Lanpass v. AA Advantage
 

Hi all. I've been a LP customer for some time now but I will be relocating from LIM to MSP and I'm considering the possibility of switching from Lanpass to AA Advantage (i'm ruby right now). Didn't care much for status until a couple of years ago and I managed to get it last year.

Since I have family in LIM I'll be returning at least twice a year there, so I can get the milleage needed for qualifying to gold in AA in those two trips (I wanna try MSP-LAX-LIM). But I'd like to know if someone here is also an AA customer and could make a balance between the ups and downs of Lanpass compared to AA (redeeming miles, does it cost the same, better or worse, etc.)

Thanks!

Have a look here http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/onewo...help-here.html

AA sometimes has technical problems seeing (and thus booking) award flights on LAN which have availability showing elsewhere. But if your award flights will be on AA itself or other AA partners, that should not be an issue for you.

AA's website it much better than LAN's website in many ways.

And there are many more opportunities to earn AA miles without flying than earning LAN kms without flying (for those based in the USA, at least, as you will be).

Evaluating redemption rates is always tricky because you never know when airline X will devalue next and how. (For example, BA Avios redemption rates for LAN or AA longhaul business class went up by 50% earlier this year, so any comparison that someone would have made between BA and LAN before then would have been invalid after that change.)

And evaluating earning rates (on flights) and status qualification is also tricky, given that the two other major international airlines in the USA, Delta and United, have already shifted to a revenue-based earning system for redeemable miles and also added a "elite qualifying purchases" minimum for earning status. Since American and US Airways have been busy merging the past year or two, they've put off evaluating what, if any, changes to make to AAdvantage, but the merger process is getting closer to completion now, so who knows if and what they'll decide to do later this year or next year?

So all you can really evaluate is how it works this instant, but there's no guarantee that it'll continue to work that way for years.

I've had a much better experience with AA than LAN.

Thanks for the comments. I know it's a tricky question. Sdsearch: I don't mind that much about redeeming miles, what is more important to me is the treatment and extra perks that status has. Lanpass cabin upgrades, it seem to me, are less likely to happen that AA (am I right?).

Being based in MSP I could switch to Delta but I don't like it from past experience and since I will return to Peru I'd like to stay OW that has LAN, with the biggest share of US-bound flights and AA, with the most seats in relation to Delta or UA.

The only thing that bothers me with AA is the age of their fleet.

AA has totally different upgrade policies for "domestic" vs "international". (I put those in quotes because AA doesn't always define "domestic" and "international" at the dividing line you'd expect, and for each aspect of operation they can place that dividing line in a different place!) "Domestic" flights you get free upgrades on flights of 500 miles or less, and need to use "stickers" (a legacy name) aka "500 mile upgrades" to upgrade on other flights. These kinds of distance-based upgrades are not available on "international" flights. (IIRC, for these kinds of upgrades, "domestic" includes for example lower US<->Canada flights.)

The other way to upgrade (without getting to the top level of status) on AA is to use miles+copay. The advantage of having the copay is that it works from most any fare you can book on aa.com. (At other airlines that don't have a copay, you can't upgrade from the cheapest fares.) Using miles+copay upgrades is pretty easy on domestic 2-class planes (where the same "fare code" that's used for discount "first" class is also used for miles+copay upgrades). It's trickier on three-cabin transcon flights (but from MSP, I doubt you'd be connecting to those!) or on international flights where the cabin up front is renamed "business". (Thus these kinds of upgrades are trickier to Canada than within the US.)

The good news is that AA doesn't hold back "sticker" upgrades if there's space. The other good news is that out of MSP you're not likely to have as much competition from many higher-tier elites as you would from an AA hub city. The bad news is that if all you qualify for is Gold, on the more elite-heavy flights you might connect to, you'll be last in line for "sticker" upgrades.

With miles + copay upgrades, you can do two strategies: One is to use ExpertFlyer.com (a subscription site) to watch for upgrade space to be available (and/or to sign up for alerts when it becomes available), the other other is to request the miles + copay upgrade right after your flight is ticketed, and get on a waiting list. (If you do that, just make sure to use a credit card which won't expire before the flight, since if your upgrade comes through, it could be at any time up to then.)

sdsearch, thanks! Earlier today I called AA and entered a status challenge for gold (was 140 bucks). Since I have 2 upcoming flights with AA, GRU-DFW-ORD (in W) and ORD-MSP (in A) I should be able to secure gold for 20 months next month for cheap and then be able to secure plat next year bc I have several european and latin american flights next year.

