OneWorld to Peru
 

Hello, My husband, a friend and I are travelling to Cuzco, Peru in March. It looks like AA/LAN are our best choices for airlines. We would like to buy a business class ticket, particularly for MIA-LIM-MIA. The cost is ok, about $1500 for MIA-LIM-MIA. There is no class other than economy for our flight to MIA or from LIM-CUZ. When I try to book a Biz ticket on AA website, it quotes me over $3500 for the entire trip. I could put together various single tickets including the Biz route and save $1000 but isn't it smart to have your tickets/itinerary linked? What is the trick to booking this ticket? Thanks

Having 1 ticket for MIA-LIM-CUZ only makes sense if you are planning to connect in LIM (a few hours) rather than stopover (more than 24 hours). Most flights LIM-CUZ are in the early morning hours, though cancellations due to weather from CUZ are higher than normal elsewhere. Most of the flights MIA-LIM are overnight flights so a stopover MIA-LIM stopover CUZ followed by CUZ-LIM connection MIA is very doable with 2 separate tickets.
All LAN intra-Peru flights are economy only, another reason to buy 2 tickets. Take LAN biz class MIA-LIM (767 lie flat seats) rather than AA's 757.

Beatrice,

could you post more details about your trip. Is your intention to spend time only in Cuzco or also some time for instance in Lima/Lake Titicaca? Do you have some miles you could use to book domestic flights within Peru? LAN flights to Cuzco tend to be very expensive for non-residents but don't require many miles & they have 20 daily flights...

No extra perks (lounges etc) are offered for status-members on LAN's domestic flights. If price&onboard product are your priority instead of miles, you should compare TACA prices with LAN for LIM-CUZ flights. After all, it's only 500 mile flight to CUZ.

Have you tried OTAs like Expedia or Travelocity?

And yes, definitely try to be on LAN if you're paying for business class!!

Oh, and a while back domestic PE flights were far cheaper if bought from a PE site, whether LAN's or a third party; the airlines there are (were) permitted to price discriminate based on the country of purchase! :td: :td:

We want to travel directly to Cuzco because my husband will begin work at a clinic there, while my friend and I travel around locally, MP etc..then we'd like to stop in Lima for a few days on our way back to the US. I do have miles on AA (55,000) and BA (60,000) so that may be a plan for the LIM-CUZ route. Thanks

LIM-CUZ is a very good way to use BA miles (9000 round trip + very little cash).