J by the way would be F for you dom flights so is $250 still exp?

lucky you - near on impossible to get dom j tickets anywhere but the US for that price

regarding taking time off work..

you could fly out to europe in Y , buy a RTW ticket , do the 4 flights in europe and head back to USA, (holiday 1 Value of flights $3500+) then do your 6 segs in USA ( how ever many holidays you want this may be carib/ mex etc, then off to YVR for Sking etc. (so maybe 2 holidays value at least 2K) then fly off to Asia for (holiday 4 value lots (cx flights aren't cheap)
continue to Europe picking up your cheap Y rtn ticket you bought out there and upgrade with your shiny new top tier status..

that what i was going to do orig when i thought about the time off thing but in the end i thought stuff it- why work all the time, are you here to work or enjoy your limited time onthis planet?

That presumes a coach fare and a free sticker upgrade (which I've been batting 100% on in the last year), and not a purchased J fare, which is more expensive. But I like to look at actual prices paid, not hypothetical top-fare prices that I never have, and never would, pay in determining what is a good value.

Out here, near LAX, you can often find cheap coach fares about everywhere in the country. YVR is $149, ATL is $134, HNL is $250, LAS is $58, JFK is $203, FLL or MIA is $198, etc.

This is actually a very interesting question, IMO.

If you are comparing it with the cheapest way to get from point A to point B, it clearly is no bargain. However, that is not the comparison I make. For better or worse, I have gotten myself hooked on premium class travel and cannot go back to Y except on short flights. OWEs get me into the premium cabins (I AONEs, BTW) for, what for me, is an affordable price. For what I pay for my AONEs, I maybe could find a round trip F fare, probably on a second tier carrier, but that would be it. With the the AONE, for the same price, I can get an entire year of travel and can get either to or reasonably close to, anywhere in the world I want to go. While I take mileage into consideration when planning a route, I first consider where I want to go. Since I am a leisure-only flyer (for the moment, at least), I pick where I want to go and then devise a routing that maximizes the mileage. I would not avoid a place that I wanted to go to maximize mileage, but I will add cities that that I may not have considered top of my list to maximize miles (for example, doing a RT HKG-NRT-HKG turn or a RT from JFK to the Carribbean). Also, the miles I earn from one AONE are enough for two First Class award tickets, which covers most of my leisure travel for the next year. In other words, i get two years of travel value out of one AONE ticket. I am doing one this year, will use the miles I earned next year and do another AONE in 2006.

Most importantly, it is fun. I enjoy the entire flying experience and with an AONE ticket, I can maximize the pleasure of the experience.

With maybe one or two exceptions in a year, I, too, am a leisure only flyer. So, if you knew that you were going from LAX to, say, Vienna once, St. Lucia once, New York once, New Orleans once, Honolulu two or three times and Sydney once in a year, with some flexibility for other spots during the year, how would you go about deciding how to route your AONE?

and how many miles/ points do you earn for these?

it appears that you don't quite get it- as i said in the earlier post i also count up the value for the points earnt on the trip and what you are saying here wouldn't be earning the same rates as earnt on any ONE's so it might be cheaper by $50-$150 but i would value the points and staus (in particular) worth some where in between and if you could work out what "value" you have for the point/ status/ and travelling in these classes then you can decide for yaself.

for example - imho, given the choice for dom i would prob pay �40 or so extra to fly on BA rather than Ryanair for example (yes i can get a cheap fare but do i want it?) i can sit in the BA terraces on my cheap �70 rtn fair and drink �50 worth of PJ or travel ryanair and hate the whole journey.


i think the main diff is - BA or a few others would laugh you out of town with stickers , so comparing US with any other region doesn't make sense.

Ah, a challenge!

First off, one area where XONE tickets are problematic is Hawaii. You are only allowed to fly once either to or from Hawaii and the mainland (using a North American segment). Once in Hawaii, you are forced to fly onward to Australia as it is the only Oneworld service from Hawaii to anywhere other than North America. I am pretty sure that you could arrange a surface segement to get back from Hawaii (meaning a non-flying segement - this does not count toward the 20 segment max and you are free to fly home from Hawaii using a separate ticket). Why not fly from Hawaii to Australia? No reason if you are on a DONE ticket, but, as Qantas (the airline in question) does not offer First Class on this route, you would be crossing the Pacific (one of the longest flights on the ticket) in Business Class -- not good value for money, IMO. This is a long way of saying that you can only do Hawaii once on a XONE ticket and it is imperfect at best.

