OW RTW purchase 2 additional sectors - rules
 

I note that rules permit purchase of two additional sectors on each continent for US$150 a sector.
Does this mean I could fly 22 sectors if I bought two extra sectors in Asia?
Or is 20 sectors an absolute cap for RTW explorer fares?
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ref: http://www.oneworld.com/products/explorer.cfm
A maximum of 20 flight segments are permitted for the entire journey.

Flights and stopovers
You are allowed to take 2 stopovers in total within your continent of origin in order to get to or from a gateway to commence or return from your international travel.

After departing from your continent of origin, you are allowed to take up to 4 flights to explore each of the other continents (6 flights in North America).

You can book up to 2 additional flights per continent, at a set rate.

QED



[This message has been edited by Gold Member (edited Mar 17, 2004).]

20 sectors limit is the absolute limit.
It is applied for the entire journey including extra purchased sectors.

You just ruined my schedule!

Unless you have a pre April 2003 purchased OWE which doesn't have a 20 sector limit (but very few of those left in circulation now).

Other than max 20 segements for the whole itinerary, what other rules govern purchasing additional segments?

What is the current price for them?

Thanks :)

From the star file:

Thanks for the quick response Viajero ^

Note that you can purchase extra segments in any class at or below the class of your ticket. This is useful when the extra segment doesn't have anything but coach service, for example, or the airline's biz class isn't worth USD300.

Some airlines/agents have allowed this pax to select which segment is "extra" while others have insisted that they be the last in chronological order, an obvious disadvantage when an earlier segment had that low-class service. I don't think there is anything in the rules on this.

Note also that you can have as many open jaws in your OWE itinerary as you want. For example my last ONE included London-Iceland-London. Including both legs in my ONE would have added up to 21 segments; fortunately, I was able to get a GBP39 fare for the outbound leg. That was in coach, but BA biz intra-Europe is nothing to chase after.

I don't know how much the return would have cost, since I didn't have any better plans for the ONE segment. In any case my point is, if you've put together a 20-segment trip and wish for more, or have used the free 4/6 segments in a continent and want more, first check to see which segments can be purchased separately for under USD150 - they abound.

While we are on this subject, I'd appreciate confirmation that the purchased segments do not have to fall within the long haul constraints. That is, one can purchase LHR-DXB-LHR as two extra segments even if one already has LHR-CAI-LHR or can have two extra trans-continental segments within North America or Australia (within the limitation, of course, that the purchased segments are not in the continent of origin). Correct?

Extra transcons is a no-no; extra "long" flights is a definite maybe. See this thread.

It would be nice if someone reports success buying extra "long" flights. So far it's only conjecture that the word "free" in the rules means that extra "paid" long segments will be allowed. I'd anticipate a BA/AA difference of opinion on that, as with their differing interpretation of certain Eastern-bloc fares.

In the context of experimentation, don't forget that if you buy extra segments and then elect to cancel them, iirc you don't get the money back.