Circle Explorer Route Check Please
 

Is the following route permissible under the terms of the Circle Explorer? The purpose is to visit SA, Oz and HK on one trip, not to gather miles.

GIB-LHR-JNB-DUR-JNB-PER-SYD-AYQ-CNS-SYD-HKG-LHR-GIB.

Specifically is the JNB-PER route allowed as it is SAA metal for QF codeshare.

Thanks.

You can not use SAA metal. Only One world metal is permitted.
Furthermore, you can do only two stopovers in south pacific continet
(and other continents.)
So, you should specify stopover points for advice.

GIB-LHR-xJNB-DUR-JNB-xSYD-AYQ-CNS-xSYD-HKG-LHR-GIB
is valid routing example.

Thanks. Shame about the JNB-PER route as it is much more frequent than JNB-SYD. Not sure I understand what you mean by stopover in this case. In what sense is SYD a stopover and AYQ or CNS not?

With a little tweaking, you could probably squeeze into a Global Explorer which would allow you to use SA on that route. Specifically, if you do PER-AYQ-CNS-SYD without the backtrack to Sydney as you have it now then it comes to 33000 miles and you could route GIB-LHR-JNB-DUR-JNB-PER-AYQ-CNS-SYD-HKG-NYC-LHR-GIB.

If you want to visit and stay AYQ and CNS, they consumes two permitted stopovers in southwest pacific contint.
In that case, you can not stopover at SYD.

x before airport code denotes transit.

As Daren suggested, Global Explorer may be better solution, because price of 4 continents Circle Trip Exploere is (almost?) same as Global Explorer with 34,000 mileage limit.

Given that the OP's continent of origin is NOT SWP he is not restricted to 2 stopovers there.

With the circle indian you get two stopovers per continent and six total. Works differently than the OWE.

It is a Circle Trip Explorer ticket, not sure if that's the same as a Circle Indian?

I found the rules (admittedly for tickets ex-Japan!) and there is no mention of the 2 stopover rule except in continent of origin. It does say no more than 4 flight segments per continent however.

aristoph you need a little terminology here. The One World tickets are:

One World Explorer ticket a/k/a OWE = fare depends on number of continents visited
One World Global Explorer a/k/a GLOBEX = fare depends on mileage
One World Circle Indian Ocean a/k/a CIRIND = as it is described, can circle the Indian Ocean, i.e. travel to Africa, South West Pacific (Australia in your case) and Asia possible. European originations are permitted.

There is no such thing as a Circle Trip Explorer Ticket. The folks here are suggesting the relative merits of OWE vs. GLOBEX vs. CIRIND. You can find the rules for them here if you want to read up yourself. Good luck with the planning.

See
http://www.oneworld.com/products/circle_trip.cfm

Circtle Trip Explorer EXISTS!
Fare Code are
AONEWC3/4
DONEWC3/4
LONEWC3/4, LHONEWC3/4, LMONEWC3/4

Circle Pacific Fare also exists.
See
http://www.oneworld.com/products/circle_pacific.cfm


By the way,
I forgot total limit of 6 stopovers rule at my previous post.
My suggested routing violates this rule.
So,
GIB-xLHR-xJNB-DUB-JNB-xSYD-AYQ-CNS-xSYD-HKG-LHR-GIB
Is valid one.

Yes, they are the same. If you click on the link that someone else put up and go to "planning your trip" it lists the 6/2 limitations.

I found good pointer to these fares.
See
http://www.rtwinfo.co.uk/ft/explorerlatest.pdf

This document describes newest rules.

If Circle Indian Fare and Circle Explorer are same,
Circle Indian Fare Rule in http://www.hardlink.com/~markdu/OWFiles/
(eamus wrote above) is OLD and obsolete.

Under new rule, free flight segments within each continent are limited to 4.
Old rule did not have this restriction.
You can purchase additional flight segments within each continet except the continent of origin (same as One World Explorer Fare) under new rule.

Maximum of 20 segments is also applied under new rule.

Circle Indian Fare Rule in above link does not describe this 20 segment limit.

