Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[Captain Halliday]

was is this an error and should l persist or indeed the result of a whole-itinerary recalculation of taxes and fees?

I have no way of knowing.

You could put your itinerary into something like ITA Matrix which will breakdown the fees.

You’d have to then add them up manually and compare to what you’ve paid so far.

 

[adenda]

I have no way of knowing.

You could put your itinerary into something like ITA Matrix which will breakdown the fees.

You’d have to then add them up manually and compare to what you’ve paid so far.

Post automatically merged: Feb 6, 2023

Yes I’ll do that - if only to satisfy my curiosity

 

[MelbFlyer]

So on my latest Classic Reward itinerary as per below, I've been able to choose seats for some, and some I cannot.

Below is the breakdown:

Melbourne to Hong Kong - CX Economy - Unable to choose seats at all
Hong Kong to Paris via Helsinki - AY Business - Seats chosen
Paris to Barcelona - AF Business - Seats chosen
Barcelona to London - BA Business - Unable to choose seats without a ridiculous charge
London to Singapore - BA Premium Economy - As per above
Singapore to Melbourne - JQ Economy (out of all options, this was the only available flight, sigh) - Unable to choose seats at all

Just wondering for the legs that I am unable to choose seats for now, if that's normal?

I remember booking a rewards flight from Melbourne to HK (economy) and then HK to New York (business) on CX a few years ago, that I was able to choose seats well in advance (and not just a few days prior to the flights themselves).

 

[SydneySwan]

Just wondering for the legs that I am unable to choose seats for now, if that's normal?

It is normal for BA unless you pay their standover charges.

 

[algae]

BA that's standard, they make you pay in business as well.
CX is surprising, you should be able to in theory...

 

[Mr H]

BA that's standard, they make you pay in business as well.
CX is surprising, you should be able to in theory...

It is status based. CX allow you to book a seat in advance in Y for a fee or if you have status, I think. BA charges in any cabin unless you have status. Other airlines might let you pick, but some will hold the best seats back for status pax.

 

[ozflier]

Barcelona to London - BA Business - Unable to choose seats without a ridiculous charge
London to Singapore - BA Premium Economy - As per above

Certain oneworld elite levels are exempt for this seating charge .
I am pretty sure OW Emerald flyers are exempt!

 

[adenda]

Are you able to select a seat preference (window/aisle) on CX? I've done this on CX in the past (for non-CX airlines like Iberia and Qatar) and it seems to randomly assign seats according to your selection. If there's 2 travelling they won't be adjacent to each other or even the same row!
Once that's happened though I've found I can then change the selected seats to my actual preferred seats on rj.com.
(I'm lifetime bronze by the way)

 

[PointsTraveller!]

So on my latest Classic Reward itinerary as per below, I've been able to choose seats for some, and some I cannot.

Below is the breakdown:

Melbourne to Hong Kong - CX Economy - Unable to choose seats at all
Hong Kong to Paris via Helsinki - AY Business - Seats chosen
Paris to Barcelona - AF Business - Seats chosen
Barcelona to London - BA Business - Unable to choose seats without a ridiculous charge
London to Singapore - BA Premium Economy - As per above
Singapore to Melbourne - JQ Economy (out of all options, this was the only available flight, sigh) - Unable to choose seats at all

Just wondering for the legs that I am unable to choose seats for now, if that's normal?

I remember booking a rewards flight from Melbourne to HK (economy) and then HK to New York (business) on CX a few years ago, that I was able to choose seats well in advance (and not just a few days prior to the flights themselves).

Try Royal Jordanian's website.
I was having the same issue with IB a few weeks back and was not able to change on their website but Royal Jordanian allowed it.

 

[ozflier]

re yesterday's discussion to routing home from Milan to Brisbane late May this year and thank you for everyone' s comments .
I have been able to do an online booking home via DEL or CMB but the booking engine will not allow the final connection thru to Brisbane despite there being award seating available if I made a booking separate to my OWA.
I rang Qantas and repeated the situation and what was found on line .
In response to the question "what is the origin and destination" of the requested flights - ie MXP/LIN/FCO and BNE respectively, nil could be found in business for 7 days either side of the best date for me.
I presented him the various flights I could find in business and he did try but nothing could connect thru to Brisbane.
He elevated the situation to a supervisor - no go but the term "married segments " was mentioned in the explanation.

 

[Mr H]

re yesterday's discussion to routing home from Milan to Brisbane late May this year and thank you for everyone' s comments .
I have been able to do an online booking home via DEL or CMB but the booking engine will not allow the final connection thru to Brisbane despite there being award seating available if I made a booking separate to my OWA.
I rang Qantas and repeated the situation and what was found on line .
In response to the question "what is the origin and destination" of the requested flights - ie MXP/LIN/FCO and BNE respectively, nil could be found in business for 7 days either side of the best date for me.
I presented him the various flights I could find in business and he did try but nothing could connect thru to Brisbane.
He elevated the situation to a supervisor - no go but the term "married segments " was mentioned in the explanation.

MEL-SYD-BNE? Or flights to Brisbane's secondary airports (OOL and MCY)?

 

[djkelly69]

the booking engine will not allow the final connection thru to Brisbane

Haven't done any searching myself, but am guessing none of the flights are direct in to BNE and require a domestic flight on the end?

If so, it seems like this is the issue where QF won't let you tack a domestic flight on the end of an international award segment (although I thought some previous posters may have indicated Hobart agents were able to get around this).

Worst case can you finish in MEL and get a separate flight home?

 

[Ktan89]

@adenda how old is your PNR and did the departure city change at all from the first originally booked departure?

