AONE4 - advice sought please
 

All,

Having already received loads of useful advice from this forum, I would like some more please. I am currently getting ready to book and ticket an AONE4 ex-CAI through BA. The following is my current plan, and it has been "approved" by the OWE validator.

CAI-LHR-xHKG-MEL-AKL-SYD-BKK,NRT-HKG-NRT-HKG-YVR-JFK-DFW-SFO-LHR-AGP-LHR-DXB

I have the following questions in mind:

1) As this is 17 segments, I presume it can not be e-ticketed. One option is to travel from LHR-MEL nonstop although I was hoping to break up the journey and use CX also
2) I am going to keep it opendated, so presumably I need to only book the CAI-LHR flight? Do I need to specify airlines for the other routes where this is a choice?
3) What is the best way to check A availability when I decide on the other flight days/times? Expertflyer or the KVS tool? Also, who do you call to book any of the segments when the day/time is decided?
4) In case anyone is wondering the break between BKK and NRT is so I can pay for a SQ flight in first class to try them out. The HKG-NRT repeat routing is because I want to maximise time in CX first!

Any other comments appreciated!

I currently have 2 of these AONE ex CAI open.

1.
I am not aware of any Europe-Australia Non Stop currently. CX is the best option (12 instead of 14 seats on BA in the nose of the 747 etc.). Great lounge in Hong Kong - you don't need to take the next flight out, you can stay up to 24 hours in HKG, take a bath in the lounge or go to town for a few hours to break the long flights up if you want to. See other posts how to get to the lounge first and then into town.
2. Yes, opendated is fine. Just make sure all segments are ticketed in A - even if specific flights have no A. It is easier to change this way. You need to specify airlines, but don't need to reticket to change the airline.
3. I am using the KVS Availability Tool (do a search here). Great tool, the paid version (which i would recommend) has access to several reservation systems. I buy the tickets thru a travel agent in Germany, he does all the rebooking for me - just send an email with the changes to him. This is very well worth the fee he charges for the ticket.
4. Did that on the last ticket. I had 2 asia coupons left. So we went HKG-(TPE)-NRT-HKG (same plane) and then on to FRA. They do a crew change in TPE. We where the only ones in F to NRT - the crew found out that we are going back with them - so they asked why. After explaining the purser said: oh - it is like a cruise, but by plane and not by boat..... We got a bottle of Champange at the end to celebrate later..... (don't forget to pre-order the Kaiseki Dinner for the NRT-HKG)

Btw: If you want to try SQ: They have very good prices CMB-LAX in F. You could use the RTW to go to CMB and do a little sidetrip to LAX.

Clearly there aren't any - but there are some which are Direct which means that you use 1 coupon instead of 2 which can be important if you are up against the 20 coupon limit. I am not aware of any mechanism by which one can pre-order the Kaiseki meal on the HKG-NRT-HKG non-stop flights. Please would you enlighten me? (Having said that I have never found that they run out, especially if you have a word with the Senior Purser soon after you board to amke sure one is reserved for you.)

You mean as a pre-requisite to ticket an open dated coupon? If so, AFAIK, only the city pair is necessary, not the airline.

Agreed. The issuing airline may choose to put an airline code against each segment, but it really is immaterial since every coupon is valid on any OneWorld airline which flies that route.

Which would mean issuing said leg as an open segment if A is showing 0 availability at time of booking.

Apologies for confusion, meant 1 flight number rather than "nonstop" in original post (i.e. BA or QF).
As for booking the flights, who does one call to do this, assuming no travel agent is used. The airlines themselves or BA Cairo?

Once you are ticketed, you should be able to call the BA RTW desk wherever you are and add specific flights. They can pull up your PNR.

For Ex-CAI, you have two options: to use BA (which has a local presence) or AA (which uses local agent EMECO).

Which you go for is largely a matter of taste / convenience; my own experience is that I've found both to be extremely efficient, but have come unstuck with AA when trying to change legs after travel commenced, requiring me to contact its rather less than spectacular (at least competency-wise) Dublin office.

Either way, I suggest you call the local reservations office of either BA / AA, get the itin booked and then contact either BA CAI or EMECO to have them take over the reservation and ticket.

Do a search using the keywords "Sobhi" for BA and EMECO for AA CAI and you'll find lots of useful info, including occasional oddness when it comes to how you take physical delivery of the ticket(s).

I knew such a thing exists for AA, but for BA? :confused:

I disagree. All my recent tickets have been Emeco/AA ticketed, but if I want to make a reservation on a CX flight I simply call CX reservations, book it in the relevant class (A normally) and give them the AA ticket number. Similarly with QF and BA.

I have a telephone number for BA RTW: [1] 800-828-7797. Having said that, I've always ticketed on AA, so have never had cause to confirm that it is valid.

Irish lad, do look at the posts that compare costs of RTW tickets on BA versus AA. BA imposes a significant fuel surcharge, and AA does not. You'll find a significant swing in the cost of your ticket depending on whom you chose.

With what?

Useful to know. Are they as competent as the AA RTW desk (given the right Aagent) and will they deal with you if you haven't purchased your itin ex-US? (There's no BA RTW desk that's customer-facing elsewhere, as far as I'm aware)

With your assertion that you have (by implication, only) two options. To me where I got the OWE ticketed is irrelevant. As regular readers will know I almost always get the ticket open-dated and then simply call the reservations line of the airline I wish to fly on and make a reservation for the sector I wish to fly, quoting the ticket number when I do so. I guess that my average AONE3 has 4 or 5 PNRs (reservations) containing sectors from it during its life. It also probably changes ticket number and ticket stock at least once during its life (normally from the Emeco-issued AA stock to a CX@HKG-issued CX stock).

