RTW vs Circle Pacific
 

With the recent jump in Circle Pacific fares, it looks like it is just as much as a RTW fare, CP = $11200 for 26K miles vs RTW 5 Continent $9500 in Biz Class. I have been to Europe more times than I remember on business and vacations but never west of Hawaii or south of Panama.

I was planning on a CP but might as well do a 4 or 5 continent RTW. Am I missing something here or has RTW jumped in price as well. I just checked the oneworld site for the fares.

Cheers

You are not missing anything. It's just that they have not updated the pricing structure for xONEx for a while now. I'm expecting a similar jump in fares to what we have recently seen with the Circle Pacific.

I'm betting the Circle Pacific fare increase was more limited in its scope and intent - it was Qantas wanting to slam the door on a work-around to their astronomical monopolistic revenue fares in business and first between Oz and N. America. All the others had to do was say okay, and wait for the shared revenues to roll in.

I suspect JAL coming in didn't help matters either as it made DCIR22 fares much easier. JFK-SYD-NRT-JFK for ~16k or 5.5k on circlepac. Eventually people figure it out.

What shared revenues? No one is going to buy CIR tickets at those prices. Now the Hong Kong travelers must be very happy as they still have CIR fares similar to the old ones.

Let's see... Do a AONE3 ex-USA ($10600 USD), take the first leg to HKG. Then purchase a DCIR26 in HKG for 47340 HKD ($6070 USD)and do Asia, SWP, Hawaii and back home. A few months later finish the DCIR26 to HKG via NRT (use eVIPs to upgrade US-NRT to F) and then continue your AONE3 doing more Asia, then on to Europe, and finally home.

So 2 trips, easy qual for EXP, and the long northern TransPacs in F for $16670 USD. Note that southern TransPac is broken up by stop in HI so D shouldn't be too bad.

-or-

1 much shorter ACIR26 trip for $15200 USD and no EXP qual.

A no brainer IMO. You always have to find the challenge in a problem and work it to your advantage. Now, I figure this isn't going to be an option by the time I am ready for it, especially since my travel card is full with 1 month in Europe, 1 month in Asia/SWP, and 2 months skiing the Rockies in the next 8 months. But, I thought I would mention it just in case any other ex-US AAdvanatge members could take advantage of it.

All true, but there are many (mainly corporate) flyers who won't go through all that and who use Circle and RTW products in the course of normal business operations. For them, a $9300 Circle ticket is cheaper than a $17500 RT in J to SYD. Granted not as cheap as $5500, but still a savings of 45% is not negligible. Whether the SWP and N. America markets continue strong for this product, only time will tell.

It's hard for us in this little crazed subculture to see the bigger picture of these products. My litmus was sitting next to a business traveler a month or two ago in J on YVR-LHR who has offices in Vancouver, New York, London and Hong Kong. His office buys him a DONE3 a month and saves tons over alternate fares. I mentioned to him that they'd be cheaper if he started/ended someplace besides Canada, and he shrugged and said his time is more valuable at work than it is flying to Stockholm or Mauritius in order to save a couple grand in airfare. I believe that man is more representative of purchasers of D- and A- products than denizens of FT boards. I could be wrong of course.

Yup. Similar to NZ's demands in *A although at least their increases were not as bad (but from higher starting amount). In the space of 4 years or so *A RTWs ex-NZ have gone from about the cheapest to about the most expensive :(

Yes, but the 90% increase from $5500 to $9300 is going to hurt a lot of businesses, especially in this economy. I have a feeling a good number of people may end up purchasing QF Y+ or NZ Y+, or be stuck in the back of the bus, or just not take as many trips, rather than ponying up the $9300.

This is just the price we have been paying down here anyway. And it is still a good deal compared to the alternative of having to do this on normal tickets. It is almost impossible now to find a SYD-JFK J class ticket for less than $10k. So there will still me many people buying it.

It has just become a different type of ticket. Before it was something a private person would consider or small businesses for a trip to Australia or the US. Now it is a ticket for someone who needs to go to SYD and HKG in business class.

those of us in US who (a) don't relish the idea of 15 hrs in L- (eg. LAX-MEL) and (b) too frugal to pay the new DCIR22 price will (c) have to find some other way.

me, I can't spring for a RTW to get from USA to go touring Aus/NZ with my SO. am thinking of DASxx in combo with positioning trips to NRT in first/biz on AA (AAward or upgraded with AA miles).

DASxx prices exNRT are 462000 and 539000 JPY which converts to 4344 and 5068 USD, resp. Add another $2k for positioning (US-NRT) in biz and this is way ahead of RTW and CIR. xASxx Does require a stop over in SE Asia, but I figure a day or two in Bali or SIN would be justifiable under the circumstances.

EDIT: $2k figured on $1400 coach upgraded with AA miles (AA X fare) + $600 copay

Very good point, and I agree with his point of flying half way around the world (for no purpose) to save a couple grand. My scenario, while not geared to the business flyer, doesn't fly around the world for no purpose. Instead it turns one vacation, into two; granted a bit more expensive, but still a deal with the current pricing structure. Of course in my warped way of thinking, if the seats I want aren’t available on a flight, then that is just an excuse to make my vacation longer (never shorter). :D

Now, non-business travelers will, and even some business travelers may, baulk at these new fares. As you said time will tell. If ONE and CIR ex-HKG prices hold until early fall 2009, which I doubt, then I will probably book this type of itin for myself starting Q1 2010.

