TAM Pulling out?
Dec 31, 2012 | 8:43 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: San Jose, Costa Rica
Programs: UA 1K M, AA 2 MM PREM, HYATT Globalist, Marriott Lifetime Platinum., Hilton Gold, Hertz Prez Club
Posts: 813
TAM Pulling out?
We tried to make reservations using UA and US miles but were told 'no flights' were available over a 6 week period between GIG and MCZ - which is unheard off as we can but tickets.
Do you know if TAM is pulling out of *Alliance and blocking free tickets.
In the past, UA had to send a request and then hear back as to confirmation and that worked fine. This time I was told, they cannot even send a request.
HELP!
Do you know if TAM is pulling out of *Alliance and blocking free tickets.
In the past, UA had to send a request and then hear back as to confirmation and that worked fine. This time I was told, they cannot even send a request.
HELP!
Dec 31, 2012 | 11:49 am
#2
Join Date: Nov 2009
Programs: UA Mileage Plus: Premier Silver
Posts: 340
TAM has yet to make an official announcement in regards to leaving. That being said, everyone and their cat knows that TAM will soon be leaving. I suppose it is possible that TAM knows exactly when it will be departing the star alliance and has blocked tickets for after that date.
Dec 31, 2012 | 4:11 pm
#4
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Bogota
Programs: Lifemiles Gold, COPA 1K, Hhonors Diamond, Carlson Gold
Posts: 98
They have to give six months to leave *A and pay an exit fee. I think they have another 12 months before they are required to leave, as part of the Brazilian approval of the merger.
Jan 1, 2013 | 7:09 am
#5
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Atlntida, Canelones, Uruguay (MVD) and rarely GNV
Programs: AV LifeMiles, CM ConnectMiles, BA Exec Club. Former:ex-ASGold, ex-UA1K, ex-COPlat, ex-NWGold.
Posts: 2,672
ACC2008: Awards are available. Right on united.com. See this screenshot of very good Feb and March availability (there was nothing in January). I don't know your dates, and I didn't search roundtrip, but did do this search to prove or disprove the case: http://prntscr.com/nskj1. Case disproved.
It's a huge leap from "can't find my dates" to "TAM Leaving", and a bigger one from "TAM Leaving" (arguably but not inevitably true, see my mid-2012 posts on my fuzzywanderer-dot-com blog about ways around the Chilean ruling) to "TAM has secretly already left" which is what you were supposing.
As to the 6 week period of no flights for awards by United: There have been plenty of times and plenty of airlines where there are no award flights available. Being able to buy a ticket is not evidence in any sense of award ticket availability. The only time it is, is on your "home program" airline's own metal (their own code and their own aircraft, not even codeshare) if your program has a high-mileage award program for "all seats". Which increasingly is not the case for many programs even at their top-cost award tier, or is limited to only top-level elites. It never works for other airlines in the alliance.
JohanSlam: The requirement to leave Star, or more specifically to not be in any alliance which has AviancaTaca in it, was from the Chilean courts. The Brazilian court simply said that at the end of a transition period, the LATAM airlines had to all be in one single alliance. Chile also imposed that condition, but Brazil doesn't care if they are in Star or not, as long as they are not in both Star and oneworld.
I still wonder what LATAM is up to, not having made any official alliance announcement yet. And I still hold the view, admittedly out there and highly unlikely, that LATAM can find a way to convince the Chilean court (or ignore it and use as an affirmative defense in litigation) that TAM is in fact NOT in "the same alliance as AviancaTaca" even though it is in Star, because AviancaTaca has no frequent flyer, no benefits, no recognition reciprocity whatsoever with TAM and vice-versa. There has to be a reason behind how when AVTA joined Star, they really joined "Star-minus-TAM". One logical reason is it is an attempt to prove by "facts on the ground" that a LATAM airline can be in Star while "not in the same alliance as AviancaTaca".
Otherwise, why wouldn't LATAM management just come out and 100% unequivacably say "We're out of Star and TAM has applied to join oneworld in 2014"? LATAM is still playing some alliance game, or it would be entirely settled by now. The pre-merger swap by Continental from ex-partner Delta's SkyTeam (literally Northwest, which forced SkyTeam on CO) to new partner United's Star happened in three days! Obviously with more behind the scenes technical, business procedure, and legal work. But a major airline operationally switched over from being a full member of one alliance to another in literally three days. So the process model exists, even if one of the alliances in question is not in play (?) for TAM. They could announce right now what they are going to do in a year, exactly like CO did when they partnered (years before merging) with United.
They have not announced. There must be a reason for not announcing.
But right now they are still a full member of Star Alliance, with full Star reciprocity and benefits (except with the AviancaTaca "carveout"). So let's not make minor availability issues into major speculation of secret exits.
It's a huge leap from "can't find my dates" to "TAM Leaving", and a bigger one from "TAM Leaving" (arguably but not inevitably true, see my mid-2012 posts on my fuzzywanderer-dot-com blog about ways around the Chilean ruling) to "TAM has secretly already left" which is what you were supposing.
As to the 6 week period of no flights for awards by United: There have been plenty of times and plenty of airlines where there are no award flights available. Being able to buy a ticket is not evidence in any sense of award ticket availability. The only time it is, is on your "home program" airline's own metal (their own code and their own aircraft, not even codeshare) if your program has a high-mileage award program for "all seats". Which increasingly is not the case for many programs even at their top-cost award tier, or is limited to only top-level elites. It never works for other airlines in the alliance.
JohanSlam: The requirement to leave Star, or more specifically to not be in any alliance which has AviancaTaca in it, was from the Chilean courts. The Brazilian court simply said that at the end of a transition period, the LATAM airlines had to all be in one single alliance. Chile also imposed that condition, but Brazil doesn't care if they are in Star or not, as long as they are not in both Star and oneworld.
I still wonder what LATAM is up to, not having made any official alliance announcement yet. And I still hold the view, admittedly out there and highly unlikely, that LATAM can find a way to convince the Chilean court (or ignore it and use as an affirmative defense in litigation) that TAM is in fact NOT in "the same alliance as AviancaTaca" even though it is in Star, because AviancaTaca has no frequent flyer, no benefits, no recognition reciprocity whatsoever with TAM and vice-versa. There has to be a reason behind how when AVTA joined Star, they really joined "Star-minus-TAM". One logical reason is it is an attempt to prove by "facts on the ground" that a LATAM airline can be in Star while "not in the same alliance as AviancaTaca".
Otherwise, why wouldn't LATAM management just come out and 100% unequivacably say "We're out of Star and TAM has applied to join oneworld in 2014"? LATAM is still playing some alliance game, or it would be entirely settled by now. The pre-merger swap by Continental from ex-partner Delta's SkyTeam (literally Northwest, which forced SkyTeam on CO) to new partner United's Star happened in three days! Obviously with more behind the scenes technical, business procedure, and legal work. But a major airline operationally switched over from being a full member of one alliance to another in literally three days. So the process model exists, even if one of the alliances in question is not in play (?) for TAM. They could announce right now what they are going to do in a year, exactly like CO did when they partnered (years before merging) with United.
They have not announced. There must be a reason for not announcing.
But right now they are still a full member of Star Alliance, with full Star reciprocity and benefits (except with the AviancaTaca "carveout"). So let's not make minor availability issues into major speculation of secret exits.
Last edited by MarkXS; Jan 1, 2013 at 7:12 am Reason: better screenshot showing connecting flight to MCZ