Best way to book this mixed airline flight?

pimento

I want to fly to AKL using Air New Zealand with a SkyCouch

http://www.airnewzealand.co.uk/777-300-economy-skycouch

for reasons that I won't go into, I need to fly straight there.

On the return trip, I want to travel home via SYD and spend five nights there. To avoid doing a dog leg, I want to use someone like QF or SQ but when I try to do the entire booking on the Air New Zealand web site, they want to divert me so that all the flights are theirs.

Flying out early January 2015 and home about a month later. Dates are flexible.

What's the best way to do this booking? Two separate bookings with the two airlines? If so, can I even do that, buying a ticket from a country where I'm not commencing my journey? You never used to be able to do that, or, is there an agent that you can recommend that will be able to sort this out and not charge me a king's ransom?

Thanks for all ideas/recommendations.

Doshwaster

No experience with Air NZ but I book flights starting in foreign countries all of the time. I'm recently back from a trip around SE Asia that had several internal flights all booked directly with the airline.

Just watch for foreign currency conversion costs on your credit card. Use a card such as Halifax Clarity if possible.

comeandgo

If I need flights when on holiday I use a search engine of that country, ie not a .co.uk site as I've found prices can be cheaper that way. when we were in Egypt the internal flights we booked were half the price booking through an Egyptian site.
And I have used Air New Zealand a few times and no problems.

SW17

It's not generally a problem these days to book one-ways with airlines outside your (or their) home country. However, a few airlines still have a bit of a 20th century attitude to one-ways in terms of pricing, so it can result in higher prices versus each sector of a booked return. Just try it out and see, it just depends on the fare rules.

Given your itinerary, also worth checking out a round-the-world ticket (out via LAX, back via Asia) on NZ/SQ via Star Alliance website or with offline multi stop specialists like Flight Centre, Trailfinders etc. I know the mantra on MSE forums is "go direct" and usually it's good advice, but for this type of trip these companies can sometimes access fare combos that don't surface very well online (out of the unappealing guts of the GDS). Worth a phone call IMHO.

Obviously_the_best

I'd probably (cost dependent) book singles from the UK to NZ , NZ to Oz and Oz back to the UK.

richardw

SQ do some code sharing with Air NZ.

andycris3107

eBookers has an advanced option that will allow you to choose which airline per leg. I don't know if they would allow you to book the skycouch though.

The alternative would be to call Flightcentre (0800 082 3402) and they can do you a custom quote for the same price as online.