SYDNEY IN COMFORT DILEMMA - HELP

Hubby and I have been saving our miles for 2 years. It is now 336 days before our preferred travel date to Sydney, ie 16 Nov - 10 Dec. We intend to go LHR-HKG (UC) and HKG-SYD (PE) - no problem!
However, because of this 336 day rule, today I can book the outbound flight, but have to wait 3 weeks to book the inbound, which generally wouldn't be a problem - BUT looking at the website I have to pay more in taxes to do this, ie £166 taxes the LHR-HKG UC return, BUT £105 taxes for LHK-HKG UK one-way (which is all I am allowed to do today). Is there a way round this please?
Many thanks.[?]

Not sure that there is any way round your problem. We had the same thing when planning our trip. We had to wait for our return date before we could book the whole trip.

We had to wait for 4 weeks from the outbound flight before we could book it all. But we were lucky and got all the seats we wanted.

Perhaps someone else knows differently.

Mark

[Scrooge]

If you are very very lucky you may get someone at FC that will "hold" a seat for you, they are not supposed to do this, but get the right person and they will, give them a call, they can only say no.

Originally posted by SANDYT

However, because of this 336 day rule, today I can book the outbound flight, but have to wait 3 weeks to book the inbound, which generally wouldn't be a problem - BUT looking at the website I have to pay more in taxes to do this, ie £166 taxes the LHR-HKG UC return, BUT £105 taxes for LHK-HKG UK one-way (which is all I am allowed to do today). Is there a way round this please?
Many thanks.[?]

I'm a bit perplexed. You would, of course, have to pay more in taxes for a return flight - VS YQ surcharge and HKG departure tax.

Are you not wanting to stop-over in HKG? Since (I assume) you are booking the LHR-HKG and HKG-SYD sectors separately then you will pay the HKG departure tax whether or not you do stop-over. If you don't intend to stop-over in HKG then you can easily claim the HKG departure tax at the HKCAD desk next to the United check-in counters.

[mitchja]

I would bite the bullet and just book your out-bound reward flights now (before someone else does as SYD is very popular in Nov/Dec).

OK so you end up paying a bit more tax, look at at this way, you're flying to STD (in comfort) for not a lot of money

Regards

[mcmbenjamin]

Ok so it is 336 day prior but prior to flight time or the day? And in what time zone is the 336 day/ 8064 hours calculated from?

The original question is a little ambiguous but in case we have missed the point so far:-

£105 one way taxes are not doubled for the return. I believe you will find the inbound taxes, when you are able to book, will be around the £61 pound mark. This would bring the taxes in line to be the same as if you had bought a return flight initially.

Paul

Originally posted by mcmbenjamin
Ok so it is 336 day prior but prior to flight time or the day? And in what time zone is the 336 day/ 8064 hours calculated from?

thread hoisted, in case anyone knows the answer to this question... I'd be quite interested to know!

336 days prior to DATE of travel, based upon local time of SHARES servers, which is based in US West coast.

[Scrooge]

Originally posted by Juliet
336 days prior to DATE of travel, based upon local time of SHARES servers, which is based in US West coast.

Thank you for that little bit of info I had no idea about [oo]

[mcmbenjamin]

Originally posted by Scrooge

Originally posted by Juliet
336 days prior to DATE of travel, based upon local time of SHARES servers, which is based in US West coast.

Thank you for that little bit of info I had no idea about [oo]

Ok Thanks a bunch Juliet [^]

12:01AM West Coast time. Maybe a VF reward booker clock? [:?]

Hmm... so 8 hours forward for UK time. Meaning the new day's rewards hit the systems at 8am?

Originally posted by McCoy
Hmm... so 8 hours forward for UK time. Meaning the new day's rewards hit the systems at 8am?

from experience, give or take...... it may be based upon those servers but I have seen them come on over the surrounding two hours.

please bear in mind that when the FLIGHT is released, not all booking classes may be released, and some booking classes may not be released at all, including miles reward seats or Z seats.