HI everyone,

Afew weeks ago, I received some very useful advice here regarding buying my ticket in BUD despite living in the UK. Plans are progressing well, and I now have the following route devised for early next year:

1) BUD-(LHR)-MCT.
2) MCT-LHR.
3) LHR-SFO.
4) SFO-HKG.
5) HKG-CMB.
6) CMB-(HKG)-(LHR)-BUD.

(XXX)signifies that no stopver will be taken there- merely a transit.
I know I'm not taking full advantage of the stopover options, but shortage of time and the fact that I need to visit Muscat and Colombo governed the routing.

I do have a few final quiestions to ask before I go to BUD to buy my ticket:

A). In part 6 at the end of the trip, am I allowed to transit through HKG, despite having taken a stopover there earlier?

B) In part 6, I will be returning to BUD via LHR. Is this permitted, given that it could be considered that I am backtracking to England having previously taken my stopovers in LHR and MCT? (there is however no other way to get back to BUD other than via LHR).

C) It is my understanding that I will be charged extra for the final segment LHR-BUD, despite it being only my 4th flight segment within Europe. This is because I would have already reached my Europe stopover limit by stopping in MCT and LHR. ("once the stopover limit has been reached, all remaining flight segments will be forfeited"). Can someone confirm that this is unfortunately true?

Many thanks for any help.

Salt.

[This message has been edited by salt (edited 11-04-2000).]

[This message has been edited by salt (edited 11-04-2000).]

A) Yes you can transit back through Hong Kong as backtracking is allowed within continents except North America - Hawaii
B)Yes you can fly back through LHR for same reason as above.
C)Strict interpretation of that rule could mean you'd be charged for an extra segment but its never happened to me. I have to fly back from Montreal to Sydney having used up my 3rd North American stop in Montreal and have not been charged for the necessary connecting segment to JFK which is my 6th NA segment. I presume if there is no direct flight back to your origin from HKG you won't get charged for a connecting segment if its within your segment limit. After all one of the other rules is that open-jaw in your continet of origin must be within the country of origin. So you wouldn't be allowed to not travel back to Budapest.
Come to think of it, it is actually impossible to return to your origin and have 2 stopovers without needing another segment because when you've had your 2 allowed stopovers you are always going to have to get back to your point of origin.

I trust that your ability to argue in Hungarian is pretty good!!!




[This message has been edited by 3544quebec (edited 11-04-2000).]

a) For whatever reason, I wrote b first. Same answer sounds like it applies, though.

b) You can backtrack as much as you want in the same continent as long as (1) you only make a stopover in a city once, and (2) you haven't reached your max segments or stops.

c) As quebec said, you need the 4th segment to get back to BUD, so it is the one place it is allowed. I think that technically, Budapest is considered the "3rd" stopover.

Good luck. I am still fighting a couple of things with them, and it's been about a month.

The unwritten rule about OWE tix seems to be that you generally need a great deal of perserverance.

You and/or your TA are very likely to get a whole variety of answers to the same question from OW RTW desks and fare desks.

[This message has been edited by wideman (edited 11-04-2000).]