Eastbay1K

My last AS redemption on LA was a rare HUCA situation with the agent - one didn't see any availability I knew was there, and agent 2 booked me within a minute. LA loads the flight into the system (about 330-331 days) but doesn't immediately load inventory (revenue/award - nothing) and does so within the next several hours to day.

grandgourmand

HUCA worked for me too. I'm just checking to make sure AS sees same availability as BA.

I know I said earlier that I'm using Avios...and will. Was previously planning to use AS, but will save those for a CX trip instead.

fedechat

Yes, they load the inventory between 2 and 11am.

Booking on BA.com should be easy, but I'm always get an error with TAM or when a flight include a connection with 2 different partners. Just call BA, they should waive the booking fee.

jbalmuth

I've had no problem at all booking LAN flights on britishairways.com with Avios, and have done the JFK - SCL route several times. I've had to call BAEC for intra-South America routes (BA's booking tool doesn't recognize many/most cities that LAN, LAN Argentina, etc. fly to in S. America) but they have always waived the telephone booking fee if I pointed out why it couldn't be booked online.

One obvious caveat: booking so far in advance ensures that either you or LAN will have a schedule change. If you change your mind, cancellations on BA's site are easy (and they don't cost more than the tax you paid upfront), but changing dates is not very easy. When LAN changes its flight times or cancels a service, they have a longstanding nasty habit of not contacting passengers directly (presumably relying on BAEC to pass on the news). In other words, during the 330 days between booking and flying you need to periodically check that LAN is still planning to operate their flight. Forewarned is forearmed.

Eastbay1K

But it is BAEC's duty to pass on the news. Your contract is with the ticketing entity. When I redeem miles on AS, AS often takes a month or two to deliver the news re: my inevitable LA schedule changes. Fortunately, I already know about it.

I did finally install LAN's mobile app and you can, as a non-LANPASS member, put in your itineraries. I hope that the app will update, as necessary. (I just checked, and it did update re: a schedule change on a Travel Agency booked trip in a few weeks.)

grandgourmand

Thanks for the heads up.

Does LAN just change the flight times or cancel flights haphazardly? I'm booking this trip as a return for my in-laws so the last thing I need is for them to be stuck in Santiago (although I can think of worse things). Equipment change, change of flight times (we monitor closely) I can handle.

I also have to consider that I'd be using pre-devaluation Avios so I really don't want to be refunded my points.

jbalmuth

I've had no greater problems with LAN than with any other airline, but I honestly cannot recall not having a change, or two, or three in any ticket booked nearly a year in advance.

The important thing here is that your in-laws will typically not be contacted directly by LAN between now and then if LAN's flight times change, and only BAEC will be able to make any changes in your LAN itinerary if LAN cancels their flight or changes the departure time etc. between the day you ticket the itinerary and the day of their flight.

barbh2

I want to book 2 business class tickets EZE-MIA-RDU; EZE to MIA will be on LAN Argentina and connect to MIA to RDU on American Airlines.

The flights I want in January 2016 popped up on the British Airways rewards website early Friday morning (0 economy class seats, 7 business seats available).

Called American Airlines to use my miles to book this flight combo, several American Airlines agents can't see it.

Would prefer to use American miles, but figured might have to use AVIOS instead, so I tried booking on the BA website since it is showing the exact flight combination I want- no go. When I try to book it online I get an error message saying to call BA Executive Club. When I ask agents to book it at BA Executive Club they are also unable; they can't see the award as being available.

Has something like this happened to anyone else? Is there an explanation for what is going on? Any suggestions/ workarounds for getting these flights booked with my miles?

bobert24

I've decided that LAN award space is determined by a monkey with a dart board. Everything about it is completely random - what flights are available, when they're made available, everything.

For example, I've been looking at a RT flight LIM-JUL. There's been very spotty availability, and it changed every day. Now almost every day around my dates has at least a dozen seats per day available LIM-JUL, but zero JUL-LIM. I went back and checked a flight I was having a hard time finding space on (CUZ-LIM), and now every flight, every day, for a week, has 7 seats available.

I'm sure there's an algorithm somewhere. But I feel like when it's not flinging darts, it's busy flinging its own poo.

bobert24

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...ilability.html

bingocallerb22

Lan Peru started a domestic sale yesterday so that explains the wide open availability. I booked a reward tix the day before auuurghh

fedechat

Are you sure that you saw MIA-EZE or EZE-MIA on BA.com? I never saw any 4M (LAN Argentina) flights on BA website, only QF in the past (not anymore), and AA can not see it anymore.

krzysz

I am actually looking at this domestic sale now (http://www.lan.com/es_pe/sitio_perso...romodelfan_piu), which also covers domestic LANPass offers bookable worldwide (so you can also make reservations on the US LAN website).

I am thinking of booking domestic LanPass award flights from Lima, outbound early July, inbound end of July. Although the sale covers flights until 16 July, it was still somewhat attractive till about two days ago, when they increased the required number of kms for all flights from 28 July until 10 August (I checked a number of routes, e.g. AQP and CUZ and it seems it applies throughout the country). I understand that 28-29 July is a busy period because of the national holiday, but what about early August? Is it also a busy travel period in Peru?

I am wondering whether to make a reservation now, when the offer is still on at least for the first half of July. Is my assumption correct that once they increased the number of kms for late July/early August, there's no turning back and that they will remain high?

I remember that at the end of April last year they ran an offer on the US website, which involved both LanPass km reduction and 20% discount on the domestic flights in a few South American countries. I can't recall whether late July/early August was a blackout period then though.

bingocallerb22

Tough to answer. They run a sale every few months, not sure you'll see another within comfortable time frame. Closer to the date costs/km go up generally of course.

fly747first

I have met LAN's revenue management team and I definitely concur with your description.