Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Shoot me down if this is a dumb idea, but to avoid multiple 3500 FF pt. fees on a 280K OW itinerary as you add more flight segments as soon as the seats are released, is it feasible to just book multiple classic award segments on-line as separate bookings and then ring up QF customer service and ask them to combine all the bookings into one itinerary as a OW RTW once you have your whole itinerary complete? Or would QF just say "Nah, you can't do that"?

 

[Grooba]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Shoot me down if this is a dumb idea, but to avoid multiple 3500 FF pt. fees on a 280K OW itinerary as you add more flight segments as soon as the seats are released, is it feasible to just book multiple classic award segments on-line as separate bookings and then ring up QF customer service and ask them to combine all the bookings into one itinerary as a OW RTW once you have your whole itinerary complete? Or would QF just say "Nah, you can't do that"?

Purely talking about the points and not the tax/fine component, if you booked them all separately and you were trying to maximize the 280k value, the total of all individual segments would be more than 280k points.

So say individually it cost you 360k points and you also satisfied the other rules of the said award, I highly doubt you could just ring up and ask them to combine them all then refund you the 80k difference.

Of course I'm speculating on this and would love to be proven wrong.

Full marks for thinking outside the square!

 

[sergeyvzn]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

from my very recent experience of getting 2 J seats (myself + partner) on a 3 class AA service SFO-JFK:

when end the whole trip was originally booked about 330 days out (October 2013 for September 2014) there were no J seats at all. In January 2014 there were single J seats available on each daily service (there are 4 each day) so we had to split our booking into 2 separate ones and were to fly 3 hr 40 min apart on the same day.
two weeks ago, suddenly, more seats were released and we changed my booking to the same flight that my partner was booked in January so we are fine now going together
so AA do release the seats in batches, much later than 330 days, in my case it was more like 240 days out
hope it helps

 

[footy99]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

These awards appear to no longer exist after the latest 'enhancement'.

Edit: They still appear in the T&Cs - just not advertised anymore. Will try a few dummy bookings to check.

Edit again: False alarm! Sorry.

 

[serfty]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

If not 331 days out, is there a particular time IYE when they are released, Princess F?

About two years ago they were tending to appear 315 days out ... about two weeks after the 330 day mark.

Not sure these days.

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Shoot me down if this is a dumb idea, but to avoid multiple 3500 FF pt. fees on a 280K OW itinerary as you add more flight segments as soon as the seats are released, is it feasible to just book multiple classic award segments on-line as separate bookings and then ring up QF customer service and ask them to combine all the bookings into one itinerary as a OW RTW once you have your whole itinerary complete? Or would QF just say "Nah, you can't do that"?

For anyone interested the answer from QF was "Nah, you can't do that". They will not combine multiple on-line bookings into one - so there's no alternative but to pay the 3500 pt. fee every time you add/change flights.

 

[Colrad]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

For anyone interested the answer from QF was "Nah, you can't do that". They will not combine multiple on-line bookings into one - so there's no alternative but to pay the 3500 pt. fee every time you add/change flights.

I called today and asked the very same question. I was told that they could combined all the legs into a single booking and the 'system' would then recognise it as OW award - but the 3500 pt change fee would apply for each additional leg and for each passenger in the booking, in my case 5. So 17,500 points each time a new flight opens up!Er, no thanks.....

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

I called today and asked the very same question. I was told that they could combined all the legs into a single booking and the 'system' would then recognise it as OW award - but the 3500 pt change fee would apply for each additional leg and for each passenger in the booking, in my case 5. So 17,500 points each time a new flight opens up!Er, no thanks.....

Another case of QF not being able to get their facts straight - same question but exact opposite answers. I was categorically told by "Karen" last night that they could not combine individual on-line bookings into a single OW itinerary. It's not supposed to be roulette QF!
Perhaps Red Roo should step in with QF's official position because juggling OW RTW award bookings can be a hassle when scarce availability dictates that you often need to book seats on in-demand routes before the later flights have been released. QF could make the process more user friendly and it would probably free up a lot of their operators' time and make it more efficient if they did.

