A few years ago there really wasn’t such a thing as a ‘round the world’ flight ticket (RTW). Long before the airlines starting grouping together as marketing partners, travel agents simply put a collection of one way tickets together, each with a different airline, to create a bespoke itinerary that usually involved about half dozen stops.

Although this is still sometimes the case, nowadays most RTW tickets are based on specific fares offered by the major airline groupings. The following is a basic outline of those products. They are still quite complicated beasts however, with all sorts of rules, exceptions, tips and tricks. A good travel agent should know these fares inside out.

Firstly a quick re-cap on some glossary:

A stop is a city you are staying in for more than 24 hours.

A transit is an airport where you are changing planes. It usually does not count as a stop unless it exceeds 24 hours.

mileage is the distance flown between 2 cities. For a RTW ticket it is calculated from Australia to Australia and all points in between. You usually need a travel agent to check this.

The are 3 alliances of airlines who work together to give us round the world journeys. They often have more than 1 fare that consists of rules and conditons depending on your journey.

Star Alliance – this is the largest group of airlines and includes; United Airlines, Air Canada, Lufthansa, Austrian Airlines, Air New Zealand, South African Airways (a new entrant), Scandinavian Airlines, Singapore Airlines, Thai Airways, British Midland and Swiss Airlines. It used to include the Brazilian national airline Varig but they are currently suspended from the group due to financial difficulties. Think about the combined route network of these airlines and you should be able to realize how versatile a ‘Star Alliance’ ticket is.

These fares are based on total mileage flown as well as stops or cities visited. The cheapest ticket allows a total of 26,000 miles and allows a maxium of 5 stops. This is really only going to allow a simple itinerary such as: Australia- Bangkok- Rome- Madrid- London- Los Angeles- Australia.

The next levels are for 29,000 miles, 34,000 miles and 39,000 miles. These tickets allow a maxium of 15 stops.

Prices start at about $2700 for these tickets plus taxes/fuel surcharges etc..

One World – this is the better known grouping as it includes Qantas. In addition it numbers; British Airways, Cathay Pacific, American Airlines, Lan Chile, Iberia, Finn Air, Lan Peru and Aer Lingus.

The Oneworld has RTW tickets similar in design to that of the Star Alliance. Whichever you end up using will probably depend on which alliance offers the stopovers that you want. The Oneworld also has however a quite unique alternative called the Oneworld Explorer which is not based on mileage flown but continents visited. The more continents visited; the more expensive the ticket with a limit on the sectors (flights) allowed per continent.

And this is limited to each continent. An example of where you can travel on 4 continents is Melbourne to Santiago – Lima – Cuzco - Lima – Santiago- Rio De Janeiro – New York – London – Dublin - Paris – Barcelona – Amsterdam – Hong Kong – Melbourne.

Australia , America, Europe and Asia = 4 continents.

These tickets are all seasonal – that is they are more expensive at certain times of the year; usually July, August and December (yes July and August – the northern hempisphere’s summer). They are also only valid for one year. If you are likely to be away for longer than that you need to look at a one-way ticket if possible.

There is a third group of airlines, although in a much looser framework than the formal alliances above.

The World Journey – is a RTW ticket that uses the services of Malaysian Airlines, Emirates, Air Pacific, Air Tahiti, South African Airlines, Continental Airlines, KLM (Dutch national carrier), Northwest Airlines amongst others. Its little used but it has 2 distinct features:

It’s the only RTW that includes Emirates, an airline that eschews formal airline alliances.

It is non-seasonal so its very good value if you are departing in the traditional high season period.

Its main disadvantage is its limited route network. In particular the only carrier offering trans-pacific flights is Air Pacific.

Some tips and tricks to planning your round-the world ticket

• use a map or atlas when planning your trip. Try and be ‘geographically logical’ to avoid expensive backtracking that eats up the mileage. Travelling from Australia to Europe, then to Asia, then to North America is not logical for example.
• Avoid departing from Australia if you can in high season.
• If you are planning to visit South America on this trip you are almost certainly going to need a ‘Oneworld’ ticket.
• Africa can be included on both main RTW tickets although the recent inclusion of South African Airways in the Star Alliance is big news.
• If you are trying to keep the costs down avoid Africa or South America from the itinerary altogether.
• You don’t have to fly all the time. Flying into one city such as Singapore and then making your own way up to Bangkok for example is classic travelling. En route you can visit Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Langkwai, Phuket, Koh Samui etc. It still counts in your milage calculation however.
• Be aware of airline routes. Just because you are allowed 4 sectors in Africa say on a Oneworld ticket does not mean you can have any 4 flights you like – the route has to be operated by a Oneworld airline.