Paper -> eticket, + max 16 segments after June 1st
 

Hello:
Currently building a DONE4 ex-Japan with 20 segments so it has to be a paper ticket. However, I'm getting conflicting advice about re-issuing it as an eticket after the first 4+ segments have been completed.
AA RTW office says that it cannot be re-issued as an eticket because the completed segments will still show as part of the itinerary.
Japan office says it can be re-issued as an eticket.
Does anybody know for sure if it is possible or not?

Japan office also implied that that it could only be reissued as eticket if there were no open segments, but I thought you could have open segments on an eticket?

While speaking to the AA RTW office, he told me that as of June 1st (when paper tickets can no longer be issued at all) RTW tickets will be limited to maximum 16 segments. Does anybody know if this is true? If so, it will sort of reduce the value of these tix by 20%

Happy Travels

It is not supposed to be done as the flown segments are supposed to be reflected in the itinerary to be reissued, but it can and will be reissued as an eticket most of the time as writing out a paper ticket is extremely labour-intensive and most AAgents would try to avoid it.

AA's systems can't seem to produce etickets with open segments.

Hmm... so come mandatory eticketing, we'd not be allowed to have open segments? :confused:

This rumour has been discussed extensively elsewhere on the oneworld forum. I only hope that the AAgent you spoke to was right about the 01JUN date as it's give me some time to issue my next itinerary yet.

Out of interest - what if i issue an itinerary under the old rules, and somehow need to reissue the ticket after the mandatory eticketing deadline. Obviously there'd be certain things under the old rules that wouldn;'t be possible with compulsory eticketing, such as the 20 segment allowance. But even if in theory they need to honour the old rules, isn't it virtually impossible to create a paper ticket after 31MAY (as paper ticket stock will no longer be created, IATA shutting down paper ticket clearance processes etc). So what happens in that case, if I require a paper ticket after 31MAY?

QF009, I'm curious about that as well. I plan to depart for my RTW in March of 2009, so I'd like to buy my ticket prior to 6/1/2008 in order to get 20 segments under the present rules....will be interesting to see how that plays out.

and the answer is ... linked PNRs
 

IATA is mandating a very simple solution for the >16 segment problem: all IATA airlines must support linked PNRs by mid-2008. Many do now already; even AA has had this capability for years (but most Aagents are unfamiliar with it). The ticket can be arbitrarily long, split into 16 segment PNRs. This also allows for unlimited open jaws, if desired, as well as handling most other restrictions. And the ticket pieces can clear independently, so none of the back-end processes have to change, making this a fairly bullet-proof solution. So now you know why the airlines have mainly ignored this "problem", as it is a non-issue (or rather, already solved). Does make for good fodder for FT threads, I suppose.

If linked PNR's are the answer, then the need to limit RTW tickets to 16 segments (the limit of 1 e-ticket) is a red-herring, is it not?

I'm not sure I fully understand. Are you saying AA is deliberately not implementing a capability they have or that they have been implementing it all the time, even now, but most of us, including AA agents, are just unaware of it? In other words, is AA actually issuing linked tickets today?

I am just a dumb customer of AA and don't have any inside knowledge, but I have had a linked e-ticket issued (with more than 16 segments), so the capability is in Sabre today. Whether there are other problems (maybe in back office processing) making this undesirable is another question; certainly AA seems to try hard to avoid using this capability and most AAgents are clueless about it. It worked flawlessly for me so it would seem to be a viable and working feature.

I've got one, too...but I'm not sure what might happen if I need to get it reissued again. (I was told that the revenue department would get very upset, in that event; however, I really don't know why.)

And from Bryan Wilson, the IATA's e-ticketing project director:
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/...653996900.html