LAN Airlines

Canceled flights – I was booked from Sydney to Auckland return. Flights both ways were canceled as well as both rescheduled flights the following day. 2 full days wasted at the airport with little to no information. Ended up insisting they rebook me on qantas which eventually got me there and back. Would never fly this airline again.

Overall flight experience was good however quite upset we had to repurchase tickets to come home as – Overall flights from Sydney - Auckland - Santiago - Bogota were well. We missed our return flight home from Bogota in March 2017 (flight was 10.30am, we thought 6.30pm instead that was the arrival time for Santiago which on our itinerary 6.25pm & BOGOTA were in Bold font and next to each other which is how we got confused). Staff tried to… Read more

assist to see if there were any flights to help us make our connecting flights and there wasn't, however having to repurchase a one way return ticket home for two adults at a cost of $3400 was quite upsetting and stressful (more than our original total cost of two return tickets). It would have been nice to have received a reminder email in regards to our upcoming flight schedule ALSO some effort made to have contact us in regards to missing our flight in the first place.

We ended up leaving Bogota the next morning at 4am to Lima - Santiago - Auckland - Sydney and returning one day after our original return date.

Lost luggage – On my flight from Sao Paulo to Santiago on the 21st Jan (LA 761), I forgot my carry on luggage in the plane. I realized that a few minutes after leaving the plane and I was told that I could not go back to get it. They said I had to submit a form online and that's what I did. They replied a week later saying that they didn't find it and that there… Read more

was nothing else they could do. It was a relatively big brown bag and no way it could have just disappeared. They are not doing any effort to try to find it.

No Customer Service – We were booked on flights from Santiago to Brisbane. We checked in and received our boarding passes. We noted the gate number and went to that gate waiting for our flight. Unbeknown to us and several other passengers the gate number had changed. There were no announcements. When we tried to board our flight the indicator panel showed a… Read more

different destination. We were advised the flight was departing from another gate. Upon arrival at this other gate we were advised the flight had been closed off five minutes earlier and we were unable to board the flight. There were no announcements asking for late passengers for the flight. Interestingly they took our baggage off the plane along with other passengers baggage all without making any announcements. After much discussion with airline personnel we were sold tickets for the next day to return home to Australia. It turned out we could have gone on standby but this information was not made clear to us because of the poor customer service officer speaking mainly in Spanish and not English to the other passengers. No compensation was offered. We felt that we have been scammed into purchasing new tickets. Never, ever will we fly with this shoddy airline.

Luggage torn in South America – Traveled as a group of 40 Australians. Two suitcases were damaged. The Antler case was slashed from top to bottom. The hard sided case was also cracked. Staff offered us a $20 US CASH for the damaged case. We eventually got $40. Not enough for a $250 suitcase. Meals were the worst we experienced after 22 flights. Meals trays were not collected for… Read more

over 2 hours. Travellers were taking trays back to staff. Our flight from Lima Peru was delayed for 4 hours.

Changed my flight times and refused to refund – Terrible customer service and the promise of a solution that was never delivered. Painful to deal with and am still owed $1400 for promised flight refund by this company. Would not recommend

Bad but cheap – Impossible to check in online & select seats. Was pre allocated a centre of centre seat which despite the websites claim, could not be changed, yet the window seats went. Staff on board were off hand, aloof & boarder line rude.

Good Business class Sydney to Auckland – Have used Lan a few times, around half price of other business class from Sydney to Auckland. Have mostly been on time. Flight from Auckland leaves very early, so that is one downside. Service pretty good, food OK, but having extra legroom and lounge access makes up for it.

Worst airline ever! – I have flown extensively on many airlines and vote this one as absolutely terrible. Food was the worst ever, do yourself a favour and eat before you fly if you dare go with them. Flight from Santiago to Sydney was oversold. We were told of this by someone who could not speak English, they refused to put us on the place even though tickets were… Read more

bought and confirmed over 3 months earlier. People who could speak Spanish were given preference and were given boarding passes even though they had not printed them off and clearly had not checked in online.

We were suspicious when the LAN app and the website refused to allow us to checkin up to 48 hours earlier. We were offered some sort of compensation - a voucher for future travel - as if we would fly with them again! The flight was scheduled to depart at midnight and we were standing in a makeshift queue waiting for volunteers to be bumped. Absolute confusion, no process whatsoever to deal with this situation. We eventually spoke to a supervisor who advised this was common practice for LAN and other airlines, so how about contacting us BEFORE we arrived at the airport given we had provided all our contact details.

Finally got on the place as we had someone with us who could speak Spanish. We were separated but on the plane at least.

Last straw was that the flight was then delayed 90 minutes, no doubt because of the checkin mayhem!

Service on the flight was awful. Bad food, no drink service, insufficient water for a 12 hour flight.

We'll be providing feedback to our tour company, why they would jeopardise their reputation by partnering with this basket case of an airline is beyond me! Never again LAN, never again!!!

