I've got a situation where I need to go on a business trip (client will pay) that will have the following route:

MIA-LON-DXB-HKG-(LAX connection)-MIA

Now this trip is pricing out at a bit north of $9K in J using aa.com - so I figured a DONE4 (can I do a DONE3) is a better bet... even bought in US... Now that I'm doing that - of course I'm thinking - there's got to be a better way - why should I burn the 1 year 16/20 segment ticket for a 2 week biz trip...

What would be the cheapest way to "break" the journey, assuming I can get mileage tickets on AA and partners as the "way back" or "round trip" to make it happen???

Should I stop the RTW in HKG and then add a variety of "segments" in ASIA? and then get an R/T award on CX that's HKG-MIA-HKG? Any other thoughts?

BTW - is the mileage calculator right? Is this almost 47k miles in BIZ? Plus I'm PLAT so it'd be 94k miles?

Thanks
Nick

First, welcome to FT!

Second, read the sticky threads at the top of this forum for very important Q & A and especially fare info.

Third, look at the origin points and decide if you want to travel (as inexpensively as possible) to one of them in order to save money. For example, there are a couple of origin points in Europe - say Sweden or Gibraltar, where a 3-continent RTW (all you need) are ~$2000 cheaper than a US origin. Can you get to ARN or GIB for less than two grand or its equivalent? Even the Euro zone, say Spain, is $1000 cheaper.

If you start in Europe and want to break the circuit, you could do it either in Asia or N. America, where the 6 NA segments (including Central America and the Caribbean) might serve you well. And of course you could easily add Asian segments too. (xONE3s are actually maxed out at 17 segs, but you can buy more.) N. America might be useful from either a personal or work standpoint.

Note that for $700 more (plus more taxes of course) you could get a DONE4 from one of those places, break the trip in N. America, add South America, break it there (RT back to MIA) then complete the Atlantic crossing from S. America back to Europe.

No, you wouldn't get double miles. You'd get something over 225% counting class of service bonus.

I�m a fan of doing multiple RTWs.
As Gardyloo suggests, start with a MIA-LON separately, then get a cheap flight LHR-ARN and purchase a DONE3 in Sweden. Then use that ticket for your target destinations of LHR, DXB, and HKG, then go on to Sri Lanka. You can buy a second DONE3 there for less than US$4500. So pause your first ticket at that point and fly the second RTW back home (through HKG, LAX) to MIA. Then use that second ticket to fly within North America (as Gardyloo suggests) then when convenient, use it to fly to Europe then on to Asia ending up at CMB.
Then you resume your first ticket with more flying in Asia then back home (HKG, LAX, MIA). You can use the remainder of this ticket for more flying within North America but at some point, within the year, would need to go back to Europe ending in Sweden. All this (with all the FF credit from probably more than 100,000 flown miles) for less than US$10,000 before taxes.

I also like multiple RTWs. The price of a DONE4 in CMB right now prices out at US$5038. You will need to add taxes to this; my latest ticket involves about US$914 in taxes.