jsguyrus

And if I should luck out and be able to add EZE-SCL to my existing award, do I need to reclaim baggage? And minimum connection time for that one?

simonsuo

Either at LAX or LATAM south America destinations like lim, scl, cus, if you changed your reservations many times, the check in time can be from 10 minutes to 2 hours.
it sounds like the system of checkin counter at your first leg will start with your very first reservation, after adding all bags and required info, the agent will only know at the last step you made a change.
so, be prepared because they need to go from original, search change 1, then change 2, until the final one.
usually only the senior agents know how to do this. So, if you check in with most of the other unexperienxed agents, good luck.

John26

What do the senior agents who onow how to do this look like in LAX? Cuz this will be me trying to check in on a reservation changed a couple of times haha

Does it help ifhthe first segment is AS? I thought AS issues boarding passes for both AS and LA segments

simonsuo

It will be like Ridiculous long checkin time at LAX at LAX

The boarding pass is not an issue, you can easily do so on the LATAM app too. The problem, at least for me, was the checked bags.

John26

I decided not to check bags since Alaska Rez insisted I can be given boarding passes for the LA segments when I check in at SFO. Get to SFO and they can only check me on for the AS segment from SFO-LAX because their system says Guest doesn't have assigned seats for all segments (agent showed me their screen...I see all the segments). Alaska app shows seat assignments for all segments (SFO-LAX-LIM-GIG).

I didn't want to hold up the F line so I went to the lounge and called Rez. They keep saying to just check in with LATAM again in LAX. Would really rather not exit security and go thru that. Cannot go to the DL or Qantas LA partner lounge without a boarding pass tho.

I did use plusgrade to upgrade to Premium Economy on LIM-GIG but Alaska and Latam both confirmed I already have the new seat assignment for it.

Eastbay1K

There are some check-in kiosks on the airside bridge between LAX T4 and TBIT. You can try and get a BP there. Also, if you can get the BP to show on the LATAM App, you should be good to go for the lounge.

John26

Thank you!!

So Rez told me on the phone that they went to the LATAM web site and checked me in for the LAX-LIM segment (previously it didn't work for me) but they (and I) couldn't get me checked in for LIM-GIG tomorrow morning.

Then I find out that the Alaska rez agent skipped thru the screen with my personal details and never gave LATAM my middle name (I believe you enter it in the First Name field so that it matches your passport). So yes a boarding pass is issued but it's missing the middle name on the passport (I previously emailed LATAM about this and they said as long as you enter it correctly when you provide your passport info you will not have a problem.

I know the Alaska Rez agent was trying to be helpful but I wish she hadn't gone on their site (or at least checked with me before she did).

So it looks like I live to go to the ticket counter now anyway.

But thank you for the tip about the kiosks! At least I can enter a lounge for a bit.

JustSomeFlyer

Booked MIA-LIM-SCL with LATAM using AS miles. It appears there was a schedule change on the LIM-SCL sector. Now when I login to my AS account I get the error message ( "Due to flight schedule changes, manual assistance is required on this reservation. Call Alaska Airlines at 1-877-862-4093 at your earliest convenience." ) however when I login to LATAM with the LATAM PNR it already reflects the new flights and I already selected seats on the new flight as well. Any advice for next steps?

ual744777sta

You need to call Alaska to get the reservation to sync up. Basically Alaska has to confirm the LATAM flights manually.

WarringDanimal

Has anyone booked a mixed cabin award with the A320? LATAM's version of business class is sold as premium economy. Alaska's business class mileage tickets book into economy per the website, but does the award allow premium economy seating, service, and baggage allowance?

3.5 hours SCL-PUQ is fine in economy but would be better with a guaranteed empty middle seat.

Eastbay1K

It does not. It books into the main cabina. There's no way to book award space into the LA W cabina via AS.

John26

One option is to use Plusgrade to upgrade to PE once the flight is within 14 days (bid and take your chances or pay for an instant confirmed upgrade). However, I don't recommend it on Alaska Mileage Redemptions because it caused massive headaches trying to check in (especially for a downline segment). Even though I paid for the "Instant Upgrade" and was confirmed immediately, essentially they have to take you off of the flight, place you on standby, and clear you from standby to get you back on the flight and into PE to be able to check in.

On an Alaska redemption in Business, Alaska coupd only check me in for SFO-LAX-LIM and could not check me in from LIM-GIG because their system said I didn't have a sear assignment (I did and brought proof but it wouldn't work). They said to exit security in LAX and ask LATAM. Supervisor in LAX said it had to be dealt with in LIM becaise the flight is solely under their control for anyone who used Plusgrade. LATAM reservations couldn't help, either.

After flying LAX-LIM, it took 1.5 hours with 3 agents & (and this is not exaggerating) 6 (yes 6) supervisors in LIM to figure out why they couldn't check me in to the next segment from LIM-GIG. Luckily I didn't have bags.

This can also can require you to go thru Immigration (twice of course) at your transfer point depending on how strict security is being about requiring boarding passes for onward segments to go thru int l transit security (a story for another time perhaps).

All of this eats into your lounge time (PE is eligible for lounge access for international segments) and may cause you to miss your flight if you don't have a lot of time for them to resolve it.

I would never do that again if i didn't have a lengthy connection.

I enjoyed the catering and service rom LIM-GIG on the A320, but not the stress. Btw, I did the same thing on GIG-IGU-GRU (domestic flights) but that was on a paid ticket on LATAM and it worked very smoothly.

ddlo1982

Will be flying out of Chile first time next Feb, some posts on reddit kinda puzzled me. I want to double check that for PNT > SCL > LAX flight, luggage should be able to check thru all the way to LAX, right? Because I will have a long layover in SCL, like 10 hours, going to take uber / taxi to do a quick city tour that day. Just want to see if anyone else can confirm that. Thanks!

CurbedEnthusiasm

Does DL typically have different LATAM award availability than AS? I'm guessing that is the case because many options that show up on DL's site don't show up on AS' site.

Is this a case of a system issue or different partner availability?

simonsuo

It can check/thru, but I think you may need to collect bags at SCL and re-check it before your city cruising, assuming it is not an overnight layover.