I would look at the BA files with a huge grain of salt because historically they have been notoriously inaccurate. I would personally put far more creedance in the starfiles than the BA files, especially since the starfile and the info on the oneworld website are identical while the info from BA is different. The starfile *does* reference the 20 segment limit but does not reference a four segment limit. I expect that whoever wrote the BA file mixed up the Circle Trip with the Oneworld Explorer but maybe it is something new. Maybe markdu would be kind enough to just check if there has been any modifications to the starfile. Should be easy enough to check by comparing the date at the end of the file. If there has not been changes then I suggest just booking through a carrier other than BA.

If you look closely at the rules here:
http://www.hardlink.com/~markdu/OWFiles/OneCirInd.html
You will see that the fare basis codes for the circle indian:
And the fare basis code for the circle explorer from the rtwinfo site are the same:
Also the 20 segment limitation is in the markdu version of the rules here:

If you are in A or D class, be aware that QF are only operating WHY class aircraft on more and more flights to ASP and AYQ.

Thanks Darren and jerry a. laska.
I apology my confusing posting.

I am puzzled now. What is the point of a ticket with 20 segment maximum but only 6 stopovers? The most segments you could reasonably use on a 4 continent ticket would be 16, unless you took two connecting flights to each stopover. Why would they offer such a restrictive package for the same price as a Global Explorer?

My guess is that since it's not the more popular trip that it absorbs a lot of the changes that are incorporated into the OWE even though they dont entirely make sense. For example, the two stopover limitation is probably a throwback to when the OWE also had such a limitation. I am sure that the drafters considered what would happen if they scrapped the limitations and envisioned a trip with 20 segments total and 15 stops in Asia or Africa so they decided not to change it when imposing the 20 segments. I do wish that the trip allowed 8 or 9 stops with a max of 3 per continent.

Darren, I must be dumb and/or not understanding this thread, but the way I read those files they actually have a different fare basis, eg: DONEX (One World Explorer) vs. DONECX (Circle Indian Ocean), which suggests that they are not the same - you wouldn't have two different fare codes for the same ticket - and in any case the most obvious difference is that the CIRIND doesn't require one Pacific and one Atlantic crossing. The restrictions seem otherwise pretty closely track each other so I wonder if that's what you mean when you say they are the same? The other difference seems to be pricing: the website I looked at listed what looks a lot like a CIRIND fare for A$2389 plus taxes and it also lists the Circle Pacific Fare by name for A$2999 plus taxes.

I think that the One World website reference to a "Circle Trip Explorer Ticket" is a slightly woolly way of saying we have a special fare or two here and you should talk to your travel agent about it, rather than a substitute for the Sabre files. But I am happy to be set straight on this.

I will state this with the disclaimer that something might have changed that I dont know about. If so, then I apologize for being misleading. The D obviously reflects class and the X is the number of continents or miles of the fare.

Oneworld Explorer - DONEX
Continent based. Six free segments in North America and four for each of the rest, max 20. Must go around the world. Two stops in continent of origin, unlimited stops in the others.

Circle Indian / Circle Explorer - DONECX
Continent based, fare is the same as the Oneworld Explorer. Depending on whether you ask BA or Sabre, either the same segment number restrictions as a Oneworld Explorer or unlimited segments, max 20. Do not need to go in a circle but not around the world. Max two stops per continent with max total of six stops.

Circle Pacific - DCIRXX or DCIRXXSA with South American option
I know nothing about it other than it's mileage based. Look at http://www.hardlink.com/~markdu/OWFiles/OneCirPac.html for more info.

Global Explorer - DGLOBXX
Mileage based. Can do either 26k, 29k, or 34k on economy but biz and first are limited to only the 34k option. You can use FJ, GF, and PH in addition to the eight oneworld carriers along with a few others like SA on the Qantas codeshare from South Africa to Australia. There are stopover restrictions which for most tickets will be 5 per continent with 15 total however youre restricted to two in the continent of origin.

If there is any besides these four then I dont personally know about them. It's possible but seems unlikely since the people here keep pretty good track of things.

Good luck with your planning.