According to TPG, ANA has removed the hefty fuel surcharges (YQ) on US-Japan routes. I took a look myself and found a few interesting details.

US-Japan Round Trip

  • Departing from Japan, NRT-SFO round trip: the surcharge is very low! And these flights are operated by ANA. Business class for 85,000 miles is a fantastic deal.
  • Departing from the US, SFO-NRT round trip: the surcharge is also very low! And these flights are operated by ANA. Business class for 85,000 miles is a fantastic deal.
  • Departing from the US, SFO-NRT round trip in first class is 150,000 miles, with the same surcharge level.
  • Looking at the tax breakdown, there really is no YQ.

China-US Round Trip

  • Departing from China, PVG-SFO round trip: the surcharge is still quite high, requiring $350+.
  • Looking at the tax breakdown, this $289 YQ is still pretty intimidating.
  • Flying it in the other direction still comes with $388 in surcharges.

China-Japan Round Trip

  • Departing from China, PVG-NRT round trip: taxes and fees are not high either.
  • Departing from Japan, NRT-PVG round trip: taxes and fees are not high either.
  • There really is no YQ.

What’s the Best Way to Book?

To sum up, even though these are all ANA-operated flights:

  • China-Japan and China-US round trips have no YQ
  • China-US has high YQ

That looks pretty strange... If you split a China-US round trip into separate tickets, it becomes a very poor value: 40,000 + 85,000 compared with booking it directly for 90,000, which is much higher overall. If you need this routing, you could book the Japan-US segment as an award ticket, then add a separate China-Japan round trip yourself (for example, with a cash ticket or by booking with BA). Be sure to pay attention to layover time, through-checked baggage, whether you need to leave the airport, and whether the airport operates 24 hours a day.