SCL Arrivals Facilities
 

From my LanPass statement:

Freshen up after your flight!
If you fly First Class or Executive Class, you can now freshen up completely using the showers in our Neruda VIP Lounge when you arrive at Arturo Merino Benítez airport in Santiago.

You need to freshen up after paying the "reciprocity" tax on entry (unless that has been dropped by now?).

It hasn't but. fortunately, you only need to pay it once for the remaining life of your passport. On the bright side, Aussie's only pay about US$35 while U.S. passport holders now pay US$100.

This reciprocity thing really hits U.S. travelers to several countries, as the U.S. keeps raising its own visa fees.

I flew to SCL two weeks ago and asked about the fee being for the "life of your passport", and was told that as I held an Australian passport the "stamp" was only valid for 90 days.

So it looks like paying $100 as US citizen ends up cheaper in the long run.

Dani

So does this access extend to those with status (OW Saphire or Emerald), or just those on paid Business and First class tickets? Alternatively, is there another lounge on the domestic side - from reading through the Lan Chile website I haven't been able to quite work that aspect out. Happy to hear from anyone that's been through down that way.

Only time was going to easter island where they set up a sort of odd situation in which they made me go through the domestic terminal and ask someone who would then let me through to the intl side and into the lounge. Don't know if it's the same or if there is a lounge, but I have been told that there is.

Would also like to know - South America is all too poorly served by this board

Well, here is the link to the article and you can decide for yourself. I don't personally think so. It seems to be only First and Biz. The fact that they are offering it is a Lan Chile amenity not a Oneworld amenity. I can't remember offhand, but I think the BA arrivals lounge is the same in London. Otherwise, I don't remember any other place I have been that has offered an arrivals lounge at all.

I hope they don't, incidentally. Why should they offer a service that no other Oneworld carrier offers, save London, and then be forced to allow all the Oneworld flyers in it? Departures, I can understand. LA flyers get reciprocity with other airlines, so LA should provide the amenity. But until AA, CX, QF, IB, EI, and AY start ponying up for an arrivals lounge, the arrivals feature should be limited to whoever Lan Chile (or BA) believes should get the amenity. Just one flyer's opinion.

http://www13.lanchile.com/lanpass/ne.../en_un/321.htm

Correct. The BA arrivals lounge is for BA/QF First/Business class passengers, plus BA Gold and Qantas top tier frequent fliers only.

Having said that, I did once manage to blag my way in on a CX Diamond in transit between a CX J arrival (in T3) and a BA Club Europe departure in T4.

There are also AA arrivals lounges in London (Heathrow at the airport, Gatwick at a nearby hotel) and Paris (at the airport). In all cases they are restricted to AA passengers who arrived in first or business class. No oneWorld partner passengers. Status won't get you in.

I wouldn't be surprised to hear that there are more, but I don't know about them.

There is a lounge on the domestic side, but it is not a LanChile lounge.. it is a VIP lounge. I had to pay $20 to get in; it had internet access and comfy sofas with booze and snacks.

Here's the SCL scoop. The lounge is available only in the secured departure area. Once you clear immigration it is TOO LATE. This is despite a detailed email from Lan prior to a trip in 12/01 in response to my inquiry - when they told me to get my luggage first, etc... If you are connecting to another int'l departure you are fine.

The national flight side has Pacific Club Salon VIP (not too far past security). Entry is approx. CL$10.000 or $11.000. They are currently Diners Club affiliated, but that comes and goes. Certain other credit cards get you in from time to time, but each trip, its a different story. In any event they have a shower room which is spartan but clean, no hair dryer, etc. Free drinks but no snacks to speak of.

They are also Priority Pass associated, but if you are on a pay per visit PP membership, the PP fee is higher than the actual fee if you just pay there.

Pacific Clubs Salones VIP have a network of lounges around various airports in Chile. I have been in 3 or so of them. They all have dialup internet terminals, free drinks, and your snack is "nuts with raisins." You can also buy a membership for a single lounge, or multi city access.

