JohnnyColombia

Can we have a LAN forum yet please?

EDIT: The TalkBoard New forum evaluation criteria questionnaire is here

It has been about a year since the last request for a LAN forum was rejected for less than obvious reasons (less than obvious to me at least)

LAN, for those non-believers is South America’s biggest airline & known for superb onboard service, a broken website and lousy customer service.

It is a member of the OneWorld alliance, it has three subsidiaries also affiliate members of the OneWorld alliance. LAN Perú, LAN Ecuador & LAN Argentina. There is also LAN Cargo in Colombia and in 2012 we will have LAN Colombia here too.

LAN has codeshares with other OneWorld partners AA, QF, BA, CX and IB

LAN flies to everywhere pretty much in South America, directly to JFK, LAX and MIA in North America. SFO too. Through an increasing number of AA codeshares they are also marketing flights from Washington DC, Denver, Orlando, Chicago & Boston. In Europe LAN flies to Madrid and Frankfurt with OneWorld connections to BCN, LHR, CDG etc. LAN flies to Sydney and Auckland too. A total of 4 continents

LAN has the creative but difficult to understand South America Airpass allowing the economical exploration of South America when arriving on a OneWorld carrier

LANpass is LAN’s FF programme. It has 4 million members and offers distance based OW awards in Kilometers. E.g. LHR to CDG is 12,000 kms return (8000 miles) compared to AAdvantage’s 20,000 miles for the same trip.

You might say that LANpass’s members are typically Spanish speakers and are not interested in partaking in an English language forum. But could the same not be said for IB Plus that has just been given its own forum? Do the majority of Alitalia members not speak Italian? Do the majority of JAL members not speak Japanese? The language argument is a non-argument.

Aside from that FT already has a raft of bilingual members that are ready to help out English speakers with the ins and outs of LAN Spanish.

LAN does not have an official representative on FT, yet the absence of an official representative is reason in itself for having a forum as it is a measure of LAN’s Chilean contempt for its own passengers. None of us get much assistance from LAN, hence we come to FT, thus it would be dandy and handsome if the talkboard would give us a dedicated forum to focus all this LAN specific lovingly harvested information in one place, not betwtixt the muddle of “Other North and South American Airlines”

We have andreadbc! Beat that! Can I nominate her as a mod already for our new forum?

Unbelievable I know but perhaps LAN doesn’t have its own forum because the mods think it already exists.



LAN has ridiculous discriminatory pricing depending on where you buy your ticket and what residency you have, it is a frequent theme on FT

LAN is a popular airline for AA and BA redemptions

Threads that could go in the LAN forum?

I am not going to labour over a count up as the last petitioner did just to get this request rejected but how about the following from the front page?

Working out mileage per segment

Elite updates, lack thereof

Changes to award tix

I accidentally bought a Peruvian ticket

I think the other LAN-ophiles can chip in now with their own thoughts. My final words…

Seriously, how can an airline as large and with such a reach as LAN possibly NOT have its own forum? Why do we have to keep asking? How can 3 different Virgin brands and their FF programmes have a forum each? LAN’s combined fleet is larger than Cathay Pacific’s fleet and more than twice as large Finnair’s fleet.

Just what does an airline have to do around these parts to get its own forum?

Mwenenzi

A lot of threads with many post on each thread

JohnnyColombia

I make you right. According to this post from exactly one year ago. AdamSouthFL's search identified just under 500 LAN related posts.

I am not digging out the smaller forums but let's guestimate conservatively that LAN has 800-900 posts now, that puts it on a par with about 10 other airline forums.

That's not including the posts that slip into OneWorld, AA, BA and even credit card forums.

MJLouise

I would love to learn more about LAN too, would love to use my BA miles on LAN. Another vote for a LAN forum.

ttuna3

+1 on all of the above posts.
As has been noted before LAN is the big kahuna in spanish South America and when you add their "merger" with TAM there really aren't too many place in the Southern Cone they don't fly or codeshare to as well. Given the amount of traffic on the UACO marriage the LATAM saga should be even more interesting given all of the local politics and the fun of watching Star and Oneworld battles to come. As noted they are the Southern Cone connections for AA, IB, BA and QF, and they are busily expanding all over the continent. Seems like a no brainer to me for a seperate forum.@:-)

bingocallerb22

+1

I have visited other FT type fora, they are generally dormant because of inactivity, so they remain so. This LAN forum, though not dedicated, has a handful of active members who consistently provide useful and surprising information. If so few can do so much, think how much more an active dedicated forum would be! Success breeds success.

NYC-LIM Business class (is there any other way to do the NA/SA red-eyes?) costs, what, $5k on AC, AA, LA. On XL a third of that, routing via GYE. GYE is your friend and an excellent modern airport to boot. I have been flying NYC-LIM direct with excellent LAN in flight service, with an excursion to GYE for $1200, all in, all in Business, plus getting 17.5k status Kms. With some connectors and national flights, 2 trips gives Premium, 3 almost Premium Silver. How? It is here, but try to find it in the noise and clutter of other North and South American airlines threads. This trick has been recently closed by LAN, but some are trying to find the work around. When we find it, where do we post... below the Porter discount thread?