Stay clear from this airline povla air ways – At this present moment i am awaiting for my mother to arrive via santiago - auckland -syd return flight dead set been nothing but a nightmare we are frequent flighers who visit family( used diff airlines). However on this trip she has fallen ill and couldnt make her flight contact numbers for support while shes been in chile have been shocking… Read more

they hung up on her and spoke really povo slang spanish classy and didnt even care. The only person who was helpful was the emergency 24/7 contact for an agency in au who told her to get a medical certificate and found a return flight however we had to pay up front 2k one way return ticket to get her back here so im guessing goodluck to us getting any compo as reviews state they are barrio bajo de servico p.s the chairs are small not comfy go elsewhere aimgos

Service – I was making a transfer flight to Lima, Peru. I arrived at the reservation desk to retrieve my tickets for the seats I had picked out prior. At boarding, I noticed that my seats were not together with my husband and in the middle and separated by a couple rows. I immediately went to the counter to resolve the issue and all they said was sorry the… Read more

flight is fully booked. I told them I arrived early and I had picked out my seating prior, thus I didn't think that I would have to double check the seating on the tickets. They said they couldn't do anything and then I noticed the flight attendant walking by that made the mistake. I asked him for his name, he walked away and had a bad attitude which made the situation worse, no apology! They did nothing, this trip was for my honeymoon. I will never forget this and I will never fly with LAN airlines as long as I live. I will be sure to let everyone know about their service.

Do not use this airline under any circumstance – One of the most stressful experiences ever. My wife got sick and couldn't travel, and they refused credits. So, I found friends to take the seats...and as they have no Australian office or even phone number...had to try to do it over the phone, to a foreign country in a foreign language. There is zero service. If you pay and have an issue don't expect any help...be prepared to loose it.

No water! – On our flight home from Santiago in June, we asked for exit seats, since we were the first at the airport we were hopeful but no! We later found out that those who did get the seats had arrived much later. Why were we discriminated against?? true we don't speak Spanish but neither did they!!! However there was worse to come. Breakfast was the… Read more

worst experienced (I've had many airline breakfasts!!).. The 'maid/service' bell was totally ignored!! Why have it??? BUT when I asked for water during the night they told me they had NONE!! I was totally gobsmacked... NO WATER!! (they did have mineral water which I dislike!!) What a disappointing flight after such a wonderful holiday!!!

Double charges-Flight cancellation-Reimbursement never received – We booked 3 domestic flights with LAN in Peru We started our experience with a double charge on the credit card for the same ticket. -We called their customer service, the instructed us to fill a form online and wait to be contacted back. -They contacted us back via email 1 month later asking the same information and proof we had already… Read more

provided.

-They wanted the customer to prove that a double charge happened, while they should have already noticed that their REVENUES exceeded the amount of tickets sold.

-They never refunded the money. We are now processing the complaint with our bank to get the money back.

The first flight on Feb 15 was CANCELLED due to weather conditions.

-LAN informed about the cancellation and instructed all passengers to call customer service to reschedule the flight. They did not assist with flight rescheduling in the airport as would have been more reasonable.

-They refused to provide accommodation or meals for foreign passengers.

- The passenger asked for help to a friend in Peru to call, because as expected a foreigner does not have a phone available (especially if you were not even planning on staying in Lima, so no access to a hotel) and the call center replied saying that they will call back in 2 hours. They never called back. Furthermore when calling a second time the call center informed they might be taking longer than usual due to no seat availability. However when asked if we could book a completely new ticket they said they do have seats available.

- Since the delay was already too long and implied losing pre-paid accommodations in another city and missing out vacation days, the passenger bought tickets with another airline to reach the final destination.

- The passenger then asked LAN AIRLINES for a reimbursement of the unused ticket, the ticket had a fully flexible fare and thus reimbursements were accepted. LAN printed a refund document and promised to return the money on the credit card within 14 days. It has been 4 months and NO REFUND was received.

- After calling several times to LAN to complain that the refund was not received on the credit card, LAN issued a word file saying that they refunded on Feb19 as proof of payment. The refund was never received though, we complain again and requested LAN to provide copy of the bank transaction for the refund and they REJECT our request.

We have thus, had an awful experience with this airline. Lost twice the value of the flight ticket. Had to buy a new ticket with another airline. Lost time during the vacation, one night of hotel in Lima, lost time for phone calls and it has just been a terrible experience.

Hope other passengers do not have to go thru this kind of nightmare! Don´t fly LAN!

Beware of LAN, waiting indefinately for flight to be reconfirmed – Beware of LAN. negative star rating, had system allowed same. I had purchased return airfares, Melbourne to Santiago, last year, to fly this April, 2015, but still waiting, and it is the end of May. I received an email 5 days before my flight, requesting I reconfirm my booking, with a phone number provided.....sounds pretty… Read more

straightforward......however, when I attempted to do so, I was never able to do so directly, being advised I would receive a call back to enable me to do so......this call back was never received, despite numerous phone calls and emails from me. I was never able to speak to anyone who had any authority to process my reconfirmation, and always advised that someone would call me back, and there were never any responses to my emails. While I have lost $1,890 in airfares, plus accommodation booked and paid for in advance, I feel I may have saved in the long run, had I have been able to fly as planned.

