Adding to the confusion :

According to the newsletter that AA sent out to members in May, South America is deifined as also included Latin America.

Can somebody please clarify what exactly constitute Africa? Morocco? Egypt?

According to Davistev, in his post on page 1, he states that:
To avoid any confusion, the continents are as follows: Europe and the Middle
East; Africa including Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Sudan and Tunisia; Asia
including the Indian subcontinent; Australia and the South Pacific including
New Zealand and Papua New Guinea; North America including Canada, the U.S.,
the Caribbean and Mexico and finally Central and South America.

Which program defined this?

[This message has been edited by Guy Betsy (edited 06-09-2000).]

Has anyone seen the rules for BA Exec Club US members on this promo? I'm assuming that 5 continents equal 50k BA US miles, but would be interested in learning if anyone has seen this documented anywhere.

MiamiPrep and Terenz - how can one go about buying these non-US priced tickets ? For Canada, I can see going to Toronto and buying it there (since I live in DC), but what about the European fares ? I do know that one must start in that country, but can one buy the ticket via mail, e-mail, fax ... It seems a shame not to take advantage of the strong US $ compared to the Euro. Thanks...

I would check with each program individually and believe nothing other than what they say about their own program. If CX tells you something about AA, don't believe them. Get it in print too. There are a lot of discrepancies between programs regarding which country is in which continent. Most of the websites have the rules posted.

HiC

Go to a travel agent in the country. I can recommend one for Canada. I understand some airlines (in Europe) will let you book and buy it out of there, and go for counter pickup. I think this is a result of EU price transparency mandates.

Headinclouds - you MUST start in the country where you purchased the ticket from. Sure you can buy the ticket from an agency via the internet and pay by creditcard. But you still must go to that country to start your journey.

If you don't the airlines can have the autority to decline you borading in USA when they check your passport and don't see a stamp in say, Bogota, where you might have bought your ticket from.

Better be wise than lose a ticket!

A lot of countries no longer stamp passports. They either scan them or enter your details into their computers. But I am sure that airlines have easier ways of checking whether the actual flight commenced from the country where the ticket was purchased from or not.

Be careful people - these Oneworld promos are fraught with ambiguities, especially with regard to booking classes. I personally got gypped out of 50,000 miles on last Fall's 100,000 promotion by flying Iberia (my 5th carrier) intra-Europe in *B* class, which didn't earn mileage on BA EC. Oddly enough, the Iberia flight was part of a simple triangle trip within Europe on IB/AY, Rome-Barcelona-Helsinki-Rome, all booked in B, and Finnair accorded mileage on BOTH their
segments but not Iberia! The only thing BA
could tell me is that "a number of other Exec Club members got screwed on this too" - somehow, not very consoling.

On this new Visit the Continents promo I was on the phone for some time with BA EC and am not sure I ever got a straight answer on the geographic definitions... ABSOLUTELY get it in writing or get it documented in your air record that what you are doing will qualify for X no. of continents on the promo. And
ESPECIALLY make sure the booking classes qualify - I hear a lot of people on here talking about cheapo flights to/from E Timor
and/or Casablanca but keep in mind these promo fares might be in non-mileage earning classes, which would disqualify the flight if it's not being acknowledged as earned mileage. Word to the wise, here....be VERY careful, especially with Iberia.

On the subject of codeshares I'm not at all certain that a flight which is not BA metal, for instance, would be disqualified - on BA's EC program, codeshares earn mileage as though they were BA flights- so LGW-CMN would most likely be fine (given the booking
class is a mileage-earning class). Basically, just ask the question, does it earn miles?? THEN worry about the geographic rules!

YOU CAN BUY A NON-US TICKET IN US. I BOOKED THROUGH AMERICAN'S AROUND-THE-WORLD DEPARTMENT, AND WAS TICKETED IN MIAMI. I LEFT FROM SPAIN, BUT GOT THERE ON ANOTHER TICKET. ORIGINATE AND COMPLETE AROUND-THE-WORLD TICKET IN SPAIN -- USE OTHER TICKET AT BEGINNING AND END OF AROUND-THE-WORLD TICKET.