I have three PE tickets for SCL-GRU on Sat for which we had row 1 per-assigned in the 3 row 2x2 PE cabin with middle seat blocked. Just done online checkin at T-48 and being shown an all economy domestic seatmap with 3x3 from row 1 all the way back and been assigned row 37!! Boarding pass still says Premium Economy but 37F. Clearly wrong seatmap has been loaded for checkin.

LATAM phone support utterly useless. First said to call BA (who issued ticket)- when I pointed out that it was their seatmap via their website the answer was to ask at the airport...

Anyone seen this before? Will it fix itself between now and departure?

thanks

Thanks. Have conversed with LATAM on Twitter and after a few nonsense replies (PE cabin with A/B/C layout...) they’ve admitted the aircraft change and downgrade and said $100 in cash or $200 travel voucher will be offered at the airport.

I’m not interested in small change comp and want the class of service I booked or better. They have refused a move onto the flight before (1640) as it is Premium Business not PE. After your reply I have pushed again saying if a downgrade without prior warning is acceptable then an upgrade when space is avaialable should be equally...

They have offered the 1505 with PE but that is 3 hours adjustment to my schedule vs 1hr 20 for the next flight.

Lets see. Thanks.

Personally i’d rather have a Y seat on 78/76 than a Y+ seat on A320. YMMV but i’d personally try and leverage a partial refund rather than chasing either a time change or an upgrade to J (which I can’t see happening but I suppose you never know)

Three J seats secured on the 788. Didn’t waste time with telesales, instead was driving past SCL on way back from a day trip to Valparaíso so stopped by the ticket desk at the premium check in area.

Yes thanks for your advice PABLOCO. I didn’t have to push too hard as that flight had a half empty J cabin. In any case the fare difference one way between PE and J was not significant, about the same as the compensation offer so I was well armed with arguments but didn’t need them...

What I still don’t understand is how an A320
can lose a PE cabin?? Isn’t it just a curtain and blocked middle seats and meal? not that I’m complaining at the overall outcome of course..

yes it is. Maybe the curtain can move forwards as well as backwards if they need the loads? Otherwise no idea

The thing is that LA‘s newest A320s as well as all A321s, which are deployed on domestic or shorter haul international flights, do not even have the possibility of a Y+ cabin, but have a (basically non-changeable) Y-only configuration.

For some reason (maintenance?), there is no aircraft with a Y+ cabin available for the day of your flight or may be they only had a few reservations for up-front, but an overbooking situation in the back, and it was more convenient (economical) for LA to pay compensation to the few Y+ passengers, but to be able to accommodate all flyers. For sure, you could think of more possible explanations.

As a standard, LA NEVER adjusts the size of the Y+ cabin, even if technically that would be doable. Thus, Y+ seats a maximum of 12 on all routes and, even with the usual elite upgrades, there is often a couple of seats free on the flights that I commonly take (SCL to LIM, GRU, EZE or LIM to BOG, UIO or vice versa), hence the actual need for a larger Y+ cabin does not seem to be there or other factors (such as quicker turnarounds) are more important to LA.

I am quite curious to see, what the future holds for Y+ with LA. Will they introduce a proper cabin at some point (as JJ used to have on their single-aisles)? I kind of doubt it given the current LCC-like moves.

Anyway, I quite like the product. Yeah, the seats are the same, and pitch and width only a little more generous, but privacy and service wise Y+ with LA is a far cry from regular Y.

So the earlier flight in proper J class on a LAN 787 was extremely pleasant... until we got close to GRU and a tropical storm was passing over and after holding for 20 mins diverted to Rio where we took on fuel, waited an hour and then made the hop back, arriving later than the downgraded flight we were orginally on and messing up our evening plans.

Oh well, I’m getting too old to hit the nightlife in Sao Paulo anyway