPM itineraries
(b) with the Middle East – lots of us took advantage of this for our ex-KRT itineraries
(c) between the United States and Canada – so start at HNL and end at JFK

Stingy examples:

Geographically small countries, such as Holland, Belize, Caribbean island nations…

I guess that we would all like to see the rule say:

4(c) Travel may originate at any point for which fares are published and must terminate in the same continent
Or even
4(c) Travel may originate at any point for which fares are published and may terminate anywhere:D

OK I know the ticket is named a Round-The-World ticket, but from the airlines’ perspective what is wrong with having flexibility such as these? After all, we are still limited to 16 flights maximum.

What do others think?

Other points:

In post #13 above headinclouds suggested a new exception
(h) within Europe
Which, with the current definition of Europe, could mean something like originate in Germany and end in Morocco

_____________________________

Another issue with this rule has arisen recently – see post #144 in this thread http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/onewo...periences.html
The OP wanted to originate in Russia West of the Urals (in other words in Europe) and finish in Russia East of the Urals (in other words in Asia), but origin and destination are in the same country. This was on a Global Explorer, not a Oneworld Explorer, but both fare rules have the same words for this rule. The ticketing airline refused – presumably because it felt you had to return to the same continent and same TC area as well as to the same country. When the whole of Russia was defined to be in Europe, this problem would not have arisen.

_____________________________

In my view, a couple of the exceptions could be removed:

(d) between HKG and China
– as pointed out by christep in post #7, nowadays this is covered by (a) within country of origin
(e) between Malaysia and SIN
– IIRC this predates MH’s joining the alliance
(g) between Maldives & Sri Lanka/India
- IIRC this came in when BA commenced its LGW-MLE service, it certainly predates UL’s joining the alliance, which has services to MLE, and the commencement of CX’s HKG-MLE services

So, what do others think?

Given the premiums that the airlines charge on a per sector basis I can't see this happening... But with AA adding a premium Y cabin, I would really really like to see a premium Y RTW added to the rules...

Now back to more realistic wandering

Fred

Quote:

Originally Posted by headinclouds (Post 27019583)

Quote:

Originally Posted by pandaperth (Post 27023462)

Which, with the current definition of Europe, could mean something like originate in Germany and end in Morocco

They could narrow it slightly by saying 'within the European Union' or more generously, 'within the European Economic Area' which is the EU+Iceland+Norway (and +Switzerland if defined as the European Free Trade Association (EFTA)). Not sure what level of association the UK is going to end up with after Brexit yet...

I don't think an origin/destination open-jaw 'within the EU/EEA/EFTA zone' would be unreasonable.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wandering_fred (Post 27024121)

I agree, it'd be nice to see. Slight issue in that, for now, very few of the booking classes for PE are aligned, unlike A/D/L, and there wouldn't be a straightforward name for the hypothetical PEONEx.

The current longhaul PE surcharges are silly compared to the overall cost of a RTW though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JAXBA (Post 27033434)

Not unreasonable, but would need to disallow the EU "outermost regions" (the French, Spanish and Portuguese holdings that are considered part of the EU but are in Africa or the Americas).

Quote:

Originally Posted by pandaperth (Post 27013444)

* 3 Continent Fare is only offered for travel originating in Asia, Europe/Middle East and North America

(and I further expect 3-continent fares to be published for countries in the southern hemisphere continents).

...

Well it seems my hopes have been dashed. It is now Sept 6th and no sign of a new version of the fare rules.
No sign of xONE3 fares in EF either (though I only checked business class ex-SYD)
Also, I have plugged into the on-line tool a very simple 3-continent all southern hemisphere itinerary (SYD-SCL-GRU-JNB-SYD). The tool says it is a valid itinerary, but it prices it as four-continents.

If there is a lurker - what's going on??

Nope, no xONE3s out of JNB either yet, in any class.

Maybe they're hesitating because two thirds of a Southern Hemi xONE3 would have to use the GRU-JNB-SYD flights, and they don't want a product based on that?

Posted minutes ago on Facebook by oneworld: https://www.facebook.com/oneworldall...766557146630:0

Quote:

A new version of the oneworld Explorer round-the-world fare has been launched – for travel solely in the southern hemisphere....

Haven't actually found the fares filed as yet... will keep checking.