Now, you are LAX based and want to include Vienna, New York, St. Lucia, New Orleans and Sydney. I am assuming you do not want to buy in the USA, as it is expensive. Let's say you buy in Egypt, which is around $6900 pre tax (add about another $250 for taxes). Getting to Cairo is on your own. From New York JFK, I used Egyptair in First Class for $1500, which was fine, but nothing special (as you might expect for $1500). JohnAx has also used Egyptair F to get to CAI for starting a OWE.

Let's say Vienna is your first destination. There are no Oneworld flights direct from Cairo to Vienna, so you will have to change. British Airways operates the only Oneworld three-class flight ex-CAI, so you would route CAI-LHR-VIE (2197 miles plus 795 miles).

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...OR=&MAP-STYLE=

After your stay in Vienna, I would send you back to the USA. While you could easily go direct to New York from Vienna via London, I would reccomend that you go to LAX as it is much longer and more miles (plus, it is home for you). As such, I would route you VIE-LHR-LAX on British Airways and American (if AA is your FFP of choice, you cannot earn AA miles on BA transatlantic flights, so you must fly AA on this route -- if you want BA across the Pond, we have to route you through Canada, Mexico or the Carribbean), which is another 795 miles plus 5456 miles.

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...avy&MAP-STYLE=

Now, you are in North America and must do all your North American flying before leaving the continent. You have six North American segments, one of which can be a transcon. I would send you non-stop from LAX to JFK on American (2475 miles). St. Lucia is tough because the only flights on AA are from San Juan on an ATR. I would reccomend you either pick a Carribbean destination with non-stop service from JFK (Barbados or Aruba come to mind) or just route to SJU and buy a separate ticket to St. Lucia. Let's stick with routing to SJU, which is 1598 miles from JFK. I would do this as a round trip, routing LAX-JFK-SJU-JFK, using three of your six North American segments. Once back in JFK, I would route you back to LAX via DFW (JFK-DFW-LAX). If you want to go to New Orleans, you can book this as a separate ticket ex-DFW or LAX, whichever is convenient. This leaves you with one North American segment to use to get to Hawaii (I'll assume HNL, but could work for any non-stop flight to Hawaii from LAX).

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...avy&MAP-STYLE=

As I mentioned, you can continue to SYD from HNL, but only in Business Class. If you are on an AONE ticket, I would reccomend routing back to LAX at your expense and flying onward to Asia from there. I would route you on Cathay Pacific to HKG (7260 miles) and then from HKG to NRT and back (for miles or to stay if you wish), which is 1842 miles each way.

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...avy&MAP-STYLE=

At this point, you will have used 13 of your 20 segments and flown 31,000 miles (remember, if you are already Platinum or higher on AA, you will be earning 2.5 miles per mile flown). From here, you still have two extra Asia segments you cna use before heading to Australia. If you do not want to visit somewhere esle in Asia, you could do another mileage run on CX. India is part of Asia, and although only Business Class, offers a nice amount of miles (Bali or Jakarta or other options, Jakarta may evne offer F class). Let's say you decide to do Bali as a mileage run (2136 miles and can be done as a day trip).

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...avy&MAP-STYLE=

Now, you are back in HKG and have used 15 segments. Off to Sydney on either Cathay or Qantas, which is 4580 miles from HKG. Since you need two segments to get back to Cairo (one to fly to Europe and one to get to Cairo), you have two segments to use in Australia. As with North America, you can only do one transcon, so Perth is out. Fortunately, you can do a round trip to Auckland, which is 1345 miles from Sydney.

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...avy&MAP-STYLE=

Back in Sydney, you can fly back to London on British Airways or Qantas, which is one segment, although it stops in SIN or BKK on the way (you cannot stopover and must continue on to LHR). This is a 10,573 mile flight.

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...avy&MAP-STYLE=

Finally, you need to have a segment back to Cairo or elsewhere in the Middle East (per the rules, you can route to another Middle Eastern city and end there). Let's say you want to go to Dubai, a popular turn-around place for FTers using XONE tickets, which is 3420 miles from LHR.

http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=C...avy&MAP-STYLE=

As you can see, total mileage on this routing is 56,573. Total elite qualifying points would be 84,860. Total earned mileage would be 141,433. You would need to pay your own way to CAI, back from DXB from SJU to St. Lucia and from DFW to MSY, or use miles (FWIW, I am using miles to get back from DXB when my AONE5 ends there in January 2005).