Care to comment Red Roo?

 

[flychrisfly]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Another case of QF not being able to get their facts straight - same question but exact opposite answers. I was categorically told by "Karen" last night that they could not combine individual on-line bookings into a single OW itinerary. It's not supposed to be roulette QF!
Perhaps Red Roo should step in with QF's official position because juggling OW RTW award bookings can be a hassle when scarce availability dictates that you often need to book seats on in-demand routes before the later flights have been released. QF could make the process more user friendly and it would probably free up a lot of their operators' time and make it more efficient if they did.

Care to comment Red Roo?

I was wondering the same thing the other day. it would make life a lot easier to deal with an extended trip over many weeks with different airlines having different award seat release timeframes if we could book the pieces separately and then once they're all locked in simply make one call to join them all up and have points difference refunded (assuming you had enough for all the separate bookings to start with). Happy to pay one fine for this.

 

[Sumnerned]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Another case of QF not being able to get their facts straight - same question but exact opposite answers. I was categorically told by "Karen" last night that they could not combine individual on-line bookings into a single OW itinerary. It's not supposed to be roulette QF!
Perhaps Red Roo should step in with QF's official position because juggling OW RTW award bookings can be a hassle when scarce availability dictates that you often need to book seats on in-demand routes before the later flights have been released. QF could make the process more user friendly and it would probably free up a lot of their operators' time and make it more efficient if they did.

Care to comment Red Roo?

Red Roo might be busy with other stuff just now...

 

[ozbeachbabe]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Another case of QF not being able to get their facts straight - same question but exact opposite answers.

I was categorically told by "Karen" last night that they could not combine individual on-line bookings into a single OW itinerary. It's not supposed to be roulette QF!

It may be a case of the CSR requesting those flights in the new pnr before calling yield & asking them to KK the flights in the new pnr & cancelling segments in the old pnrs.

So they're not actually combining multiple pnrs as such because all flights need to be in the same pnr for ticketing purposes & also so the airlines can see your on-carriage flight so they can check you in & issue boarding passes for more than one flight & tag your bags through to your final destination.

 

[Janflyer]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Hello! Can anyone tell me if there is an easy way to do the planning for a 280K trip - i.e. other than continuously having to go round and round through the whole thing on the disfunctional Qantas website every time you want to change just a single date?
For example, is there a different website to look at flight availabilities for a particular segment, say, over a few different days? If I could just break up the trip into its bits before putting it all together, it would save me a lot of pain!
I've tried having multiple web pages open and trying to do it that way, but that seems to just confuse the website and then everything crashes and I have to start all over yet again!
Any tips would be most appreciated!

 

[pangwen]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Hello! Can anyone tell me if there is an easy way to do the planning for a 280K trip - i.e. other than continuously having to go round and round through the whole thing on the disfunctional Qantas website every time you want to change just a single date?
For example, is there a different website to look at flight availabilities for a particular segment, say, over a few different days? If I could just break up the trip into its bits before putting it all together, it would save me a lot of pain!
I've tried having multiple web pages open and trying to do it that way, but that seems to just confuse the website and then everything crashes and I have to start all over yet again!
Any tips would be most appreciated!

I used a combination of EF (paid) and Award Nexus (was free for AFF paid members, not sure about now), as well as the BA Avios site when looking for availability. EF and Award Nexus were good to find options over multiple dates, while BA was good to "confirm" whether the earlier tools found real availability.

 

[Colrad]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

I used a combination of EF (paid) and Award Nexus (was free for AFF paid members, not sure about now), as well as the BA Avios site when looking for availability. EF and Award Nexus were good to find options over multiple dates, while BA was good to "confirm" whether the earlier tools found real availability.

