Last week I booked a RTW One World Business Class fare for travel departing Australia in September.

When I was ticketed, I was shocked to learn that American Airlines will no longer provide complementary upgrades to First Class where they offer only two service levels on domestic US flights. The conditions of the RTW OW ticket now states that "where two classes are offered the traveller will be downgraded to the next lowest class of travel - without compensation".

All my AA flights have been booked in Y class despite me paying for a OW Business Class ticket.

This sucks! I have expressed my anger to my travel agent, Qantas as well as American Airlines but to no avail!

I have cancelled the ticket and purchased a Star Alliance RTW ticket. Star Alliance has confirmed in writing that all my US domestic flights taken with their RTW Business Class ticket (i.e. with United Airlines) will be ticketed in A class (First Class Economy) although the airfare purchased is a RTW Business Class fare.

Has anybody else experienced such backlash from this move between Qantas and American Airlines?

[This message has been edited by Gary (edited 08-08-2000).]

My dad is in SYD on the first stop on a huge OW RTW in Business. He was booked in First in all his US legs that have it (BOS->YYZ is on an ERJ so no First).

However, his last segment is on the 29th of August. So it's not happening right up to the end of August, but we'll see about it from September on.

Of course he, through apathy, is putting them back on his QF account which is so far past Gold. This just might motivate him enough to start accruing for status (and all the upgrades) on AA.

It would be a huge change for them to do that - look to UA to follow suit in a few months

Star Alliance has confirmed in writing that all my US domestic flights taken with their RTW Business Class ticket (i.e. with United Airlines) will be ticketed in A class (First Class Economy) although the airfare purchased is a RTW Business Class fare.

For all flights on two-class-planes to/from Hawaii and all segments North America to/from MEX United will also downgrade on Star-rtw-trips.

Star-rtw-tickets are not valid at all on UA-Express-segments.

[This message has been edited by Rudi (edited 08-09-2000).]

Not true !

I just spoke to American Airlines' Round-The-World Help Desk and they said that if you have a Business Class ticket, you are permitted to book in "A" class , which is First class on a 2 class aircraft.

This is only for the Oneworld Explorer RTW ticket as some other RTW tickets do not permit the above.

guy betsy is correct

the OW RTW Explorer (or Continent) fare permits travel in A class in absence of a business class cabin - even after 1 SEP as per both BA and QF.

However the Global Explorer RTW doesnt allow this "free" upgrade. This fare is apparently available only in certain markets and also only in certain classes depending on the origin.

this info is from BA so take it for what its worth

and rudi - regarding *A downgrades on specific sectors - a possible way around this is to use AC or MX both of which offer a business class cabin and these days it looks like a good idea to avoid UA anyways!

[QUOTE]Originally posted by bers:
[B]My dad is in SYD on the first stop on a huge OW RTW in Business. He was booked in First in all his US legs that have it (BOS->YYZ is on an ERJ so no First).

It sounds as though your father was lucky enough to book and be ticketed before Wednesday 26th July. This is when the change took effect.

My travel agent advises that AA will honor any RTW tickets booked prior to that date with First Class travel (i.e. ticketing in A class).

Any booked after that date will be ticketed for Y class on AA.

yes indogulf regarding *A downgrades on specific sectors - a possible way around this is to use AC or MX both of which offer a business class cabin that was one of my detour reasons to go an AC from HNL last sep-99.

Another way around is to book the flights to/from Hawaii on UA 3-class-flights.

I just spoke to our Corporate Travel Agent. She had not heard of such a thing and contacted both Qantas and American Airline. Neither of them said they new anything of the sort.

Gary, could you give us more details?

Is it possible she was not booking you on the OW RTW fare? Booking you on flights with full A class (not necessarily full F class - thank you AA revenue management).

My dad's ticket was only issued last week so definitely after the 26th of July.

my TA mentioned something that may be causing the confusion - she told me that if the flight has no business class cabin they will ISSUE the ticket in Y (or M) but will ENDORSE your ticket to A at the time of booking the specific flight.

This is apparently to prevent you from flying in A class should a particular flight on your sector have a D class cabin. However as far as I know AA doesnt have D except on its Flagship transcons.

So maybe this is where the confusion lies ????

I think indogulf & guy betsy has your answer.

There seems to be 2 main types of RTW tickets that I have seen: 1w Explorer, and Global Explorer.

The Global Explorer has been around longer and used to be better than the old RTW tickets before 1w was formed.

Now that they have the 1w Explorer fare, I find this to be better.

At the moment, I cannot remember the specific differences between the two types of RTW. However, it looks like one of the differences are the business class tickets on a 2 class plane!

Mind you, Gary is talking about RTW fares originating from Australia. Certain RTW fares are specific to ex-Australia only.

However, I spoke to the AA special RTW desk 3 days ago and she said that she has never heard of such a ridiculous thing.

I think what your agent meant is when you're ready to book in 'A' class and that class of service is full, and its a 2 class flight, you will be downgraded to M class without any refund, because you are not allowed to book in F class. You may waitlist, but if A class is full, it's full.

On my way from BOS to TPE and then to Europe and Boston I had a RTW on star, with a portion(TPE-HKG) on Oneworld. I was in Business class and for some reason the UA flight from BOS to SFO had 3 classes. Since I arrived early I got on an earlier flight in F class which was much better.

I just finished my international AA biz class trip on 16th Oct (US segments) and I can safely say that I was in 1st class on ORD-DFW and DFW-LAX on AA. Not even a mention of a downgrade. I must add that I also loved the service on AA which IMHO comes in after CX and BA.

Spider, was your ticket booked ex-Australia? If so, was the ticket booked prior to 26th July?

Gary,

My ticket was not booked ex-Australia. New routing and new stock were done in early Oct. But I must admit that the first leg of the journey started in early July.