I have a flight tomorrow from OTP-DOH-IAD. I�m coming on a flight from DUB that gets in 95 minutes before OTP-DOH.

My plan was to online checkin, use the transit lane and have any documents checked at the gate.

its 12 hours until the flight and online checkin still isn�t available, just a message to say it�s available 24 hours in advance.

I called QR who said it will open soon, but I�m not so sure.

Any experience from this? If I can get OLCI to work before I leave DUB I�ll have to push the OTP-IAD back a day to avoid being late for airport checkin and I�d prefer not to do that.

 

When is your DOH-IAD leg?

Ive had it before on a double leg journey that I couldn�t OLCI before the second leg was within 24 hours. Of course, this was pre-COVID.

 

Although it's probably not what you want to read, it might be that OTP has suspended OLCI due to the requirement to check more documents. The amount of connecting traffic at OTP would usually be small, it's not hard to imagine that the station manager at OTP has made the decision that it's easier to get all doc checks done upfront at the check-in desk rather than at the gate, and DOH call centre agents would probably not have visibility of this.

Whilst OTP is usually ok for back to back type flight, planning a 95min gap between flights on a self-connect does seem to be very risky especially with the everchanging health requirements and paperwork.

Whatever happens, good luck!

 

Even if OLCI worked, boarding passes could not be generated in advance for US flights until a QR agent has checked vaccination + test documents and take a photo of them to upload into the system.

If you could think you could trek from your arrival gate through immigration to QR check-in within less than 35 minutes, there are no issues. If you don't want to risk, either move your DUB-OTP flight earlier, or your OTP-DOH-IAD flight later.

 

It all worked out well, just about.

I could access the OLCI exactly 24 hours prior to my US flight leaving DOH, despite this it still wouldn�t let me compete the check in.

My FR flight, despite arriving early every day for the past week managed to arrive 5 minutes late, to a bus stand.

I had a glance at �transfers� when I passed and it was not only closed, but blocked off. Got into the immigration hall to the normal
chaos in OTP but having been there previously I know to keep going through all the queues to the bottom of the hall where despite 20 people queuing for the side desks there were only 4 in front of me.

Through quickly and half ran to customs and out to the arrival hall. It took just a few minutes to get to departures where I made the QR desk with about a
minute to spare.

This wasn�t intentional, my initial plan was to leave OTP tomorrow, but due to another schedule change I had to move things around. It�s not recommended, but sometimes needs must. 😀

Didnt QR at one point use VeriFLY or something similar to verify documents at OLCI?

Now for my next challenge, a tier point from from IAD tomorrow, again with a shortish connection. At least if there�s a delay I can cancel for credit and do it at another time and spend a couple of days in Washington.

 

Wow, congratulations on managing to pull that off. I am sure you realise just how close that turned out and I guess your nerves are rather frayed. Hopefully you can build in considerably more buffer time on a self connects in future, but in the meantime you enjoy a drink or three onboard, and if it's on the IFE maybe watch Wallace and Gromit in "A close shave" as something playful to wind down to.

Thanks also for reporting back, hope the rest of your journey is stress free.

 

On a similar vein...Wednesday I have my first ever flights on Qatar booked for me...BHD-LHR-DOH-PEK. First leg is on BA and they tell me they can't check me in for the Qatar flights and Qatar website says OLCI is not available. Have not been able to contact with anyone via phone as calls just get cut off...there doesn't seem to be an online chat facility and no chat option. Will I have to go landside in LHR to check in? At least I have 6hrs there. Thanks

 

QR has an airside transfer desk at T5.
It's located at the very end of the desks at the left side of BA transfer desks at the arrivals level near transfer security.

 

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Assuming this is on a single ticket, in reality BA should be able to check you through to PEK, but in the case that they cannot they should be able to check your luggage through and you should stand your ground on this point, if necessary compromising on picking up boarding passes at LHR as ISTFlyer has indicated.

Pro tip: Assuming BA did check your bags through, when you get to the gate for your QR flight in LHR (try not to arrive at the last minute) approach the gate staff.with.your bag tags from BHD and ask them to verify that your bags have been routed and loaded for your Doha flight.

Thankfully you to have enough time to go landside if needed at LHR but you shouldn't need to if it's a single ticket, BA and QR are partners.

Assuming you don't have some 'special' VIP arrangements for your arrival into China, good luck with the 2 or 3 week quarantine, and happy year of the tiger.

 

thanks for that. Very helpful. It is a single booking ref made with Qatar.

 

Fantastic. Really appreciate that info.

 

ISTFlyer and plunet thanks again for your advice and thoughts. When I used OLCI for my BA flight this morning, it allowed me to also check in for my Qatar flights, which is what I would have hoped to have happened. It was just wrong info given to me by BA customer service!

 

Useful feedback that you were able to fully check through, although a shame that both BA and QR gave you the wrong info. Still worth checking whether your bags have been transferred and loaded at LHR when you get to the gate (or in the lounge if you have access). Have a great flight.

 

Hey all,

Sorry to resurrect a dead thread, but I�m having a similar issue. Have a MAD-DOH-BKK itinerary leaving MAD at 0905 Wednesday. Online check-in wasn�t working, so I called QR and got quite a few weird, and perhaps contradictory, explanations from the agent. First he claimed that because I upgraded my DOH-BKK segment from J to F with avios (although in reality I upgraded with qcredits) OLCI isn�t gonna work. Then he said actually since there was a schedule change to the DOH-BKK flight, it�s under airport control (the schedule change happened 2 weeks ago�) but maybe will work in a few hours but maybe no. Then he finally said the app doesn�t work but should work in google chrome incognito mode (it didn�t work). I�m kinda laughing here at the myriad of explanations he gave since they all seem pretty ridiculous and wrong. Should I assume OLCI isn�t working for me since it�s more than 48 hours before my DOH-BKK flight, or are some of his explanations accurate? Also, kinda important as I�ll be flying into MAD earlier that morning on an IB JFK-MAD flight and really don�t wanna go through passport control.

 

Firstly it doesn't always open exactly 48 hours before. And yes it may also be that you need to wait until all.sectors are within 48 hours.

Just keep an eye on it, it will most likely be fine by tomorrow at the latest. Worst case is IB may be able to check you in at JFK, or you'll be able to check in airside at MAD at one of the transfer desks.

This all assumes you don�t have checked bags, I don't know IB's policy for through checking on separate tickets