I am sure others can tweak this, but it is a good start.

I hope it helps.

I would earn the same q-miles for these as I would with an AONE, and since I normally would qualify on miles rather than points (never saw the value to paying 5-6 times the fare just to get an extra half point per mile), the difference in points is not really significant. Though I would earn 25% fewer overall miles, and if I were ever to re-qualify for elite based on q-points, then I would earn 66% fewer q-points. I do get it.

Flying mostly upgraded domestic flights, and one or two upgraded European flights, earning EXP in a year would require me to spend about $4,000 plus 50k-100k miles, and fly about 100,000 miles, and I would earn 200,000 miles for the trips. Using an AONE, earning EXP in a year would require me to spend about $9,500 ($8,000 or so for the AONEx out of Cairo, and $1,500 for the other six or so flights necessary to qualify) and fly about 80,000 miles (considering that the flights used to make up the 15k or so difference would probably earn a half point per mile), and I would earn 310,000 miles. So, yes, I would get an extra 210,000 miles for that extra $5,500, about 2.6 cents a mile.

The thing is that I do a lot of my travel domestically, and only one or two trips abroad in a year. Nothing to Asia in more than 10 years, and never been to Australia. That is not to say that it wouldn't be interesting to see those places. It would, and I do like to experience different cultures. But in evaluating these AONE trips, I don't think that they make economic sense. Nevertheless, it seems that they can be valuable from a non-economic perspective, if you recognize that you are paying a premium price for a premium product.

And I want to make clear, so I am not misunderstood: I understand that the price paid for the premium product is a discounted price compared to the normal price for that particular product. It is just not the best price you can get for that routing. You are paying more than the best price, in order to obtain a certain amount of premium over and above the cheapest product.

It's like this: I can buy a Chevy for $20,000, or a Mercedes for $40,000. The Chevy's list price is about $20,000-$28,000, while the Mercedes' list price is closer to $60,000-$80,000. The Mercedes is the better bargain, but the Chevy is the better price. What we are talking about here is the bargain price for the Mercedes.

So, I do get it, right?

Thank you, it does. It certainly gives me food for thought. While it might be tough for me to part with an extra $8,000 or so to do one of these trips, it might be an interesting experience.

I meant to ask about this. Do you mean that you can actually include a cruise as part of an AONEx ticket? Or did you mean that I would arrange a separate flight outside of the AONEx?

he means arrange a seperate flight

AA is alot easier to get EXP than i think most other ONE partner airlines, for what you do on BA youd prob still be blue

well it seems you have answered your own Q 's
the ONE is not for you, it is only worth it if you want to go to these places.
as i said i cannot fly anywhere ex uk for $250 p/seg in J on the days i would like to travel so i see it like that and i don't have to worry about searching for the cheapest flights on carriers i don't wish to fly..


usuing your car example above i assume that you would buy the cheaper car, same as if you could fly j for say $400 trans atl or fly Y for $200 you would choose Y - then thats why ONE is not for you

if i earn 200K + miles i would be earning a free Oneworld award ticket

when you start earning op up's/stickers on trans atl - then i think you may be correct but until i see that i will fly up front and pay (not much) to be there

Please don't make assumptions. . . . I'm trying to understand and decide. Regarding the car, I actually went somewhere in between. I got an Infiniti for $27k when they were selling for $50k, and everyone was still wondering what they were. It seemed the best value for the money, and everyone asked me why I didn't get a Lexus or Mercedes, which were more popular and only a bit more expensive at the time. Now Infinitis are quite popular and more expensive.

The question becomes whether the extra features are important enough to spend the extra money, and whether there is actual value in the price difference. Same thing with these.

I looked at my '04 travels carefully, and realized that I spent $4,600 on the following trips (including the cost of purchasing some sticker upgrades when I did not have enough in the bank already, and 50k miles ($500) to upgrade the London trip): SNA-MSY (F); LGB-JFK (Y); SNA-HNL (F); SNA-HDN (Y); SNA-HNL (F); LGB-JFK (F); SNA-OAK (Y); LAX-LHR (J); SNA-HNL (F); LAX-ATL (F); LGB-CUN (Y); SNA-PHL (F); LAX-HNL (Y).

