Old Jan 11, 2014, 10:36 am
FlyerTalk Forums Expert How-Tos and Guides
Last edit by: centrifuge41
WARNING - The cancellation fee has been increased up to $200 for long haul premium awards as of Feb 2017 .

T&Cs here:
How to cancel a Lifemiles ticket:
  • Lifemiles tickets cannot be canceled or changed online, you need to call the Avianca/TACA call center (+1 800 284 2622). #2 for English, then enter your Lifemiles number, enter #3 for Lifemiles then #3 again for transactions.
  • The cancellation fee is variable, $50-200. The change-fee is $150. This is per passenger/ticket. If you cancel, you will not get back the $25 booking fee paid when the ticket was issued.
  • The cancellation fee for Awards booked after 20th/2/2017: Award Tickets are reimbursable by paying a fee that varies depending on the redeemed route, the redemption channel and other circumstances, Accurate information of the reimbursement cost shall be informed at the time of redeeming the Award Ticket. If you cancel, you will not get back the $25 booking fee paid when the ticket was issued.
  • You need to set-up a phone PIN to do any changes to tickets on lifemiles.com before or during the call. Do this before you call as doing this while calling can add a couple of minutes to the call
  • Make sure your address and phone number are up to date in your lifemiles account. This will help immensely as spelling out everything letter-by-letter to the phone agent.
  • Your credit card information is collected via an automated system on the phone and not by the agent. The system first asks you for your card number (Visa, Mastercard, or American Express), followed by the expiration month/year in MMYY format, then followed by the Security Code. Press * to correct mistakes in entering numbers.
  • You need to enter/confirm credit card information for every ticket seperately. The process is simpler for remaining tickets as you only need to: first confirm the last 4 digits of the card (1 - Yes; 2 - No); followed by the expiration Month; followed by the expiration Year; followed by the Security code. For AMEX,(and sometimes for visa too ) the whole cared number has to be entered again
  • Similarly if you have used credit cards before, the system keeps information about your credit cards, so even for the first ticket, the process is simpler as you only need to confirm the last four digits of credit card, then expiration month, then expiration year last two digits only followed by the security code
  • Be prepared to spend between 20 minutes and 3 hours on the phone to get your changes / cancellation done, depending on the agent you get, or if you're really unlucky, you may spend days getting it sorted out.
  • Avianca transactions may trigger fraud alerts on your credit card, you may need to contact your bank about this.
  • Miles should be back in your account instantaneously, tax refund can take longer (2-3 weeks)
  • Money paid for miles purchased as part of "more money/less miles" choice will NOT be refunded in cash but as miles.
  • As soon as your flight is ticketed, the refund for a cash & miles booking will be only in miles
  • BE PATIENT: some agents are very knowledgeable and fast, others take hours to get a simple cancellation done
  • TAXES ARE REFUNDABLE: if an agent claims that taxes are non-refundable you may need to write an email to [email protected] to follow-up
  • You should be able to see your cancellation receipts under "Your Lifemiles" - "Print receipts" (Only works with Internet Explorer!)
  • NEW RULE - Ticket cannot be cancelled in the T-48 to T+24 window. Ticket can be cancelled after T+24 as long as ticket is valid, which is up to 365 days after issuance date (not travel date!)

Some agents have stated that the ticket can be cancelled even AFTER the flight dates, as long as the ticket is "open". Confirmed by FTers @ #334, 336, 371 and 445.
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Cancellation of Lifemiles ticket

Old Aug 5, 2014, 4:34 pm
  #331  
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Programs: SPG Plat 100, A3*G
Posts: 678
Originally Posted by zagy
So... caught in the LifeMiles Cancellation FunZone again

Have an award ticket for August 6th SFO-PVR... but found and booked a much better connection for me: IAH-PVR.

And now want to do a cancellation of the first ticket.

The system is currently down, lady said she suggests I call back in 12 hours.

But she also said that if I can't cancel today, I have 1 year to request the miles back.

