No. You should get a 95% refund of the fare (and fuel surcharges), and a total refund on government taxes and airport fees, less any applicable service fee.

From the JNBJNB BA DONE5 Penalties category,
It may be more efficient to move your trip to a different departure date.

Hi all.
I'm new to the Explorer Ticket arena, but really interested and trying to get up to speed on it. I am really curious about the tickets out of MPM. Has anyone (not based there) been able to secure one of those tickets? It looks like Ajnaro has and Danger is in the process? If so, how? Have you run into issues with DOH being the only route in/out? I get an error message essentially saying that I can't go through there twice. I appreciate any info to get me started...and I appreciate your patience with my newbieness.

I like these ex-MPM tickets so much that this week I have bought two of them:D

One will start in September and the other in June next year.

The first one I bought through a travel agent in Australia (see post #48 in this thread - http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/onewo...periences.html)

The second I bought direct from AA by phoning its ATW desk in Dallas - see post #59)

You say you're getting an error message - are you using the online tool to try and book? Don't! The tool cannot sell you a ticket with Qatar Airways as the first carrier, and also it cannot handle the new backtracking rules which came into effect in May.

Your itinerary will have to start with MPM-DOH because that is the only Oneworld flight out of Mozambique. At the end you must return to Africa - but you are not required to return to Mozambique. I think most people are finishing in JNB, though on my second ticket I am ending in DKR:)

Feel free to post your proposed itinerary in this forum and I'm sure you will get many helpful comments

Thank you so much Pandaperth! This is so helpful! It sounds like you've had success with AA, so I will give them a call.

As others had posted, I thought that you had to return to your departure city, so that is really helpful.

Yes- I was using the online tool to figure out how everything worked and then, of course, I was trying to see how the MPM priced out.

As far as itinerary goes, here are my thoughts...keeping in mind that I just started looking at all of this this week:

MPM - manila- singapore-sydney- LAX (this is home, so I would stay a few months before taking off on part 2) from here either Buenos Aires or straight to Paris (a couple of months in Europe and maybe fly back to California on miles) pick back up in Paris and then end in MPM or JNB.

Do people ever do it like this or do they do the entire trip at once?

Based on the thread you directed me to, it sounds like the great fare may be gone soon. But, if I have understood correctly, It is not too difficult to make changes if I want to lock in that fare now and tweak it later?

Lots of people do that sort of thing when starting elsewhere other then home. I haven't, simply because I have a limit to the length of time I get get off work in any one go and can't plan ahead into the next year.

Based on the comments from the AA RTW agents posted in the forum, the MPM fare has been passed up to someone for review.
They generally do fare changes when they do rule changes, typically in the first week of a month.
They are very likely to change the fare people have been booking recently. Such a change is likely to happen either next week or during the first week of September.

If you were to lock in that fare now, then make changes to it later, don't make changes until after the first flight has been used. If you do so after ticketing, but before departure, they are likely to reprice the entire thing, while doing it later should only cost the 125USD change fee, any admin fee that airline might want to charge and any increase to taxes.

The last time I checked (about two weeks ago) Emirates also had all sorts of super-cheap fares out of MPM.

As Himeno said, people often break their RTW tickets at home. Some even have short trips from/to home during that break (more on this below).

Your itinerary looks something like this MPM-xDOH-MNL-HKG-SIN-SYD-LAX-SCL-EZE-MAD-CDG-MAD-JNB
The xDOH means just a transit there, no stopover; that way you can have your European stopovers at the end of the trip.
There are no Oneworld flights MNL-SIN, LAX-EZE, EZE-CDG or CDG-JNB so I added in connecting flights.

Your ticket will be a six continent Oneworld Explorer, so expect to pay ~USD4,500 – 5,000 for business class.