 

[Roundtheworld123]

Hi there. Not sure if this output will make sense to some on this but have been dealing with a Qantas Call centre in Jakarta as my OWA flight starts in DPS. She has mentioned that she rang and enquired with the Frequent Flyer section in Australia regarding if she could book this YVR-SYD flight but they told her that it needed to be a 'X' type class rather than it was a 'O' type class. (see red text). She sent me the extract of the bookings so far.

9 QF 076 O 22JAN 1 YVRSYD HK1 2025 0635+2
10 QF 643 X 24JAN 3 SYDPER HK1 0825 1015

Not really sure what this means. But then I went onto the Multi-booking tool site and was able to find this YVR-SYD trip and was able to book it fine. I am not sure what to do next. But I sent her the screen captures of me being able to book this flight and asked why is it that any member using QFF points can book a rewards flight but for some reason the Frequent Flyer team are telling her she cannot use this 'O' class. Does anyone know about this and what I could do or need to say?

 

[ozflier]

Haven't done any searching myself, but am guessing none of the flights are direct in to BNE and require a domestic flight on the end?

If so, it seems like this is the issue where QF won't let you tack a domestic flight on the end of an international award segment (although I thought some previous posters may have indicated Hobart agents were able to get around this).

Worst case can you finish in MEL and get a separate flight home?

May come to that but issues with delayed arrival and will QF look after me as its a separate booking.

Post automatically merged: Feb 7, 2023

@adenda how old is your PNR and did the departure city change at all from the first originally booked departure?

Ta for asking - original booking June 2022 and no change from original booked departure.

 

[ozflier]

Hi there. Not sure if this output will make sense to some on this but have been dealing with a Qantas Call centre in Jakarta as my OWA flight starts in DPS. She has mentioned that she rang and enquired with the Frequent Flyer section in Australia regarding if she could book this YVR-SYD flight but they told her that it needed to be a 'X' type class rather than it was a 'O' type class. (see red text). She sent me the extract of the bookings so far.

9 QF 076 O 22JAN 1 YVRSYD HK1 2025 0635+2
10 QF 643 X 24JAN 3 SYDPER HK1 0825 1015

Not really sure what this means. But then I went onto the Multi-booking tool site and was able to find this YVR-SYD trip and was able to book it fine. I am not sure what to do next. But I sent her the screen captures of me being able to book this flight and asked why is it that any member using QFF points can book a rewards flight but for some reason the Frequent Flyer team are telling her she cannot use this 'O' class. Does anyone know about this and what I could do or need to say?

Don't know the answer to your question but I know your frustrated feeling!

 

[pjm99au]

re yesterday's discussion to routing home from Milan to Brisbane late May this year and thank you for everyone' s comments .
I have been able to do an online booking home via DEL or CMB but the booking engine will not allow the final connection thru to Brisbane despite there being award seating available if I made a booking separate to my OWA.
I rang Qantas and repeated the situation and what was found on line .
In response to the question "what is the origin and destination" of the requested flights - ie MXP/LIN/FCO and BNE respectively, nil could be found in business for 7 days either side of the best date for me.
I presented him the various flights I could find in business and he did try but nothing could connect thru to Brisbane.
He elevated the situation to a supervisor - no go but the term "married segments " was mentioned in the explanation.

Hi

What’s your specific date that you would like to leave Milan and how many pax? When I looked yesterday there was a lot of availability Milan to Melbourne via LHR and CMB. Given the system doesn’t like the domestic segment between MEL and BNE I’d be booking mxp to mel as one booking and the mel to bne as a separate booking. Low risk given the arrival time into MEL from CMB if you pick a late flight out of MEL to BNE

 

[ozflier]

Hi

What’s your specific date that you would like to leave Milan and how many pax? When I looked yesterday there was a lot of availability Milan to Melbourne via LHR and CMB. Given the system doesn’t like the domestic segment between MEL and BNE I’d be booking mxp to mel as one booking and the mel to bne as a separate booking. Low risk given the arrival time into MEL from CMB if you pick a late flight out of MEL to BNE

preferred ++ 29 may thru 3 june for 2 pax
and thank you

 

[pjm99au]

preferred ++ 29 may thru 3 june for 2 pax
and thank you

Hi. I’ve sent you a PM with an option (it assumes this is not being tacked onto an existing OWA). The problem for the OWA is the 2 seats, plenty of options for 1 but not 2 unfortunately

 

[adenda]

I think this may be my situation. Started a conversation on Twitter to convert a current surface sector in my OWA to an award flight thanks to new availability on AA recently appearing. After waiting several hours for a response I was advised that flight could be added to my itinerary for the 5000 points change fee and additional taxes of $1,777.85 per person!!
I asked them to double check and they came back with the same response so I decided to not proceed. (I actually booked a separate partner award flight for the same sector some months ago so am covered anyway)
I decided to do a dummy booking on the AA website for the same flight and the taxes came to a total of US$48.94 (approx. $70) per person. Furthermore to pay full price for a business class seat on the same AA flight would have cost US$991 (AU$1432 or $345 less than the additional taxes)

I seems therefore that Qantas has recalculated taxes for my entire 10 flight itinerary - which was ticketed some months ago - and it appears some operator fees have significantly increased.
What confuses me though is that about a week ago I managed to get one flight in our itinerary changed to exactly 1 hour later to meet MCT requirements and I wasn't charged any change fee or additional taxes yet the itinerary was reticketed.

By the way it appears that the staff who respond to Twitter messages (and I assume Facebook Messenger) appear to be quite competent as compared to O/S based staff - just very slow to respond.

Some interesting developments. Qantas came back via Twitter to advise "it seems that there's been an oversight from our end"
They are now calculating the tax difference as AUD156.93 per person - a lot more like it but still more than I get by dummy booking on AA or ITA Matrix.