I know this was already mentioned in this thread but can't remember if anyone actually did this already (successfully of course ) and if it's really true that you can get miles back for a missed flight?
Called back again after 12+ hours... if you select LifeMiles during the automated selection, the system says: "the system is experiencing technical difficulties. Please call back later." after that it just hangs up

Flight is in less than 12 hours, so not a lot of time left BEFORE departure. If I really can cancel and get miles back AFTER departure then I have no problem with waiting a week or two until they fix their stinky system
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Old Aug 5, 2014, 6:22 pm
  #332  
 
Join Date: Jul 2012
Location: Helsinki
Programs: A3 Gold, BA Silver
Posts: 1,014
Originally Posted by zagy

Flight is in less than 12 hours, so not a lot of time left BEFORE departure. If I really can cancel and get miles back AFTER departure then I have no problem with waiting a week or two until they fix their stinky system
I called in Spanish yesterday and I was able to cancel the reservation but refunding the ticket was impossible as I couldn't pay the fee.

No-show can be problematic and that's why you should at least cancel the reservation (cancelling the ticket doensn't require paying the fee but refunding it does). As clarification, one year is calculated from the date of issuance (at least I was told so in Spanish), not from the date of cancellation of the ticket.

By the way, has anyone been able to be the pay fee at Avianca office? Going to Avianca office during my next trip South America could be easier than to try to pay it through call center.

Last edited by miikkak; Aug 5, 2014 at 6:29 pm
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Old Aug 5, 2014, 6:40 pm
  #333  
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: SIN
Programs: SQ, UA, Delta, BMI(RIP), Marriott Lifetime Titanium, Hilton Diamond (Thanks Amex) Hyatt Discov
Posts: 1,942
6 Aug 2014, 8 pm EST, systems are down. Two agents separately confirmed that the ticket can be cancelled even AFTER the flight departs as long as the ticket is OPEN, i.e. not cancelled or used prior.

Some up thread reports about this, but does anyone have first hand experience of successfully cancelling a ticket AFTER the flight has departed? If true, that means one can use Lifemiles award tickets as back-up tickets until the flight departure time without worrying about being a no-show and not being able to get the miles/money back!!

Last edited by SingaporeDon; Jan 25, 2017 at 9:23 am
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Old Aug 5, 2014, 10:55 pm
  #334  
 
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Saigon/Hanoi/San Francisco
Posts: 1,779
Originally Posted by SingaporeDon
Some up thread reports about this, but does anyone having first hand experience of successfully cancelling a ticked AFTER the flight has departed? If true, that means one can use Lifemiles award tickets as a back-up tickets until the flight departure time without worrying about being a no-show and not being able to get the miles/money back!!
Yes. I was able to cancel after the trip. I had 3 tickets under one record. One person didn't make the trip and was a no-show. I waited until after the trip to cancel without any issues.
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Old Aug 6, 2014, 6:47 am
  #335  
 
Join Date: Jul 2014
Posts: 27
Originally Posted by imm2b
They called me back 2 days later. Two agents on the phone, one was a translator. They took my Citi card numbers manually and it worked this time. I guess Avianca is still using the 80's technology.
Cancelled two tickets last night with a call back request - had 2 agents on the call and one was a translator. The whole process took 20 mins and miles were back in my account within 3-4 hours.
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Old Aug 7, 2014, 7:27 am
  #336  
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Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Between AMS and BRU
Posts: 8,852
Originally Posted by zagy
I know this was already mentioned in this thread but can't remember if anyone actually did this already (successfully of course ) and if it's really true that you can get miles back for a missed flight?
Yes, I did.... refund when I couldn't cancel before the flight (iPhone doesn't work with LM CC system) but did it after arriving home. No problem.
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Old Aug 7, 2014, 6:55 pm
  #337  
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: SIN
Programs: SQ, UA, Delta, BMI(RIP), Marriott Lifetime Titanium, Hilton Diamond (Thanks Amex) Hyatt Discov
Posts: 1,942
Originally Posted by imm2b
Yes. I was able to cancel after the trip. I had 3 tickets under one record. One person didn't make the trip and was a no-show. I waited until after the trip to cancel without any issues.
Interesting, which makes the Lifemiles propgram a bit more valuable in terms of using it for back-up bookings in case one needs to use them at the airport at the last minute!
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Old Aug 7, 2014, 9:50 pm
  #338  
soy
 
Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: DUB-BOS
Programs: various
Posts: 3,651
I think this is just a feature of the crazy way they run their program. There are loads of reports of people who cancel flights yet LM never cancel the booking. Seems crazy as I assume they have to pay for no-shows, but perhaps this behaviour is so unusual in *A the $$ cost is too low to fix
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Old Aug 7, 2014, 11:14 pm
  #339  
 
