I guess I will add to the chorus. A change from a transit to a stopover is a routing change. This is one of the reasons why in the past I had my aonex's issued routinely with stopovers instead of transits on most segments(except of course in LHR) so I would have flexibility with my routing and not have to worry about reissues and tax recalculations.

I obviously stand corrected by the volume of opinion. However, how anyone can infer that the written rules require you to pay a $125 fee when all you do is change a transit to a stopover is beyond me. I would suggest that the OP complain loudly to oneworld that their written rules are deceptive - if the rules clearly state (as they do) that date and time changes are permitted without charge, no reasonable person could possibly conclude from that statement that changing a transit to a stopover would be considered a 're-routing' and thus invoke the $125 fee.

Hiya

Sorry to keep you all hanging like that - I was on a flight, LHR-JFK. :)

My friend is in NZ but the itinerary started at JNB.

I think that what has happened is that the ticket was mistakenly issued as a transit when it should have been a stopover and this is what has caused the problems. As correspondents above have indicated, this has meant a reissue (and hence the fee) rather than the straightforward revalidation that goes with a normal date/time-only change.

I had a similar runaround with Qantas last year when I changed an AWC3 twice from DPS-HKG-JNB to DPS-HKGx-JNB and then back to DPS-HKG-JNB on a revalidation basis for both changes. QF asked for a reissue fee the second time but because I was able to show the original itinerary then this was eventually decided not to be necessary. Unfortunately those circumstances do not apply in this case.

That said, for a comparison and because I needed to do it anyway I just successfully changed the dates and revalidated my current Finnair DONE4 from MEL-HKGx-ICN to MEL-HKG-ICN and no reissue was requested!

Either way, in future bookings I am going to lock in stopvers when I book the ticket initially to avoid any confusion. I mean, we always end up changing the dates/times anyway, don't we? :D

Change from a transit (X) to a stopover (O) is always a re-route. This applies to all tickets, not specific to RTW fare rules. AKL-MEL-PER and AKL-xMEL-PER are two different routings.

It is just some fares don't have a fee for re-routing while there is a $125 fee for xONEx fares.

I am the one with the problem in Auckland - Matter resolved
 

After an hours debate with Qantas the senior supervisor put the phone down on me and refused to email me the reason for the $125 fee in writing.

I rang BA in MRU and they changed the date immediately without a re-issue fee only a local charge of $30 plus airport taxes for Melbourne (that was not due in this case).

The rules state that you only pay a re-issue cost if you re-route, simple as that.
:)
Its ironic that this flight gives me the tier points for lifetime Sapphire with Qantas and I'm on a first class ticket and was treated in this way. Qantas are normally great but this really annoyed me as I have now had 8 of these tickets and know the rules.

Now I have it changed I will be writing to Qantas, I'll keep you posted on their reply.

Correct, but that is a re-route. If you can get away with it, all the more power to you. ;)

So you got lucky with an ignorant agent in MRU... The only possible effect of getting heavy with Qantas is that they will feed back to BA, and the agent in MRU will be "retrained" so I don't see the point really.

Having said that, with e-tickets the effort involved in reroutes is significantly less than in the old days of paper (particularly handwritten paper), so it could be argued that the reissue fee is something of an anachronism.

Certainly a reissue should been required for a re-route, i.e. Effective AKL-PER to AKL-MEL-PER:To paraphrase: "There is no USD125 fee payable after Departure for Date/time/oneworld carrier/inventory changes provided ticketed points remain the same.". The ticket points are changing, so that should have applied.

It could be the BA MRU agent was doing whatever seemed simplest ...

So, by implication, a subsequent change from a stopover to a transit would not be a routing change?

Correct! However, some stopovers, versus transits, may cost you significantly more; HIP may also come into play for some fares.

That is why when booking 'dummy' (as disctinct from OPEN) segments it can be a good idea to ensure the departure time for each dummy segment is at least 24 hours or two days later then the arrival time of the previous segment (unless you are certain two consecutive segments will be booked and travelled as transit).

It avoids issues with any required additional collections.

... which, I think, is the point I've been trying to make all along. The ticket may need to be "re-issued" (whatever that means in an electronic world) and QF may want to impose a "re-issue fee" but that is not the $125 fee required by the xONEx rules for changing the routing, which is only imposed if the ticketed points change, which serfty's quote from the published rules makes absolutely clear (or so I would have thought). If you change a transit to a stopover (or vice versa) the taxes may change (as I noted in my original post) but that doesn't mean you have to pay the $125 change fee as well.

I think we'd need a definition of "ticketed points". AKL-xMEL-PER is, presumably, different "ticketed points" from AKL-MEL-PER. "transit MEL" is a different ticketed point from "stopover MEL".

In my experience over many years and many xONEx the change from transit to stopover always incurs the change fee.

It sounds like I was lucky to get my ticket changed for free by Finnair, then. :)

I was told by JAL and CX about it before.
According to the case above, the original route is AKL-PER, and then new routes are AKL-MEL for one, and MEL-PER for another one.
Therefore, this becomes re-routing.

By the way, I transited twice at London on my AONE4, and according to the T & C, this was not allowed.
However, JAL did allow me to do it:p.
So sometimes, it could be lucky that some agents did not understand the rules( or maybe sometimes, it could be unlucky that some agents did not understand):rolleyes: