I telephoned Distancia's operations center in El Salvador today.
1. I was told that I was not permitted to transfer miles from Distancia to Marriott Rewards as they originated from the Latin Pass million mile promotion.
2. I also enquired about using the Distancia Miles for an award on US Air or KLM and was told I was not allowed to do so as they came from the Latin Pass promo.
3. Has anyone been able to transfer Distancia Miles to Marriott Rewards or book and redeem an award for a US Air or KLM flight?
4. I have not been able to find anything in either the Grupo Taca web site or program guide which restricts the above. I realize there a restriction with the American Airlines award.

Thanks

There have been constant problems with trying to transfer points from LP to member airline ff programs and then use them for partners of the member airlines.

Suggest you review the numerous threads within the LP forum for a better understanding of these problems.

Incidentally, lotsofmiles, if you check out some of these threads, you will now find that there is also a limit monthly of the number of miles (30,000) you can transfer to a member airline or hotel program under any circumstances if the LP miles came from the bonus offer.

The transfer of miles to Marriott is done through Latin Pass, not through Distancia or any of the other LP partners. Therefore, miles to be transferred to Marriott should not be tranferred out of LP into Distancia. That won't work.

In similar fashion, the partnership with KLM and USA is a partnership of Latin Pass, not Distancia. So one would not transfer miles first to Distancia to use them for KLM. One would deal directly with Latin Pass in requesting KLM or USAIRWAYS tickets.

While there are certainly problems and delays with Latin Pass, this particular problem of transferring miles from Distancia and of using Distancia for KLM tickets seems to come from a missreading of Latin Pass rules and partnerships.

Phil, I believe you're mistaken. Per the member guide,

All of the awards offered by the LatinPass generic program are also available to members of any of the member airlines' programs.

If someone were to transfer miles from his generic account to his Distancia account in accordance with LatinPass's published rules (which, by the way, say nothing of a limit on transfers),

then it would be completely reasonable to want to redeem those miles for Marriott Rewards points or KLM tickets.

I encourage you to look at Distancia's literature, which confirms this.

This is another example of LatinPass and its partners completely ignoring written program rules.

(A side note on my previous post: You can find those quotes on pages 2 and 3 of your LatinPass Member Guide, if you care to look.)

Flying Dutchman,

Your logic is sound, but the distancia site definitely excludes KLM from their LatinPass award chart. This chart also does not list destinations like Asia and Africa. Maybe you need to deal with LP and give them your distancia number to get LP awards with Distancia miles??? The whole thing is clear as mud.

I may well be mistaken in my interpretation of Distancia's rules, as I do not have a Distancia account. But I do know that Latin Pass has a partnership with KLM (and USAIRWAYS).What would be the purpose of transfering miles from LP to Distancia for use on KLM, when LP itself is the one who has the partnership with KLM ?
Does Distancia advertise a partnership with KLM ? I think (but again, I do not have their entire rules) that it is through Latin Pass.

I think this illustrates the importance of knowing what is possible and not possible in transferring miles in and out of LP and its members' programs. To me it also illustrates the advisability of keeping the transactions as simple as possible. If one has Latin Pass miles and wishes KLM or USAIRWAYS tickets, I would advise following Latin Pass's procedures to secure these tickets. To do otherwise is asking for a frustrating and probably unpoductive experience.

I have never talked to any airline and had the problems I've had with Groupo Taca. I even had someone at LP say they have been told this before.

I have called them no less than 10 times regarding a matter with my Distancia account. After I either ask for someone who speaks English, or mentioned what the problem was, they ask me to hold a moment. After holding so long that I finally get disconnected, I have tried again. Not only these problems, but a couple of times they referred me to another office who on contact said they had noting to do with that matter. That office then promised to get me the proper number and never came back on the line after 10 minutes!

I have removed all refrences to Groupo Taca from my contact list.

[This message has been edited by Bobarb (edited 05-19-2001).]

[This message has been edited by Bobarb (edited 05-21-2001).]

Bobarb, what kind of problems are you having with Distancia ?. I have gotten a couple of award tickets with them, and never had a problem, on the contrary very helpful ...

My problems were not working with tickets, but trying to get some assistance with questions about my distancia membership.

Glad things went well with you, but I will stick to other airlines for flying!

MileSmiles:

Can you give me the process you used to get Distancia "Award" tickets. Just a point by point summary. I also have Distancia miles and would like to know process when I need to redeem. Thanks.

The whole process of claiming tickets on Distancia using LatinPass is very disorganized and slow.

You first call Distancia to make the reservation. You then have to call LatinPass and effetively re-state the schedule in minute detail [flight numbers, times, dates, times]. Why can't they use the record locator?

In the past you then had to go to the 7-Eleven to get a money order and get it mailed to them. Thankfully, it now appears they take credit cards.

Both LatinPass and Distancia personnel have always been courteous and polite...their systems, policies, and procedures need to be Americanized.

As far as claiming directly from Distancia, I am also interested in the response.

I was wanting info on making reservations with Distancia USING Distancia miles - which I had transferred from Latin Pass. I thought Distancia was a "safer harbour" than Latin Pass and spread my risk. Thanks.

I have found using distancia for award tickets to be very easy. I have my tickets issued directly through distancia however, and not through latinpass.