Join Date: May 2012
Location: MUC
Programs: BA Gold, AA Plat, TK*G, UA*G
Posts: 51
Is the system up and running again?
Tried to cancel on the 5th but system was down and they just said they will call me back what never happened.
Would be great if anybody has information on that
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Old Aug 8, 2014, 9:15 am
  #340  
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: SIN
Programs: SQ, UA, Delta, BMI(RIP), Marriott Lifetime Titanium, Hilton Diamond (Thanks Amex) Hyatt Discov
Posts: 1,942
Originally Posted by Juliank
Is the system up and running again?
Tried to cancel on the 5th but system was down and they just said they will call me back what never happened.
Would be great if anybody has information on that
Yes, cancelled yesterday.
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Old Aug 10, 2014, 6:04 pm
  #341  
 
Join Date: Oct 2012
Posts: 177
when trying to cancel lifemiles tickets, please take your blood pressure medicine before you call that 1800 number.
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Old Aug 27, 2014, 11:47 am
  #342  
 
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: NYC/PSP
Programs: AA EXP, A3 Gold
Posts: 4,100
Third phone call to try and cancel a ticket. First two times credit cards were "declined". But they weren't. As others have posted, the charge is approved, then instantly is debited. Called CapitalOne and they of course said they're nothing wrong with my card. This third agent wants to try the automated payment system again. Trying to convince him that others have had the same issue and only manually entering the cc details works. We shall see....

Update #1: I'm going to kill them. 20 minutes with an agent while he contacts the payment department. They want me to try the automated credit card info a fourth time. And then the call drops. Now on call #4 and almost two hours wasted...

Update #2: After another hour on the phone(bringing the total to almost 3 hours), I give up. Will make a special trip to an Avianca office. I'm defeated.

Update #3: Went to the NYC office. Only waited a few minutes to see an agent(would have been faster if the other agent weren't on the phone with Tmobile concerning her cell phone. Agent took my info. And of course their credit card machine wasn't working. Produced a crisp $50 bill which she initially thought was fake. Miles were in my account before I left the office. So easy. Am never calling in again. Luckily I work nearby. Hadn't realized that. Blood pressure starting to get back down to normal.

Last edited by justforfun; Aug 27, 2014 at 2:04 pm
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Old Aug 27, 2014, 4:50 pm
  #343  
 
Join Date: Nov 2011
Posts: 6,384
Originally Posted by justforfun
Third phone call to try and cancel a ticket. First two times credit cards were "declined". But they weren't. As others have posted, the charge is approved, then instantly is debited. Called CapitalOne and they of course said they're nothing wrong with my card. This third agent wants to try the automated payment system again. Trying to convince him that others have had the same issue and only manually entering the cc details works. We shall see....

Update #1: I'm going to kill them. 20 minutes with an agent while he contacts the payment department. They want me to try the automated credit card info a fourth time. And then the call drops. Now on call #4 and almost two hours wasted...

Update #2: After another hour on the phone(bringing the total to almost 3 hours), I give up. Will make a special trip to an Avianca office. I'm defeated.

Update #3: Went to the NYC office. Only waited a few minutes to see an agent(would have been faster if the other agent weren't on the phone with Tmobile concerning her cell phone. Agent took my info. And of course their credit card machine wasn't working. Produced a crisp $50 bill which she initially thought was fake. Miles were in my account before I left the office. So easy. Am never calling in again. Luckily I work nearby. Hadn't realized that. Blood pressure starting to get back down to normal.
wow, you went to the nyc office? crazy!
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Old Aug 28, 2014, 12:42 pm
  #344  
 
Join Date: Oct 2011
Posts: 3,835
nevermind

Last edited by mlqsko; Aug 29, 2014 at 6:16 am
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Old Aug 29, 2014, 9:32 am
  #345  
 
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: ZRH
Programs: SEN
Posts: 137
Datapoint: 2 * 2 tickets cancelled in 40 minutes. The payment system (or maybe just the agent?) took 2 or 3 minutes to confirm the payment each of the four times.
Also the agent insisted that I give him the ticket numbers. AFAIR they asked for the reservation code the other times.

Last edited by superpointsLXflyer; Aug 30, 2014 at 4:03 am
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