DONE4 Transit in Asia - 2 stops allowed?
 

Is it permissible to transit two points in Asia on the "transit without stopover in Asia between Europe and SWP"?

ie LHR-xKIX-xHKG-PER

Yes, but at the cost of extra segments.

This is a gray area of the rules and a matter of luck as to how the issuing airline interprets it. Years ago I tried to do this and at that time the routing was refused; the intra-Asia segment uses up the continent. Which would defeat your purpose. I doubt you can get an answer to this ahead of time, it is entirely up to the rate desk at the time of ticket issue (and also at the time of any re-issue, fwiw). Definitely a high-risk routing.

About 2/3 years ago i did exactly this. SYD-SIN-HKG-LHR (if memory is correct) with stops just below 24 hours in SIN and HKG.
Routing was Europe-US-Asia(3 Coupons)-Australia-Asia(transit,one coupon)-Europe.
I am not aware of any rule change since then.

This has been tested again and again as allowed, and the archive contains not one but several posts attesting to it, so I would not exactly call it a gray area. Yes, there might be uninformed agents who throw a NO as a first reaction, but there is no doubt that the ruless allow for it, and real tickets have been issued with two, and even three, transfers.

Edit: come to think of it I now remember one case of BA being somewhat negative on this issue, so I retract a little and now agree with the "gray" description. In my experience, however, AA and QF are pretty good; the others I know only what I read here.

According to AA RTW desk last month, if you use the transit w/o stopover exception to enter a continent more than once, the entry and exit city must be the same. One of the experienced agents (now retired) told me that there were abuses of this rule. It was permitted in the past if the total time was less than 24 hours, but no more.

AA RTW desk have allowed me to book a LHR-xKIX-xHKG-PER which I have to pay for in CAI tomorrow so it looks like it is OK. I am transiting in under 24 hours in total so can't test whether you could push it to the limit.

Thanks for the help and I'll let you know if I hit any snags.

paul4471

That certainly was the case with regard to transiting the US a second time, for itineraries commencing in SA, but I'm not sure whether that applies to Asia, as well.

Only one transit point allowed!
 

Yep,

It all went pearshaped in CAI when I went to ticket it. The Dublin agent couldn't believe the US RTW desk had allowed it to be booked that way and made it clear that only one trasnit point in Asia was allowed. Thankfully I mnanaged to find a LHR-HKG availability but am dissapointed to miss out on the JL sector.

It got worse with my Europe sectors but that is in another post.

Paul4471

Yes, the AA RTW desk is losing its rep as the best in OW. Quite a few experienced agents have recently retired though there are 1 or 2 still around. Starting to become a desk where if you don't like the response, hang up and call back later.

Inexperience In My Favor
 

I did a reissue last week, and knew more about the rules than the agent. My ticket was ex-CAI DONE04.

1) She counted a land segment toward my 20-limit. But I pointed out the ticket was issued before this rule went into effect. She put me on hold, agreed and did it as I wanted;

2) I had scheduled BKK-HKG-NRT on CX. I changed to BKK-NRT on JL, which was not a member of OW when I ticketed, and should not have been allowed (I had been told previously). But they ticketed as such.