While they are nice and peaceful and quiet, so are most departure areas in most airports in Chile most of the time. ¿Vale la tarifa? A veces.

I provide all this info because despite my previous FT inquiries, and no one having any good info, I learned it on my own.

Suerte

That's certainly some useful information to have, I guess I'll have to plead my case on arrival (and before immigration) if I want to shower off for free - otherwise I pity the poor soul seated next to me on the leg out to Easter Island! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Was searching on this and a couple questions came up. Figured I should ask them before my SCL trip this week.

It's clear the Neruda arrivals lounge is prior to immigration. That's really helpful. What I'm not clear on is whether or not I can reclaim luggage prior to going in there (ala arrivals lounge at Heathrow, outside luggage and customs). This would make a difference (for obvious reasons like clothing). Since I'm flying straight on to IPC afterwards not entirely sure how the luggage/customs process works...

Thanks!

[This message has been edited by Toofewmiles (edited Feb 06, 2004).]

Luggage claim is after immigration at SCL. The SCL-IPC flight is considered domestic so you may have to clear immigration/customs at SCL anyway. As I recall, when you check in for the IPC flight the LA staff walks you around the customs exit process. (That was a few years ago so it may have changed.)

As usual great and timely response Exmo.

Sounds like dumb planning on their part, unless your luggage is absolutely secure or they take steps to get you back in once you say you're going another 5 hours.

Any other suggestions or more recent experiences?

Having just gotten back from passing through SCL a few times, I can say that the information above still holds true. For the IPC flight I was on it was a purely domestic flight (didn't continue on to Tahiti) so there was no joy of using the arrivals lounge (though I doubt I was entitled anyway). But the Pacific Club Salon VIP on the domestic side was fine - and free entry still with a Diners Club card. Service was very friendly, bringing out drinks and biscuits - it's small, but sufficient to get freshened up, relax, check the internet and watch a big screen TV http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif.

When transiting International to International, there's no problem at all using the LanChile Lounge - and it's quite a nice one too, two thumbs up from me. A nice selection of snacks and beverages, plenty of areas to rest, a swag of internet terminals and decent facilities for freshening up in as well. So hopefully it can be used successfully on arrival for you - but it certainly would take some effort to do, both to get into the lounge, and then to get back out through immigration again - not a straight forward process by any stretch of the imagination.

Hmmm, how much carryon luggage can you do with Lan, or are they worse than BA? Tempted to take my garment bag...

In A and D I've always carried on a standard roll-aboard and a briefcase without any problems.

Having taken the tip from this string, I tried to access the lounge when arriving on an international J ticket on LA.

I was told both by LA ground staff and security that there is no admittance to international departures unless you're on a transfer, thus no lounge access.

Anyone here had any success? Familiar with the lounge, which is nothing particularly special, but I wouldn't mind a quick shower after a long flight next time...

Well, having net access here at the Ritz in Santiago after returning from IPC - a trip, by the way, that I highly recommend for a couple of days if you're doing an RTW ticket (think Hawaii if it was one island and 3000 people and a lot less developed), my experience was this:

1. LAX ground staff looked suspiciously at my big carryon garment bag, but once I showed them the A class ticket they left me alone. Flyertalk win #1.

2. Ask domestic connections guy if he can point out VIP lounge. He does, but then tells me I can't use it until I clear immigration. Mistake #1. If I'd just headed left I might have gone in the lounge and rolled the dice to see if they would have let me in. So much for following the rules

3. Go to shortest line at LA SCL check in after I clear immigration. Ticket desk explains that I need to talk to AA for miles for the flight as I'm trying to explain 3 times in both English and espanol que no es bien pero no es muy mal that I simply want to go through to the lounge and don't care about miles. Get shunted over to the special services desk, and have to go through two agents and get my IPC ticket reissued before I'm told I can use it but have to go back through customs as if I was exiting the country - and then clear immigration again! Given the immigration policia swore at me on the way through the first time and it was 0730 with my IPC flight in the other terminal at 0830 I give up. Push #1.

