LAN/trusting e-tickets
 

Apologies for cross-posting:

I am flying in different places in Argentina, Chile, Bolivia and Peru using, throughout, e-tickets (single PNR) of diverse LAN companies. I was told that e-tickets are often met by astonishment at check-in, even in places as cosmopolitan as Buenos Aires. I this a founded rumour, and should I try to change the e-tickets into paper ones, or should I trust LAN and just stop worrying?

The latter.

Agreed. LAN is a first rate airline.

I've never had a problem with LAN e-tickets. Just bring a printout, the same as any other airline.

IATA is "requiring" e-ticketing for all IATA airlines for all routes by the end of 2007 (requiring is in quotes as it is unlikely to be enforced). IATA has an initiative to streamline the industry and save USD 6+ billion per year. These are 100% e-ticketing by end of 2007; bar coded boarding passes; Common Use Self Service (CUSS) kiosks; RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) for baggage management; and IATA e-freight, a paperless cargo initiative. There has been a fair bit of progress on e-ticketing, a bit less for the others.

The secret with e-tickets is to always travel with your ticket number with you. When the e-ticket is lost -- and it will be eventually, I've had it happen 6 times -- the onus is on the passenger to prove that the ticket exists. Having the ticket number makes this easy, it was always found using the ticket number. Without the ticket number you won't fly.

Do make sure you know your e-ticket number (in addition to the PNR). Just in case it gets lost in a computer ;)

I agree entirely that LAN is a first rate airline - From check-in onwards. However, the ticketing agents & customer services agents appear to be consistently rude and unhelpful.

Recently, I re-ticketed a DONE5 with BA - as LAN refused to re-issue the ticket because it was originally purchased with BA in CAI. Seemed strange especially given that the next 4 segments were with LAN and I only had 7 left.

Phoned BA customer services in London whilst I was in Santiago and arranged via the phone the new routing and confirmed the costs. BA said they could not take payment over the phone, but everything was on the system including a final sentance in capital letters asking LAN to re-issue the ticket and collect payment for the change fee & additional taxes.

LAN refused to re-issue - again, and suddenly the agent was 'unable' to understand english despite holding a perfectly coherent conversation with me prior to me calling BA, I tried explaining to her again - politely, explaining I was trying to catch a flight to IPC in 2 hours time, the ticket just needed to be re-issued and that I had cash in my hand to cover the costs. She said her supervisor would be able to help - But she wasn't due to start her shift until 9am - 15mins prior to the departure to IPC.

I waited, and asked for them to contact BA or the LAN head office to see if there was anything that could be done. Nada.

Eventually I was told the only way to re-issue the ticket was to take a taxi to the BA office downtown which I did and had the ticket re-issued within 10mins. The BA agent even showed me the notes on the system explicitly requesting LAN to re-issue and take payment.

Disapointed & frustrated doesn't even to begin to describe how I felt. In stark contrast LAN's new business class is superior to any Oneworld partner's hard product (admittedly i've not flown AY,AA or IB in intl Business Class). Food was good, but seemed to have the same menu's for every flight and the service was a little reactive but if you wanted anything the crew were extremely responsive.

By a vote of 5 to 1, I'll stop worrying. Thanks for the info!

Classic LAN, and if you've read enough of FT you would know to expect this from LAN. I think the airline suffers from a lack of empowerment -- the frontline agents are not allowed to do anything "unusual". So a supervisor is needed for anything interesting, such as a RTW ticket reissued, and this takes hours/days to do on LAN. It took me an hour to change a full J ticket at SCL from one flight to another (same route and date!). So LAN seems to often be this way.

As for J hard product, IB has equally good new J seats (but less good food compared to LA).

Having recently flown both, I disagree. LAN's seats go completely flat, are a bit less tight and the IFE better than IB's IMHO (HUGE screens!). The seat controls did have the exact same feel to them, probably made by the same manufacturer. Problem with LAN is that you're not yet guaranteed to get their New Business product yet, as opposed to IB where you can count on it.

Has LAN NBC avail been discussed? e.g. are certain routes fully served, others not? Their schedule to complete the rollout?

It hasn't been discussed, but it will be mid 2008 before it is complete. Meanwhile the old J (with 5 F seats sold as J) keeps showing up unpredictably. LAN has a small fleet and bifurcating it between the F/non-F routes doesn't help.

It's been discussed quite a few times:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=628723
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=620494
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=580818
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=556167

Sort of like with the AA 777 F cabins, seatmaps show one of the configs, and then it is usually swapped on the day of departure. I had 4 LAN 767 flights in December, and had 1 with new Premium Business (SCL-IPC), 2 with the old two class planes (EZE-SCL and IPC-SCL) and 1 with a 3 class plane (SCL-JFK). LAN has about 20 767-300s, but I haven't been able to find anywhere how many are in each configuration.

Whereas my LA 767 flights in October (EZE-SCL-IPC-SCL-LAX) had 3 out of 4 with the new business class. The seat map on those flights changed several times between booking and the flight.