Yes, I've found that using the BA Exec Club site to check availability and then plugging into the QF search engine on the required dates works pretty well, as the BA site gives you all OW options on the specified date and route, while QF only shows some OW carriers and not all connection options. Conversely, QF lets you search multi city options to build you itinerary, where BA does not. I'm trying to do the same thing Janflyer, but for 5 people so it requires multiple legs and splitting up of the travelling party and connections across certain segments. Oh happy days.....

 

[sergeyvzn]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Hello! Can anyone tell me if there is an easy way to do the planning for a 280K trip - i.e. other than continuously having to go round and round through the whole thing on the disfunctional Qantas website every time you want to change just a single date?
For example, is there a different website to look at flight availabilities for a particular segment, say, over a few different days? If I could just break up the trip into its bits before putting it all together, it would save me a lot of pain!
I've tried having multiple web pages open and trying to do it that way, but that seems to just confuse the website and then everything crashes and I have to start all over yet again!
Any tips would be most appreciated!

Did you not notice the "flexible dates" checkbox?

if you check it, you'll get a screen for a month and you can scroll back and forth through the calendar

the other 2 mist popular engines - BA and AA - have a similar functionality

 

[Janflyer]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Many thanks everyone - will give those all a go.
Colrad, I don't envy you - I'm just trying to book for myself and I'm tearing my hair out with this Qantas website!

 

[lovestotravel]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Looking at booking my first J award here

So basically booking MEL-LAX as soon as I can to get J seats then keep adding on segments as the dates come into the booking windows

You pay 3500 points for each segment you add on ?
That is per person ?
So you end up paying another 30k or so per person by the time you finish the trip ?

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Looking at booking my first J award here

So basically booking MEL-LAX as soon as I can to get J seats then keep adding on segments as the dates come into the booking windows

You pay 3500 points for each segment you add on ?
That is per person ?
So you end up paying another 30k or so per person by the time you finish the trip ?

You can book MEL-LAX online as soon as they are released and then make additions or alterations by phone. The cost is 3500 points per person each time you alter your itinerary, not per segment added - so if you add 3 segments at the same time it's 3500 points pp, not 10,500.

You don't need to add every segment as soon as it's released either; just the ones where demand is high and/or availability is low. You are not under as much pressure to add segments as they are released on main routes with multiple flights daily (or more than one carrier) because availability on them will be good well after the release date. You can afford to wait until you can book a few of those segments at the same time to reduce the number of times you pay the 3500 pts. Try a couple of dummy bookings on the QF website to get a feel of which segments routinely have good availability. You can also ring the QF call centre and quiz them about how good availability generally is for the segments you have in mind - and that advice is free if you don't actually make a booking at the time.

 

[lovestotravel]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

You can book MEL-LAX online as soon as they are released and then make additions or alterations by phone. The cost is 3500 points per person each time you alter your itinerary, not per segment added - so if you add 3 segments at the same time it's 3500 points pp, not 10,500.

You don't need to add every segment as soon as it's released either; just the ones where demand is high and/or availability is low. You are not under as much pressure to add segments as they are released on main routes with multiple flights daily (or more than one carrier) because availability on them will be good well after the release date. You can afford to wait until you can book a few of those segments at the same time to reduce the number of times you pay the 3500 pts. Try a couple of dummy bookings on the QF website to get a feel of which segments routinely have good availability. You can also ring the QF call centre and quiz them about how good availability generally is for the segments you have in mind - and that advice is free if you don't actually make a booking at the time.

Thanks, that's not too bad then, but I have pretty much missed my chance for MEL or SYD to LAX for Feb/March next year, but this will be good for another trip later on.

My original understanding was that everything needed to be booked at once

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Thanks, that's not too bad then, but I have pretty much missed my chance for MEL or SYD to LAX for Feb/March next year, but this will be good for another trip later on.

My original understanding was that everything needed to be booked at once

Have you looked at QF15 BNE - LAX - it's often still got J seats when the MEL or SYD - LAX flights are full. There may still be availability for Feb/march next year