Hello,

I tried to solve this with LAN and searched for it on the web, but no solution for one week already, if anybody could help me or give some advice, it would be great:

I'm trying to book a OWE with LAN in a trip that would start on September 4 2008 and end on September 3 2009 but they are saying that they can't book flights for more than a year from now. And then they are delaying me over and over waiting answers from departments and everything.

Since there may be some more experienced users of this ticket here, I am thinking in a option that i would like to ask you if this is a good ideia:

I'm thinking about changing the dates of my last flights so that LAN can book my ticket and, later, when it will remain less than one year to next September, i would change the dates of the last flights to use the whole one year period of the ticket. Would that be possible? Would they charge-me or is this included in the "changing dates is free, but subjected to availability" policy?

Another question: am I buying the ticket too close to the departure date? I mean, am I going to pay more for the ticket because of that? Should I delay the trip for like 15 days and pay less?

Thanks everybody for the atention,

Davi

Hi dtsantos, welcome to FT.

Depending upon the carrier, flights may only be booked up to 330/353 days in advance.

I had this issue in March when I needed to book an xONEx for travel between June '08 and May '09, including April '09.

I booked the June flights straight off and used dummy dates for the May and April 09 flights (Nov, Dec). After returning from my June excursion, I called and re booked the remaining flights to their "correct" dates.

I did this with AA, no fuss, no additional cost, no problem.

There should be no additional cost in booking close to departure date, the main issue with that is finding the avalability in the required fare buckets (A, D & L).

With the prices of the RTW tickets going up on a regular basis it is always a good idea to book as early as possible. If you don't need the ticket later you can return it for a reasonable fee.
Then you run into the problem that you cannot book flights more than 11 - 12 month out. The ticket itself is valid for 12 month after the first flight. You can buy your ticket almost a year before the first flight, locking the price in.

In that case you book the first flight with a fixed date / flight number. Everything else can be open. Sometimes you need to book more than the first flight, depending on how you start.

If you keep the routing you just make reservations for the flights. If you change the routing you reissue the ticket, also a reasonable fee for this. Do all the routing changes in one transaction.

The risk you have with open segments: if you have an open segment AAA-BBB and there is no more flight you have to reissue the ticket. If you are already at the 16 sector limit and need an extra sector for doing this you have a problem. Same on Star when you are at the sector limit or at the mileage limit.

Welcome to FT dtsantos! The price you are paying is fixed so it doesn't matter how close to departure you buy as long as it is within the ticketing deadline.

Regarding your issue with flights to far in the future, there are two solutions: One is the one you described by just booking dummy dates and then changing later. If you change as soon as you can possibly change (350 days before your flight) then there shouldn't be a problem with availability.

The other possibility is the one unterwegs has described. And consider booking through AA as it will be hundreds of Dollars cheaper.

Welcome to Flyer Talk dtsantos

The approach suggested above is the way to go. However, there are some possible pitfalls to watch out for. For example.

Some routes are notoriously difficult to get availability in the required booking class. These will require flexibility on dates, and may require a change in routing (which incurs change fee) and a change in routing may run into a problem with too many segments (maximum is now 16) causing other changes elsewhere in the itinerary to make it work. If you provide an idea of where you are travelling, we can advise if any of those routes have poor availability.

Some routes are seasonal. Booking a dummy date outside the season for a flight is problematic.

First I would like to thank everybody for your responses and welcomes!

I will try to answer the questions one by one:

1. DownUnderFlyer, I can't book the ticket through AA because the first segment of the trip is not available to be done through AA (SPO-LIM). At least, AA told me that, that I must buy the ticket with the airline of the first flight.

2. Kiwi Flyer, my itinerary is as follows:

GRU-LIM-SCL-AKL-SYD-JKT-SIN-BKK-HKG-JNB-DUR-CPT-LON-MAD-RAK-MAD-GRU
The JKT-SIN I will do as land segment.
Yes, I'm using all 16 flights.
Yes, I could reduce it, but I thought about using all flights all can.
Do you think some of these routes are seasonal?
If you want to I could send the dates of the flights.

3. Unterwegs: LAN told me that I must set all flights of the trip. I can't schedule just the first flight. And, about open segments, my currently status on my talks with the air company is that I'm waiting for a authorization of the financial sector to allow-me having the last segments of the trip marked open segments.

I think that's all.

Waiting for your answers!

That's simply not true. AA RTW told you that, or the local AA office in SPO? I recently set up AONE3s through the AA RTW desk and then ticketed through AA Manila with the first flights on CX (and no transoceanic on AA at all). This was no problem at all.

AA office in SPO told me that. Is there a separate department of AA for RTW tickets?

Note that I have simply no segment at AA at all.

Ah - no segment on AA at all might be tricky! But yes, AA has a dedicated RTW booking office staffed by people who are experts on the OW RTW tickets (tel: +1-800-247-3247). They can set everything up for you and then you just pass the record locator to the local AA office where you wish to purchase the ticket and they take your money.

I tried to call through skype but the call was really low quality. The operator didn't understood the problem and didn't want to give me any email address.
But thanks for the tip anyway. I will try to call them again when I have a better internet connection.

Why not just make a normal phone call? Calling the US costs a minuscule amount of money compared to what you are planning to spend on these tickets. They don't do email with customers as far as I know.

You don't know how much international phone calls in Brazil cost. Just absurd!
But anyway, I have no phone here where I am.

Skype?

As mentioned 3 posts up, they tried Skype, but the quality was rubbish (as you might expect for a network not designed for real time communications).

Even if you are paying a US$ per minute to call the US, 15 minutes on the phone the the AA RTW desk could have you completely sorted and ready to go. That must be $15 well spent. (Assuming you are to get somewhere with a phone!)

Issue solved. I called them now and successfully completed the call.

Some good and some bad news for me.

Good is that they do open tickets for the segments for more than one year from now. LAN is refusing to do that.

The bad is the price. For my itinerary LAN charges US$ 2.960,00 total and AA wants US$ 4.400 plus taxes (the guy gave-me the same price i can get on the OW website).

Also the itinerary had some little changes since that US$ 3.100,00 quotation and the prices had rise in the beginning of August so I'll do the quotation again and post results here.

Just a dumb question: if I buy the ticket with, lets say, LAN, and want to change the date of one flight, that must be done with LAN or I could use another airline, like AA?

Because they are so much better than LAN, at least on the phone.