January DONE4 advice
 

Hello,

Could anyone comment on the following trip?

PHL-SJU-SXM-MIA-LAX-SYD-AKL-BNE-CNS-AYQ (ground..train and plane), DPS-HKG-BKK-BOM (ground), DEL-AMM-FCO-BUD-LED-LHR-PHL

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

Thanks.

Hello & welcome to FT.

First thought: note that you are only allowed two stopovers in your continent of origin, i.e. North America; therefore at least two among SJU, SXM, MIA and LAX have to be transits. You cannot stay for more than 24 hours in this case. If you plan to do PHL-xSJU-SXM-MIA-xLAX-... (i.e. no stopover in SJU and LAX) then it's ok.

I'm not sure whether you can do a surface segment from Australia to Asia, but I guess that's ok (rules forbid only transoceanic surface sectors).

Another potential problematic point: the rules only allow one international departure from the country of origin. If I understand the rules correctly, SJU-SXM and LAX-SYD are TWO international departures from the country of origin. The second departure ex-USA is possible only through a transit w/o stopover (e.g. SXM-xMIA-xLAX-SYD), and this exception applies to the US only. I'm sure the experts here on FT will be able to comment on this point.

Cheers

Just to make sure the above does not lead newcomers to confusion the text should read "the rules only allow one international, etc.". The second international arrival/departure allowed in this case is an exception, applicable only to ex-USA tickets.

Thanks Viajero for correcting me.

I obviously wanted to say that only one international departure is allowed, but mistakenly wrote two... It must be the X-mas atmosphere... :)

I corrected my post above anyway.

Thank you for help. I am transiting SJU, MIA, and LAX (arriving 5 minutes after midnight and departing 11:45 pm almost 24 hours later, so an overnight but not a stopover). I did find out that Malev flight Budapest to St. Petersburg is a code share on a non-permitted airline, so I am changing itinerary: FCO-HEL-LED. Unfortunately FCO-HEL on Finnair is economy only.

You might want to doublecheck the eligibility of the AY flight FCO-HEL; in the past, the one-class AY flights were actually charters and excluded from any of the OW products ... perhaps this has changed, but you need to check whether that flight is DONE4 eligible. Sometimes these flights were booked in error, and the mistake was found when boarding -- rather inconvenient. But AY should be pretty hungry for business in light of their financial situation, so maybe they stretch the rules these days.

(DEL-) AMM-FCO-LHR-LED-LHR is legitimate.

Thanks, Gardyloo; the route is comfortable, but I'm trying to see one other place, so picked Helsinki over London twice.

number_6, I checked the flight on Finnair site, where they say it is operated by Finnair. Thanks for the caution.

I was surprised to see that some flights on oneworld's timetable aren't actually eligible. This is a different issue from Global Explorer's adding 3 more airlines to oneworld Explorer.