4. Pay $11 to use the shower at the domestic private priority pass lounge. Ripoff but I needed it. By the way, the domestic lounge supposedly has wireless but I think its Wireless G, not Wireless B, as I couldn't get my laptop to work with it. Still, it was basically all I needed as they had separate computers hooked up with broadband. Flyertalk win #2.

5. Haul big garment bag with me through domestic. Security questions but lets me through. Gate agents look askew but then look at D class ticket and say go for it. Get row 1 seat on both ways because I asked. Flyertalk win #3. Net score 3 wins, 1 push, 1 mistake.

Looking forward to trying out the lounges on my return to the States tomorrow. By the way, Lan F (and J on Easter Island) was something else on the food - magnifico. Service wasn't great on any of the routes (begging for water while the 2 FAs assigned to first class sit in the galley reading is not my favorite activity) but hey, I was asleep for most of it.

Just to give yet another angle on SCL lounge situation, this is what happened when I flew into SCL from JFK on LA531 in Oct. I was on a F award ticket.I had a 23 hour transfer (int'l to int'l) so I was claiming my luggage as I was staying overnight in Santiago.

I knew there wasn't an arrivals lounge a la AA, BA. It was my first time in SCL so I wanted to grab a shower and check my hotel email confirmation before heading into town.

I asked the stewardess about going to the Neruda Lounge and she passed me onto Ground Services. They were very helpful but it was still a bit of a palaver.

She escorted me to immigration where I had to leave my passport at a kiosk. I couldn't go thru to baggage claim but she assured me my suitcase would be safe. Not sure why I had to deposit the passport. Perhaps I was going to a different legal zone within the airport. I can't recall exactly but to get to the lounge I had to go to a specific floor e.g. 2nd, walk then take another lift to another floor e.g. 3rd. Definitely not straightforward.

Lounge itself was fine if smaller than I imagined. About the same level as AA CDG's lounges. Followed the same mazy route back down, thru immigration to find no case in baggage claim. Cue mild panic attack. It turned out that LA staff had it put aside for me. Not sure if this was due to ground services requesting this or just because it hadn't been claimed.

So LA were very accommodating even though using the lounge technically wasn't allowed. F ticket, EXP status may have helped. However, the logistics of getting there could be a lot easier and I could have done without the kerfuffle of dropping off my passport.

Interesting. Glad the Salon VIP works for some people. My only complaint is that if it really takes all these handstands to do it probably shouldn't advertise it as an arrivals lounge.

I'm actually more glad now that I didn't try to go through immigration again, especially given your experience leaving the passport. I have a distinct feeling that the policia decided to screw with me as my luggage got searched on checkin as well as right before boarding, which is the first time in like 300000 miles that's happened. Had to argue a wee bit to get my shampoo bottles back - although on the other hand, the first search was probably the most thorough I've ever had, which made me feel better about flying through SCL.

Incidentally, the Admirals Club is one of the nicest in the system - food, drink, good design.

Will check it out next time. Surprised to hear it as most FT'ers seldom use the words nice and Admirals Club in the same sentence. However, I was very grateful for the one at GRU. Not a particularly good design, but a **** sight more pleasant than the BA F lounge.

I second the comment about the SCL AC. By far the nicest I have seen. With the exception of the showers and the computer work stations, I don't find the Salon VIP to be very nice. The chairs are simply awful. I definately prefer the AC to the Salon VIP. It is also substantially less crowded.

Was in both lounges 2 days ago. Mixed opinions about the AA lounge. Really nice layout and a view of the tarmac. I prefer the showers in the LAN lounge as my shower flooded the sink area with the shower door closed. All other items, such as food and snacks, wines, and internet terminals make the LAN lounge the better of the two. The smoking area of the LAN lounge in not a separate enclosed room as is the case in the AA lounge.