OWE BAEC Question
 

Does the following situation violate OWE A class rules?

I am on CX889 JFK-HKG (via YVR).
I was told a few weeks ago that that route would earn me 180 TP

But...
As flying JFK-YVR would get me 180 TP and YVR-HKG would get me another 180, would CX (who ticketed the res) allow me to ticket myself from JFK-YVR and on YVR-JFK on the same day?

Or is that a no-no :)

Thanks

P.S. Please excuse me if this has been asked, I havent been on FT this week as there was a death in my family and I can't get the google search to work.

If you are on a OWE, then there is nothing to stop you doing JFK-YVR and YVR-HKG, unless you already have a NA transcon segment - JFK-YVR is one and cannot be your second - whereas JFK-HKG does not touch the transcon rules.

Ofcourse assuming you are ticketed JFK-HKG, you would need to re-issue, which is $75. So the question would be whether 180 TP is worth $75? (I have no view on this since I don't know enough about BAEC)

I tried to do exactly this (but in the reverse direction, HKG-YVR-JFK, CX888) on my AONEx. The only issue I encountered was availability. Whilst I was able to get the full HKG-JFK, there was no availability HKG-YVR. (And given that YVR is largely a refuelling stop, I can see why they want to restrict that).

Also, the stop is YVR is a pain. They get you off the aircraft, but you are not permitted to leave the departure gate area. They do provide free coffee & water, and there is a vending machine in there - but otherwise next time I'd be tempted to "make an error" and head off with the arriving pax; hopefully to find a lounge on the way back (and also make the flight!). Has anyone done this?

BTW, my waitlist on the direct CX830 HKG-JFK didn't clear :(

Based on your experience, if there is availibility (dont see why there wouldnt be as we are a family of four and take up half the cabin lol - 4 seats to reticket) will CX allow us to do this? Would we be in any way at risk of loosing our reservation?

I guess the good thing about 889 is you are not required to disembark, although im sure you are woken up by noise, etc. Oddly enough, leaving timing aside, I think I will be able to adjust better as at least I am getting a little fresh air and am on the ground for an hour.

I didn't even bother, I thought the chances of four A class fares opening up even a day before departure were very, very slim!

I can't see why not (subject to them reissuing your AONEx's - at a fee) as advised by alect, but you might get some puzzled questions from CX as to why you wanted to do this. You'd also have to make sure your bags get checked all the way through - and there may be an issue with them being offloaded in YVR and then reloaded, so "connect times" might be important. And if they don't issue the YVR-HKG BP in JFK, then that's another minefield (forcing you off the plane in YVR).

I can't see any reason why you wouldn't be able to ask CX this question; i.e. it's effectively just inserting an extra segment into your ticket, so providing your itin is still valid (i.e. you have a spare segment, and you aren't already doing a US trans-con), then it should be OK. Caveat: I haven't read all the OWE rules, and I am not an expert on them! Do let us know how you get on.

If the flight is overbooked in Y or J, CX will not return A or D inventory into A or D but only into F or J. So when the agent releases your A4 JFK-HKG it could come back as A4 JFK-YVR and F4 YVR-HKG for example (or F4 on both legs). Then it would be up to another department in CX to convert the F4 to A4, and their job is to maximize yield including minimizing overbooking expense. They may be thrilled to have those 4 extra seats to use and won't ever give them back as A inventory. The booking agents have no way to see this except by seeing how heavily booked the rest of the flight is. You'll have to decide how much risk you are willing to take (my guess is that the next flight with 4 A seats available is months away). BTW CX is not unique in this, most airlines do not return released seats back to their original inventory but into whatever category the yield management software decides is now optimal.