lazy_flyer

Hi all. Just letting you all know that this new option on Lan comes with complications. I had a 10+ hour flight AKL-SCL and was given the option of paying $100 (USD) to book an exit row seat at online check in. I accepted this offer and selected my seat. After entering my credit card details and hitting submit the site repeatedly attempted to access the confirmation page, but failed and returned to the previous page. This cycle went on for several minutes without me touching anything. I called Lan and they said nothing had gone through, I couldn't complete online checkin for that flight but I should be able to do seat selection. I then tried again, with the same result.

I checked my bank account in the morning, and noticed my available credit was down. I called the bank and they informed me there were two transactions from Lan. I called Lan and they said they would immediately investigate, and I was cc'd on an email that promised a reply within an hour. Nothing for several hours. I sent a reminder email and finally got a response that requested I provide my bank statements, along with as much detail as possible, including emailing them my credit card details, and they would start an investigation and maybe refund one of the charges. Their system seems incapable of matching a transaction to a reservation code, which is quite unbelievable.

I've taken the flight now, at checkin they knew nothing about my seat, so now I will be seeking to have both charges reversed. So in summary, if you take up their offer of premium seating, you may be charged multiple times, lied to about whether you have been charged at all, not get the service that you paid for, and be expected to do all the work to get things rectified. I also don't think I'm prepared to email my credit card number, for security reasons.

Eastbay1K

I bet what happened is their CC fraud alert system went into a tizzy because these transactions are processed probably as a Chile transaction and it didn't go through but it tried, so you have available credit down, but the transactions will not go through.

This is inexcusable, but this is probably what happened, so the LAN agent(s) that saw your reservation didn't see what transpired.

lazy_flyer

Interesting thoughts. Your hypothesis may explain half of it. When I first noticed my credit down nothing was on my statement but the bank informed me of two transactions from Lan waiting to be processed. As things currently stand, one has now been processed and is appearing on my statement, while the other remains in limbo.

You are probably right as I tried through two different versions of the Lan site. The Chilean one (priced in pesos) is the one that has gone though, while the Peruvian one (priced in USD) is the one that has not. The irony is I called the bank to inform them of my travel to Peru so if anything I would have thought that one would be more likely to succeed.

Thanks for the reply.

IanWorthington

Is this not BAU for all things LAN?

lazy_flyer

Quite likely yes. I went to the Lan office in Lima today, which was a total waste of time. I asked three questions and received an unsatisfactory response to all three.

No, we won't look up your case to determine what has happened - deal with the credit department.

No, we are unable to create any link between your reservation and your wife's because there is an infant on the booking.

No, we are not prepared to book a domestic flight with another airline to a place that we don't fly to so that your itinerary can be all on the one ticket. You should use a travel agent for that. (Amusingly, when I asked if they could recommend someone locally, they said no to that too because none of the TA's in Lima could be trusted)

What is it about the culture of this company that makes them so customer unfriendly, with no obvious desire to change that perception?

postular

It's not the culture of the company it's the culture of the culture! You're not in Kansas anymore. Don't drive your self nuts trying to make sense of things that will always be alien to you. Just my two cents. YMMV.

og

Could the infant in one booking cause the problem that stopped the transaction?

lazy_flyer

Good thinking, but the infant is not in the booking that this transaction was for. I was traveling solo on this flight. My wife and infant are joining me on the return, on their own separate ticket.

lazy_flyer

Haha! I'm slowly coming around to your point of view

Latest update. Recall that I am requesting that both transactions be reversed, as first I was double-charged and then second I didn't receive the service I paid for. The email I received today told me that they will look into the double charge and consider reversing one of them. If I want the other charge reversed I'll have to make a separate complaint as that's a completely separate issue. Possibly technically correct, but again, awful customer service.

andreadbc

Last night when attempting to pay for an emergency-row seat, the website / verified by visa went crazy and refust to accept the payment (tried with 3 cards that I know have verified by visa - it was a website issue). At one point I got a pre-check-in with the seat number but no cards seemed to have been charged (according to the bank) and I had no payment confirmations. The call-center said they didn't see any payments either and as the website couldn't re-issue the pre-check confirmation, so it was seemingly in limbo mode (seat selected but not really paid for and no guarantee that it would be honored or "stick").

At this point I should've cancelled the check-in using the website, but the call center lady said that she'd do it and then apparently systems clashed and I could neither check-in nor cancel anything on the website. They told me to try waiting and see if things would sync up, but nothing. Later I got the call center to do the check-in in a regular seat and finally I was able to cancel that on the website, access again and pay for the exit row seat!

I hope that I haven't been double or triple charged for this! It's very annoying that the call center (or the local office) is unable to process payment for premium seating... If the LANPASS elite center is able to do this for Comodoros etc, they should be able to figure something out for the other folks...

lazy_flyer

Sounds like you have the opposite problem to me - seat selected but no payment. I guess the website is capable of all kinds of errors.

Please let us know if your seat selection is honored at checkin.

I'm still waiting for my two refunds

andreadbc

Surprise! the flight is going to be delayed almost 6 hours and the passenger is supposedly rebooked elsewhere. Good for him that he will probably arrive not-that-late. Bad for me because now I might have to deal with the refund department!!

**2 phone calls later: the refund should be processed in 15-20 business days, *sigh*...

bobert24

Time to call your credit card company and file a dispute. The information you've got in the emails you mentioned will probably be enough to do it. Let them fight it out instead of you.