Your itinerary uses 12 of the allowed 16 segments.
So you could use the extra segments to:

• Have flights within Asia, South West Pacific, South America, or Europe (you are allowed up to 4 flights within each of these continents, but remember you are limited to 16 flights overall), OR
• Have trips within North America during your break back home; you are allowed up to 6 flights within North America (there is a restriction on trans-continental flights) – so perhaps trips like LAX-MBJ-LAX, LAX-BZE-LAX or LAX-SJD-LAX

If you want to do that sort of thing, but the 16 flight limit becomes a problem then think of doing some of the following:

• Instead of MNL-HKG-SIN-SYD do MNL-KUL-SYD and train or bus from KUL down to SIN and back
• Instead of EZE-MAD-CDG-MAD-JNB do EZE-MAD-JNB and train from MAD to Paris and back

FWIW, I expect the fares to increase on Sunday night:(.
The general rule is that changes to ticketed points (meaning dropping or adding points) incur a USD125 fee (one fee for all the changes you are making at one time); and simple changes to a flight are free (such as changing the flight number, date or time).
HOWEVER, there are special provisions if you want to make changes BEFORE departure (meaning before you take the first flight on the itinerary) – if you want to do anything to that first flight or you want to change ticketed points then if the fare has INCREASED since you purchased then you must pay the new fare.

Since we all expect the ex-MPM fare to increase soon, you need to be fairly certain of that first flight.

Well actually the first TWO flights if you are not stopping in DOH.

And I will second the hope that the OW bureaucracy moves with due deliberation as I won't be able to pin dates down until the end of next week. At least at the moment WDH is only marginally (well in the worldwide sense) more expensive. But I was planning on a surface trip from JNB to Maputo :cool:

Happy wandering

Fred

i surely hope wdh will stay for my 2018 trip..

Yes, you are right of course - the first two flights if transiting DOH

I too am planning a surface trip JNB-DOH, in about six weeks time (currently in ZNZ). When will you be doing it Fred?

I doubt the fares ex-WDH are on the airlines' radar screens at the moment. Their focus will be on the ex-MPM fares if what we are hearing is correct (statements like "we must do something about these low fares" and "this is about the 10th ex-MPM fare I've done this week)
However, once they "enhance" the ex-MPM fares, if they then see a spike in ex-WDH fares...

hopefully everyone.who needs a rtw have booked ex mpm. given that ex wdh is probably 5k, and with positioning cost, it will be under radar for a bit...

it is amazing that i booked a done3 last august ex japan, then done4.ex.jnb in jan and then now a.done5 ex mpm... they get cheaper and cheaper..

THANK YOU pandaperth!

Again, thank you all so much. The information you are all providing is invaluable. I am going to try to lock this in this weekend. I am just hoping AA's RTW desk is open on weekends.

I have a solid idea of where I want to go and when I would take my first two flights. If I am understanding what I have read and what you all are telling me, the dates of the flights that follow can be changed. When I use the online planner, the calendar only opens up to June 2017. Is that a restriction with the planner only or will I have the same problem when I call AA?

I have been up since the crack of dawn trying to put something together. I would appreciate any input and any help on a couple of hitches I have run into. I'm also going to try to use this fancy new lingo I have been learning. :D <--- and emojis.

I want to book and ex-MPM DONE4:

MPM-xDOH-SIN-(Surface Sector SIN-DPS)-DPS-HKG-MNL-HKG-LAX-MAD-VIE-HEL-CDG-DOH-SEZ-DOH-JNB

The problem I am running into is SEZ-DOH-JNB at the end. A message pops up that says "100: You may have only one intercontinental departure and arrival in each continent. Change your route or your flight choice."

If I were to travel to SEZ via somewhere other than DOH, do you think that would help?

your routing is not possible to book. once you enter africa again, u cant leave again.

That makes sense. Thank you. I think I could end in Nairobi and do a separate trip to SEZ from there.

AA will not ticket your itinerary - it is misinterpreting (IMHO) the rule regarding backtracking through Europe/Middle East and will not allow ANY flights between the Europe zone and the Middle East zone (in other words your flight CDG-DOH)
I am in correspondence with AA on this - it is being looked at by them, but I have no idea how soon I will get a response, nor what the response will be of course. There has been discussion of this problem in this thread - http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/onewo...periences.html

As regards getting to SEZ - you could just finish with DOH-SEZ, in other words this flight is your return to Africa. And then make your way home from there, instead of from some other place in Africa. (Always assuming you can get someone to ticket your itinerary.:rolleyes:)