Hello all, I was wondering if anyone can advise me on how to confirm flights with this airline.

I have reserved flights for December, BA-Salta-Ba and have received reservation confirmation with a reference. On attempting to pay online with my Visa card I got thrown off the site.

I called their office in BA from my home in the UK and a guy called Eduardo said not to worry, I can pay at Jorge Newberry, just turn up an hour before boarding.

Call me a cynic but I'm not entirely reassured, what do you think?

Do you have a link to their website...? Please give me some more information and I will do my best to help you.

And yes, I think you have reason to feel a little uneasy.

Hi again Gaucho, many thanks for the offer of help, the link to the website is:

http://www.andesonline.com/

I went through the process of submitting all my details and received a return e-mail quoting me a Codigo de reserva. The e-mail instructed me that to confirm my purchase I had to pay by 5th November. I went back to the site armed with my code and was directed to the secure payment page. I entered my card details but when I pressed submit the failure message popped up.

I then telephoned the Andes office to see if I could pay by some other means, as I mentioned the guy in the office said to just turn up and pay at the airport. My concern is obviously that without a pre payment my seats will have gone.

Do you have a link to their website...? Please give me some more information and I will do my best to help you.

And yes, I think you have reason to feel a little uneasy.

I will confess to never have heard of this airline until this thread was created. I will check with my TA and get back to you with more information.

My TA tells me he has never used or booked this airline. He suggests calling them again and trying to get some sort of additional confirmation, perhaps even something via fax if their website doesnt work. Are their fares substantially lower than those of LAN and Aerolineas?

Sorry I cannot be of more assistance.

Monkey, I have heard good things about Andes Airlines. I believe they fly to Salta, north of Argentina. If I can help, send me a pm, maybe I can help you with your confirmation.

My TA tells me he has never used or booked this airline. He suggests calling them again and trying to get some sort of additional confirmation, perhaps even something via fax if their website doesnt work. Are their fares substantially lower than those of LAN and Aerolineas?

Sorry I cannot be of more assistance.

Thanks for trying, they are somewhat cheaper than AA on the BA-Salta route, around $1800 2 pax return. They fly this route once daily, I believe its the only one they fly.

If you get a chance, please let us know on what you finally decided to do and if you use Andes, please report back on your experience. Thanks.

Ive been doing some more information hunting, and the more I hear about Andes the more Im convinced it may be better to avoid this carrier. Im told they have only 1 airplane in their fleet, and are prone to frequent operational issues. Whats more here is how they handle their problems, as described by a poster over on TripAdvisor:


I just returned from Salta a few weeks ago but still didn't have time to post a detailed trip report as I've been very busy. I flew Andes and it was really ...well BAD.

The planes don't have much legroom. To make matters worse, on the flight home, I was supposed to leave at 8 AM. Long story short, I didn't leave until 11 PM that night. My travel agent was good enough to call me the night before at 11 PM and let me know that the flight was cancelled for the morning. The following day they didn't know what time the flight would be confirmed so I waited all afternoon and finally heard at 4 PM that the flight would leave at 6 PM. It didn't end up leaving until 11 PM.

Then imagine my surprised when the flight I thought I had with "Andes Airlines" wasn't with Andes. I think they subcontracted the flight out with an airline (that I believe is State owned but not 100% sure). It was called LADE. It was quite possibly the worst plane I ever flew in my life and I've pretty much been everywhere. I thought the planes were bad in Cuba but this was the worst.

It was very small, the air was stuffy and smelled horrible in the plane, the tray tables were broken so kept coming down during the flight, there were no overhead bin doors so things were falling out (talk about a safety concern!!). To make it worse, they inform us after take off at 11 PM that they didn't have any fuel so they needed to go to Tucuman to fuel!

Then to add insult to injury, there was a medical emergency as some senior citizen had trouble breathing so we didn't make it to Buenos Aires until about 2 AM.

I will never fly with Andes/LADE again and I wouldn't recommend LADE.
So, NO, I wouldn't recommend Andes...... I generally try to avoid Aerolineas Argentina as they are the worst but they were heaven compared to Andes.... I guess sometimes you get what you pay for.


I think the last line of the above comment is the most important... yes, Andes is cheap, but sometimes a cheap ticket can become very expensive.

In October, 2006, I, my brother and his wife (we are all Americans) flew Andes Airlines from Buenos Aires' Jorge Newberry Airport to Salta and back a week later. Both flights were on an MD-88, took off on time, were comfortable, had a nice snack box of food provided and were entirely satisfactory. I have a friend who lives in Salta who told me that the airline existed. He did help to confirm our reservations by walking into the Andes office in Salta. Cheaper than Aerolineas, especially because there was no surcharge because were were not Argentine nationals like Aerolineas wanted to add on. We may have been lucky, but it worked for us. I'm planning another trip to Salta this coming September, 2007, and plan to fly them again. I hope they are still in business!

I was born in Salta in 1942. This was my first trip back since leaving in 1946.

I guess the consensus is that if you are lucky and there are no operational issues, and if you buy your tickets early and are able to snatch some of the lower fares, then Andes is an option. The issue is that they have a very limited number of aircraft, so if there is a technical delay you have no other option but to wait. Also, it seems that the other larger carriers do not readily accept Andes tickets, so if you are pressed to make a connection then your only option may be to buy a new ticket from another carrier.

Three of us flew Andes from Salta to Buenos Aires on Sept. 25. Although the MD82 was 40 minutes late leaving, the flight arrived at the Jorge Newberry Aeroparque (AEP) only 20 minutes late. Worked out just fine since our Delta flight to Atlanta didn't leave until 8:30 pm that night. We took a taxi to the BYT Argentina offices (the excellent online company though which I've rented apartments in BA) and they held our luggage while we spent another 5 hours in the city before taking a pre-arranged taxi to EZE.

By the way, the impressive, cigarette carton sized snack box which we had in October, 2006, has been replaced by a small roll and a filled cookie (duce de leche, of course!) on the Andes flight. Looks like they decided to save money on the food.

Andes has added a second route: BA to Puerto Madryn. We plan to take that next year when we do Patagonia.

I've flown to Salta from BA several times to visit my father who lives there. Usually we fly Aerolineas (on the brink of dissolving). When Andes started flying to Salta, my father recommended it since it was more affordable and didn't charge a fee for non-Argentines.

He successfully purchased the ticket via his preferred travel agent in BA. However, when I showed up at Newberry, all the lights were out and nobody was at the counter. After asking the airport security about the airline, they finally found an agent to help me. My flight had been cancelled because a bird flew into the jet engine of the only aircraft they won. Luckily they were able to put me on an Aerolineas flight, but the transaction was also shady. She basically walked me over to the Aerolineas counter and busted out tons of cash to pay for my ticket. I was somewhat able to forgive them as random things do happen.

However, on my return flight I realized that these things are quite normal. Luckily the night before our flight the travel agent called us in Salta tell us that the aircraft had not been repaired and yet again, I was put on an Aerolineas flight.

After this experience, as well as reading what others have to say, i would STAY CLEAR! I think your best bet is to fly LAN since they are the only ones that are financially stable at this point.

I think your best bet is to fly LAN since they are the only ones that are financially stable at this point.

Not only that, they are profitable and pay regular dividends on their stock.

Wirelessly posted (Palm TX: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows 98; PalmSource/Palm-D050; Blazer/4.3) 16;320x448)

LAN may be making $$$ as a company, but in Argentina they are still operating at a loss.