Clearly, to make it more cost effective, to do a xONEx, I would need to include fewer domestic destinations and more international ones. But the truth is that I would still have to fly a lot of the domestic flights. At least 3 trips to HNL in a year is a given for me, and the cost of these would have to be in excess of the price of the XONEx. Luckily, it has been cheap recently, as I can get a HNL round trip for under $300, and use sticker upgrades.

Also, if I chose to use an AONEx, it would be stupid to start it this year, as I already have about 60,000 miles, but only 38,000 points. So, I would waste the 1.5x points bonus by using it this year.

Next year, I have already purchased one of my tickets to JFK ($134), and to MAD and AMS ($696), but I have not yet purchased tickets for YVR, the second JFK or MSY, and I don't have my travel plans for the last part of the year set yet. Still, it would seem that, to maximize the mileage, I would not want to begin to use the ticket until late summer 2005. Also, by next June, I will have 30,000 miles but only 15,000 points.

I also like the idea of using an AONEx every other year, becoming EXP in one year, then dropping to PLAT, using mostly award miles the next year and then using the AONEx when you are PLT. That seems efficient, and I'm thinking about exploring this possibility.

So, it's not that an xONEx is not for me. It might be, and it might not be. But I need to understand the way it works, the benefits and downsides, and how I would have to alter my flying habits in order to make the best use of it (as well as whether such an alteration is desirable for me), before I make up my mind.

Sure. You could take a cruise, take another flight. Heck, you could swim it for all AA or other OW airlines care! All a surface segment means is that you are not flying between the two cities involved as part of the ticket. How you from A to B is your problem, not theirs. Surface segments are a good way to avoid wasting a segment when the distance between the two cities is small and/or the price is cheap.

For example, on my current AONE5, I had an LHR-FRA segment, that I did not use as a surface segment. It made sense at the time as I was trying to not spend any more money than I had to and I needed to travel between London and Frankfurt. Had I done that as a surface segment, I would have been able, later in the trip to fly from Singapore to Melbourne via Hong kong, which would have been more miles and another opportunity to fly CX longhaul. Instead, I am "stuck" flying BA between SIN and MEL.

You would need to make several flying habit alterations. First, you would have to do more trips at one time instead of weekend hoppers here and there. Second, you would have to not to go HNL (unless, of course you buy a seperate ticket). Third, you will have to find direct flights for wherever you go which could be hard from an airport that's small like SNA. For example, if you wanted to go SNA-PHL then that would be four out of your six segments because (AFIAK) the flights are not direct. I agree with the others that unless you are able to take a significant amount of time off to do many segments outside the US then it's not worth it.

Benefits:
1. time/date flexibility (my most important benefit)
2. general availability, though I am usually a bit flexible
3. reroute for $75
4. you get to see more of the world

Downsides:
1. you *only* get 6 flights in the US
2. rules are complicated
3. you need to set a routing unless you want to spend a ton of cash with constant reroutes
4. going around the world can take a lot of time
5. expensive

Personally, if someone is exp and has no interest in seeing the world then they are better off doing $200 LAX-JFK or LAX-PHL runs and the occasional run to Europe for $350. If you do 4 trips LAX-LON at 11,000 miles each and 13 trips to Philadelphia at $200 each then you are renewing exec plat for $4000 all in F or J without having to deal with all the rules and restrictions of the OWE and it would probably be cheaper in the long run.

So, then, I do not need to have a continuous route on a xONEx ticket? For example, I can go HKG-JFK, with my next segment being, for example, LAX-HNL, and the following segment SNA-DFW, and I don't have to get to LAX or later to SNA on the xONEx ticket for it to be a valid routing?

That is correct.

I really would encourage you to read carefully the OWE rules, as they answer virtually all of the questions that you have posed.

Pay particular attention to the "Routing" section of the rules. In this case, rule #8 in that section says "INTERMEDIATE SURFACE SEGMENTS PERMITTED." However, you must read all of the rules, because you could not go to HNL and then take your next flight from SYD or HKG (Routing rule 1: "TRANSOCEANIC SURFACE IS NOT PERMITTED").