Flying El Al on a oneworld ticket - help pls
 

Hi

Apologies for what may be a silly question - I'm a newbie.

I am looking at trying to do either a trip on points (seats permitting) or a DONE* ticket flying from Melbourne (Australia) to Tel Aviv in late August and returning in late September. The best routing for the trip in terms of connections and minimum travel time is:

Mel - HKK - TLV - Bangkok - SYD - MEL

This flight involves flying Qantas on all of the legs other than the TLV legs, which would have to be on El Al. While I know that they are affiliated with OneWorld, I have not been able to find any confirmation as to whether or not they would qualify for use on either a oneworld points ticket or a DONE*.

Can anyone help me with this ? Or does anyone have any alternative suggestions for routings/ticket types ?

thanks in advance

:)

One thing is for sure, no El Al flights can be taken with an xONEx ticket. True OW metal or main affiliates only, you can check the sticky.

And sorry, welcome to FT!

MEL-HKG-JFK-LHR-TLV-LHR-BKK-SYD-MEL

Is about the best you coud do on OneWorld DONE4 (remember that you have to go round the world so need to go through North America). JFK could be replaced by LAX, SFO, YVR, or YYZ if you wish.

On QF award travel points you can use LY metal. On any oneWorld RTW product you'll need to use either IB or BA metal to get to Israel, from MAD, BCN or LHR respectively. Also you have to cross both the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Note there's a "Circle Indian Ocean" product sold by OW airlines that would fit your general itinerary (still no LY metal, though) that appears to be around AUD1200 cheaper than a DONE4 purchased in Oz. Phone QF to see if it might work for you.

Welcome to FT!

Have a look at the stickies and that should point you in the right direction.

If you simply want a return MEL-TLV-MEL I suspect an xONEx is the last thing you need. You should be able to get some other deal that is better. TLV may not be the cheapest place to get to - but something along the lines of MEL-LHR-LHR return and a tag ticket to TLV should be reasonable.

That said - an xONEx is a great mileage earner if you are prepared to push the miles. This would rather blow the minimum time option though.

Really ?
"Circle Indian Ocean" aka "Oneworld Circle Trip Explorer" must includes African continent. So, you must use DONEWC4 fare. This fare is same as DONE4.

From Starfile:
132N . 3. FOR ITEMS C, E, AND J, TRAVEL ON A SINGLE
133N . PLANE SERVICE OR WHEN TRANSIT WITHOUT STOPOVER IS
134N . UTILIZED BETWEEN SOUTHWEST PACIFIC AND EUROPE,
135N . THIS IS CONSIDERED A FOUR-CONTINENT JOURNEY.

Right you are, and sorry; I was looking in error at DONE5.

I think the OP might be on to something. Whilst not staying with OW, I am not sure a LHR-TLV return leg is really worth the extra flying time unless you are wanting to collect status.

Assuming the OP is a QF member, he/she will be able to collect miles with QF as shown in the link below:

http://www.qantas.com.au/fflyer/dyn/...m/terms#jump23

In fact it seems as if most classes are earning so if your not out to get status credits and actually want to get to your destination without a going well out of your way, your suggested routing could be good.

Suggest you find a good travel agent. Usually I find bestflights.com.au are good when booking in Australia and also cheap.

Otherwise as another poster suggested, you can always burn points and get a QF partner award on El Al using QF miles.

For the record, Hong Kong is HKG.