I'm surprised you Aussies put up with the non-competition. SQ wanted to fly SYD-LAX, but apparently QF successfully lobbied the OZ legislature last year to continue their near monopoly of this route. I think consumers would have benefited from the added service with more competitive pricing.

Do correct me if I'm wrong - but I believe the situation regarding the TATL route until very recently was the same - e.g. only UK and US airlines allowed to fly between UK and US (now we have AF flying that route, and BA flying France-US).

IMHO the real problem is that US airlines aren't competing on the OZ-US route and they are leaving QF to make monopoly profits. Surely they have the traffic rights? Does anyone know why they don't exercise them?

UA have a few flights, my understanding is that AA have rights but don't exercise them, continental used to have flights as did alaska iirc. Problem is that the real money on that route is in business travel and the american airlines can't compete in terms of product, the biggest competition qantas has is air nz. To be honest to _really_ get some competition there would need not only a decent airline such as singapore flying transpac but there also would really need to be a *A airline flying domestically in aus.

We just love overpriced air tickets, telephones, roads, cars.....

CO still flies to Australia. Just not a very business route.

Not sure about NZ being the biggest competition to QF on the transpac route. NZ has traffic rights to fly from SYD to LAX direct but they chose not to do so.
Operating transpac is actually not that easy. Your AC will have lots of idle time so you need high load factors and lots of premium passengers. Even VA will not really start to offer low fares on this route.

Talking about SYD-LAX. Does anyone knows what Volare Airlines Flight 1 is doing in some booking systems 13th November 2008? Leaving SYD 21.45 arriving LAX 16.30. Operated on a 77W. :confused:

My company allows business class for overseas flights, but insists on the cheapest option among contracted airlines, primarily UA and AA. Since UA routinely comes in way, way under AA, often I am able to stay on AA/OW only by using more-restricted fares such as I-class. To Australia, a DCIR was competitive with a UA D-class, so it was an option. Not any more. With UA offering D to SYD for $5k and a DCIR costing $9k, there will be no question. Is my company unique? Will others stick with OW and pay twice as much? I can't say, but it doesn't look good for me personally.

I've relied on DCIR fares for myself and OW awards for my SO to allow us to vacation in Australia, New Zealand, and Hong Kong and me to requalify as EXP at a cost that's a stretch but not impossible. Now, it will be flatly impossible. Especially with OW award hold times going from 14 days to 5, making it effectively impossible to book a OW award in D to match a DCIR.

I want to look into the option you mention. What's an xASxx -- a Circle Asia? The other choice is to perhaps do a DONE4 but only every two or three years instead of every year.

Not if you're originating in North America; however you could do a one-time repositioning trip to HKG or some such, buy the DCIR at the local price, and just begin and end the circle there; repeat as needed.

DAS13 and DAS17 (and their L and A counterparts) are Circle Asia Southwest Pacific tickets - like a Circle Pacific but without the U.S. part.

http://www.oneworld.com/ow/air-trave...h-west-pacific

Limited to 13,000 and 17,000 miles.

How do you locate a sales agent in the desired origination country? Probably HKG or Tokyo would be convenient places to originate and terminate the DCIR, since they are easy to get to. Since AA flies to NRT, that's a good choice for AAdvantage members, since one could buy coach and upgrade to business. Are there better places?

Thanks. The OW web site estimates the equivalent of US$4,582 for a DAS13 purchased in HKG or $4,325 for NRT. Adding in the cost (and miles) for the enclosing RT to NRT or HKG, it's probably about what the old DCIR was, although a lot fewer EQP since the US trip is assumed to be booked in coach and upgraded.

How would one go about booking and purchasing one?

That is VA for V australia (as well as Volaire)

Similar to how JQ was (is) also Air Jamaica

Sometimes if in different zones, the airlines can have the same designator

You can easily purchase these tickets through the AA office at NRT. You can find the phone nos. on the AA Japan website - http://www.americanairlines.jp/conte...ctURL&title=en

Here's a list of AA offices and general sales agents in various countries. http://www.aa.com/aa/i18nForward.do?...ckets/main.jsp

Set up the itinerary with the AA RTW desk for pricing and issuance ex-NRT or wherever.

Oops, I should have known that. Thanks for letting me know anyway.

Sorry, but Air Jamaica has always been JM to my knowledge.:confused:

Sorry my confusion. JQ was for Air Jamaica Express

I had no idea I could call the AA RTW desk and have them set up a ticket for ex-NRT issuance, then call the AA NRT office to issue it. Thanks!

Would this work for places AA itself doesn't fly? I notice there is a sales agent listed for HKG in the link you posted; would the RTW desk set up a ticket for them to issue?

Yes absolutely - I am in the process of getting two AONE3s set up by the AA RTW desk for ticketing by their GSA in Manila. The AA RTW desk are a joy to deal with compared to any other airline reservation desk I have ever contacted. And I find that they are now open longer hours than I thought: Mon-Fri 7am-8pm, Sat & Sun 9am-5:30pm Central time.

(And the tickets have no transoceanic on AA, but that isn't an issue either.)

I also just had the very pleasant experience of working with the GSA in JNB for a great AONE6 ... very easy and all transactions done by fax and email. Ticket was e-tix and itinerary visible on aa.com......