Go with AA. I recently was using LAN exclusively but very poor CS has led me back to AA. Now I have to figure out how to use the 200k kms I have accumulated in the past year with LAN.

If your based in MSP and frequently travel domestically within the US and other international destinations outside of South America you should stay with AA. The only downside is if you plan on traveling frequently between the U.S. and LIM you will be stuck with AA's old 757s and 767s for the foreseeable future. Meanwhile LAN will soon increase its Business Class offering with the introduction of 787-8 flights (30J/217Y) operated by LAN Perú on the LIM-LAX, LIM-JFK and LIM-MIA routes as older 18J/220Y B767s are retired next year. For example, LA2514 LIM-MIA and LA2515 MIA-LIM will switch to the 787-8 in February.

Yeah, but I think I could afford a MSP-DFW-LAX or JFK and then connect to LA. I hope AA phases out the 57's at some point, I love flying thru DFW instead of MIA, real PIA.midwest US).

Personally this is a no-brainer and the answer is AA. I moved to ORD a while ago and here are the reasons (in my view) AA is better if you live in the US:
1) You'll fly AA more often than you think. If flying to LIM why fly MSP-LAX-LIM or even with 2 stops if you can do MSP-DFW-LIM or MSP-MIA-LIM which will be shorter
2) You'll be gold already on AA. 25% mile bonus. MCE for free on t-24.
3) Booking awards is a breeze. And you can change the dates for free.
4) Lan's award chart is distance based if flying on AA. AA charges by zone, so award seats to LIM will be cheaper on average. And off peak saaver awards are super convenient compared to LAN awards. Even the more so if you don't live in MIA, JFK or LAX (LAN hubs) since LAN will charge you extra for the domestic US leg, AA won't.
5) No frustration in dealing with LAN. AA Gold phone agents know their stuff. Everything is predictable
6) Citi AA credit card

Downside:
1) Could AA move to a revenue based model soon? Maybe. Not in 2016 in my view.
2) LAN has tons of flights to LIM
3) Occasional promos and offers with KMs
4) LAN's award chart has some extra flexibility (i.e. awards are dynamically priced - AA doubles when going from sAAver to AAnytime)

Just my two cents.

AA's AAnytime awards are somewhat dynamic now too (since last year), so it can be significantly more than double in some cases:

Yes, you're right, my point was that on Lan you can have awards "closer" to the cheapest redemption rate (i.e. SCL-MIA is 35k but very often you can find seats for less than 40k~50k). On AA it skyrockets quickly which is a downside.

Even as someone who is a long-term resident in Chile, I'm sticking to AAdvantage (after trying LANPass out for two years at Premium Silver level). Good points made above, but the one kicker for me is that AA actually tries to provide good service on the ground. LAN couldn't care less (in Chile and in MIA, from what I've seen. I've heard LIM is a different world in terms of service). LAN is great until IRROPS.

You are right, I've just ended a LIM-GRU segment with LAN (was a ticket I got with kms) and the service wasn't as good as the AA GRU-DFW-ORD after that.

1. I was travelling with the lady in the first flight and since I'm a lowly ruby I couldn't get the business checkin (or I could, but not the lady). I was overweight in the luggage and they didn't do anything to help (technically was my fault). On the bright side, I got upgraded to business because there were not many people requesting upgs.

2. On GRU AA staff directed me (and lady) to the first class checkin bc they didn't had the business class counters up that day. They didn't even checked the weights (or didn't care). My boarding pass had zone 2 printed but I flashed my ruby card and the gate agents let us board before they called zone 1 (also at DFW). And apparently due to my status the checkin agent changed my fare class from N to Y (as per my AAAdvantage statement yesterday) and that has allowed me to qualify to gold ahead of time (I have a ORD-MSP that was going to take care of that) in a status challenged I requested a few weeks ago.

It's going to be sad leaving Lanpass but the quality of the service does make the difference.