But I also have situations where some of those PNRs also contains segment which are ticketed on an entirely separate ticket. This is not a problem either.

Moreover, it doesn't seem to matter if, when making a reservation, the ticket number quoted doesn't actually contain the sector which I am reserving. This is often the case in advance of a re-route, where I will make the reservation in advance, but only get the ticket reissued to match the reservation when I arrive at the airport to take the flight.

OK so to follow-up christep's post and to prevent any confusion, you can book the itin with any OW airline but for ticketing purposes - ex CAI at least - your ticket will need to be issued by BA or AA (the only two OW carriers who issue ex CAI as far as I'm aware; I've often wondered whether EMECO would issue on CX stock but never had a response to any enquiry along these lines).

Sort of true. But when you first issue the ticket then Emeco or BA CAI will want to have control of a PNR containing at least your LHR-CAI flight and (in the case of Emeco) at least one trans-oceanic AA flight.

There is, of course, nothing to stop you subsequently changing the AA flight to BA.

[Just a BTW: in the last 8 years I have done about 14 ONEs in D or A. I think 4 from Emeco, 2 from BA CAI, 1 from CX CDG, 1 from BA BRU, 4 from CX in HKG (of which one, at the cost of great psychological trauma, consisted simply of HKG-JFK-LHR-HKG), 3 from CX in TPE.)

I have had a response. They do not, will not.

For what it's worth, Finnair has/had a GSA in Cairo who was more than happy to make reservations for me, even reservations that didn't match the tickets I was holding... Perhaps someone else knows where/if this office (still) is...

OK, so just to check, I can do the following:

1) Book it through BA Cairo (Mrs Sobhi), with the CAI-LHR leg being on BA metal. I prefer to use them rather than EMECO as I have a pathetic preference for using BA and also no intention to fly AA except intra-US
2) I will break the journey up in London, leave the other segments opendated and, when I want to fly the next leg, check availability on KVS, ring up the airline (i.e. CX for the LHR-xHKG-MEL flights) and book direct with them.
3) Is this correct and relatively painless?

Finally, I am at 17 segments and considering adding a couple more. Is there any tangible benefit to being e-ticketed rather than paper ticketed?

Many thanks for the assistance thus far!

I just purchased my aone5 ticket from Emeco in CAI. Very easy and painless. They fedexed the ticket to me and all correspondance was done by email. They were wonderful. I also though that the eticket would be advantagous. But I really wanted that extra three segments. I also thought that ticket will probably have to be reissued at a later date and at that time I can switch to an eticket as I will have less than 16 segments left. I have actually done this before...

Irish Lad,

1) That's fine. BA has the advantage that they have an office at the airport where you can pick up the ticket before the flight if you are doing a same-plane turnround. But I moved to Emeco just because I found them to be faster and more effecient in email communication.
2) Yup - that should work.
3) In my experience, yes.
"Finally" (which would be 4 by the way :) ) I have a preference for paper ticketing, particularly across multiple airlines & countries, although I have done the latter part of one or two AONE3s as e-tickets after a reissue. When doing a reissue it is preferable not to use BA or QF since they will most likely charge "handling fees" in addition to the US$125 reissue fee. CX are the most efficient in my experience (especially the airport ticketing desk at HKG), but note that reissue times have gone up with the addition and frequent changing of fuel surcharges - on a 19 segment ticket it seems that the systems are over-stretched when trying to keep track of all the taxes that now need to be paid.

Emeco has an office close to the airport. They are willing to send somebody to the airport and wait for you inside (just before the immigration counters) with your ticket for the next flight. So you don't even have to get outside the transit area. Did this already twice - both times in the middle of the night.

Keep in mind you will pay a few hundred dollars more to ticket on BA rather than AA.

For those of you who might be interested, here's that contact info for the Finnair GSA in Cairo:



Finnair Cairo
Tel. +20 (0)2 579 8601

FINNAIR RESERVATIONS
Zekri Tours
Cairo office: 15. Tahrir Square, 1st floor
Tel. +20 (0)2 579 8601, 579 8602, Fax +20 (0)2 579 8603
Giza office: 14. El Khates Street, Orman-Dokki
Tel. +20 (0)2 749 8190, 336 6062, Fax +20 (0)2 749 8190
Open Sun-Thu 9-16

I've done that a few times too, but for people who are new to this the idea of going to a badged BA office when it opens at 5am or so may be less stressful than depending on an individual to turn up and find you in the middle of the night in a strange airport. Of course I have Mrs Kamal's mobile number in case of difficulty (which there has never been).

By the way, I have always found that the people at the transit security have been very reluctant to let me through when transiting from the BA flight to the BA flight back again. On the two times I have tried it I gave up, paid my $15 and went round through landside... maybe the security guy was looking for me to pay the $15 to him?

I have now received the ex-CAI RTW ticket and would like to thank you all so much for your help. I just want to recap one thing please:

Only the first three flights were booked firmly, with the rest open-dated. I have now taken the first flight (CAI-LHR). My next two are booked with CX, but I have changed the date (after the ticket was issued). This means that the original Amadeus PNR shows them as "cancelled" but there is now a separate record locator with CX and the new flights (I can not check this online, but have an email from CX). I think this is definitely OK, but wish to check. As long as my ticket routing does not change I can have as many booking references with as many airlines as I choose (only if I book with BA or someone who uses the same system will the original PNR reflect the switch to booked flights from open dated)?

Correct, and in fact even with BA it may be set up as a new, separate PNR if you don't refer them to the original.