Eastbay1K

I really don't give a flying crap what FT wants to do with or without a LAN forum. I am not even going to try pitching for one again. While I am happy to answer people's questions here, I haven't started my own new content post in probably a year. Clearly, the talkboard doesn't support it. I have better things to do than write a dissertation for why FT should have a LAN forum. It should be self-evident. If an airline with the size and dominance of LAN existed in Europe, it wouldn't even be an issue. Even VX in the US, hardly an active forum with a lot of content, got its own forum. But apparently the third world ghetto of South America isn't worthy of an airline forum of any sort. Not a SINGLE airline south of the US border is worthy of any sort of forum? This is absolute crap for an IBB that is trying to be "worldly."

So, it has become its own self-fulfilling prophecy. I don't add new LAN content via new threads here. I'm done. More power to you if you can get FT after all these years to add a LAN forum. My life has enough going on so that I am not going to run stats, diagnostics, and/or other whatever might be necessary, similar to what needs for a master's thesis or higher, to possibly get a LAN forum.

Harsh? Maybe. Factual? 100%. I've tried to get a forum in the past. I'm done.

lin821

FWIW, recent existing discussion threads on this topic:

1. Proposal: Time for a LAN forum
(from Aug 2009 thru Dec 2010)

2. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/talkb...l-lan-tam.html

JohnnyColombia

Yes recent and each one rejected

2009 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/talkb...lan-forum.html

Discussed here too

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/other...own-forum.html

Nowhere, absolutely nowhere do you see anyone tripping over themselves to object to a LAN forum

lin821

(bolding mine)

Each rejected? Well, no, not really.

The previous motion was voted on and failed in September 2009.

I did see more discussion since October 2009 but any discussion onward hasn't yield enough support (from TBers) to get to another new motion.

To be perfectly honest, I haven't followed this LAN discussion closely but I also haven't seen any motion coming out in either 2010 or 2011. As far as I know, you only need 2 TBers' support to get a motion going. Maybe that's who/what you guys should try to lobby for?

This is one TBer's suggestion (from December 2010) on how to achieve that goal:
Good luck!

ETA: Another TB election is around the corner, coming up in November. Different TBers may have different views on new fora. You guys may want to time and invest your effort accordingly.

JohnnyColombia

Thanks for the guidance lin821
Rejected and motion failed are semantically much of a muchness aren't they?

I am not minded to complete the questionnaire. I find it a bit inane and deliberate.

Is FT the best place to discuss this subject?

FlyerTalk is an interactive community that provides up-to-date information on travel-related loyalty reward programs. It's the hub that brings everyone together -- from leisure travelers to mileage junkies -- to converse about programs

LANpass is the loyalty reward programme of a very major airline. If an interactive community that provides up to date information on travel related loyalty reward programmes is not the best place to discuss the loyalty reward programme then why would I have wasted my time suggesting it. And why would so many members of said interactive community be in support of it?

That is not a rant directed at you lin821 I appreciate your input, but at the same time I have one foot in the Eastbay1K camp, why should I or anyone else jump through hoops to beg for something that FT members that have stated an opinion almost universally want? Particularly when those same questions have already been answered.

If TalkBoard members want a justification for LAN then simply read Prospero's excellent proposal for an IB forum, because what was good for IB then is also pertinent to LAN now and has been for at least a couple of years.

As for TalkBoard backers, this post is in the TalkBoard thread, I trust a couple of TBers will swing by and propose and second the motion. If we have no TBer comments in the thread by Wednesday then yes, I will start "lobbying"

JohnnyColombia

I am afraid there will be no "effort" and why should there be?

I am not lobbying for blacks to be allowed to ride the front of the bus, or for Shar'ia law to be adopted in the American Mid West, or for gay marriage to be obligatory, even for heterosexuals.

I am asking for an airline reward programme to have its own dedicated and focussed forum on a website that discusses airline reward programmes.

I cannot answer how much traffic it will get, how would I know? How many people are going to buy the Samsung Galaxy tab 10.1 inch that isn't for sale in Germany? I don't know that either.

I am merely and simply requesting a LAN forum that a hardcore of LAN frequent flyers would like, that casual visitors to LAN hubs would like, that frequent flyers of other OW programmes would like, and that even FTers from different alliances would like.

Why does it have to be as complicated as persuading a Tel Aviv butcher to sell me a joint of ham?

Gaucho100K

Eastbay1K-- while I agree pretty much with all your above points, you need to control your tone or else some of your emphasis will get understood the wrong way and your efforts towards a LAN forum will backfire.

I will take up this issue with my fellow moderators and while I dont think we have any extra clout with the TB, for what its worth I back this proposal 200%.... I think there is plenty of evidence showing that a dedicated forum does wonders for creating additional traffic and content generation.

jackal

At least two have noticed it at this point. Probably more by morningtime.

And to lin821's quote...I had forgotten about that.

How about this gem of a post from previous discussion:

phlashba

I have no doubt that the lack of a LAN forum is one of the reasons why there are so few posts about LAN it is indeed a self-fulfilling prophecy. But "if you build it they will come".

This is an idea whose time has come ---- PLEASE give us a proper LAN forum!