Bad scheduling. Poor customer service. Unreliable – I travel to Chile and Argentina once a year for work and I have frequently bought tickets through LAN airlines. 7 of the 10 flights I have have been delayed, causing massive disruptions to my subsequent travel. In one recent incident I had to reschedule and pay for a whole new flight after LAN failed, yet again, to arrive at the correct time.… Read more

After a poor chat with one of their customer service representatives I was told me nothing could be done in regards to compensation. I submitted a letter of complaint hoping for a better response but received only a simple letter 30 days later with no accountability for the constant delays. Admittedly these guys are an affordable airline and there's room for leniency, but after so many bad encounters with them and money down the drain I would rather buy my tickets through a more reliable company and pay that be extra. Be careful!

Excellent service – My husband and I flew out of Auckland this morning on the LA801 flight. [Name removed] at the front counter was a great cheery face to be greeted by at 4 in the morning. We thoroughly enjoyed the flight and the service and food was excellent. Would fly LAN again anytime.

Some of the worst airline food ever – It was the worst airline meal I have had this year. Or last year, for that matter. It was a dish served on flight LA 801 between Santiago in Chile and Auckland. This culinary gem was enticingly described as "pasta" and was offered as an option to "salmon". No-frills LAN, the national carrier of Chile, has dispensed with such fripperies… Read more

as warm/cold towels, menus and amenity kits. And, apparently, decent food.

This congealed mess, strangely burnt in places, was apparently designed to be meat raviolis in a cheese sauce.

Which might have been fine if it were not both under-cooked and served to me somewhere between lukewarm and stone cold.

I could only manage one mouthful, I'm afraid, although had I been truly hungry there was also a "salad" - six or seven pieces of tired-looking lettuce. No tomato, no onion, just sad, lonely lettuce.

To be fair, when I complained the purser did offer something alternative. I was not game to try it.

That's because on the Buenos Aires-Santiago leg, LAN's idea of a snack was the world's worst ham and cheese roll. A doughy, tasteless creation that almost defies description.

In fact on five of seven legs with LAN over the past 12 days, five menus featured some form of ham and cheese sandwich or croissant.

All this is strange, because the LAN in-flight entertainment system describes the airline's culinary offerings as "dishes that evoke the simple, homemade flavors of our region's most traditional dishes".

Obviously ham and cheese sandwiches hold a special place in Chilean culture.

The other atrocity on the same flight was this "omelette" - just a super-rubbery omelette (no mushroom or tomato, not even any ham or cheese), served with a handful of diced pieces of potato, some of which were close to raw (far left), others burnt to a cinder (sixth piece from left, top).

Omelette for breakfast

LAN also ran out of water when we were still 90 minutes out of Auckland.

When I pointed out to the chief purser that hydration was essential on long flights and that this is potentially dangerous, she demanded my passport number and said if I did not provide it then she could not log a complaint.

So LAN, and One World, consider this as a complaint. Not good enough from a low-cost carrier, let alone a major regional flag bearer.

And while LAN is not good at gastronomy or providing water, it also fails when it comes to looking after frequent flyers from One World partner airlines.

As a Qantas frequent flyer (and Qantas Club member) I had booked forward aisle seats as per my preferences, which were shown as "confirmed" on my booking.

When I checked in at Buenos Aires for my Qantas codeshare flights I had been mysteriously moved to seats just two rows from the rear. And as both flights were full the "new" seat assignments could not be changed.

This is despite the LAN in-flight magazine boasting that my One World levels have access to "preferred or pre-reserved seating". Only when it suits the airline, apparently.

To be fair, some of the LAN staff are charming and there is an impressive selection of entertainment options but on a long leg like Santiago-Sydney I would in future opt for Qantas reliability every time.

I had a good experience at the fraction of the cost of the majors – My experience with Lan from Sydney to Auckland was a breeze. The service was OK, the seats where acceptable, the TV screens and audio jacks worked (listen up Qantas) and I was fed. I also got to take 23kgs of luggage along for the ride. There wasn't any problems with the food - it was a small flight, so it sufficed and unlike JetStar, I didn't have to find my wallet for it. So actually, no complaints from me.

Never had major problems with LAN – Have flown with LAN between Sydney and Ecuador via Santiago at least 4 times over the past decade and have had no major problems... The food has always been OK the drinks really nice and all free on the flight. Service has always been great and never any problems talking to the English speaking staff even though I speak a little Spanish. Only one… Read more

major delay but still made the connection in Santiago with minutes to spare and our luggage came with us all the way.. Generous luggage allowance compared to other airlines... in economy you can have 2 bags at 23 kgs each. No complaints and will fly with them again.... We are members of Lanpass as a result of our satisfaction with this airline.

Avoid is possible – Without a doubt the worst airline I have travelled with. They cancelled a connecting flight from Auckland to Santiago, had known days in advance and not told us although they had told a few other passengers, and this after over a two hour wait in line for a delayed check-in because the New Zealand immigration 'link' was down. There was complete… Read more

disorganisation, with no one knowing what had happened to our luggage (it had gone on ahead without us with the one plane that was leaving that day filled with passengers who were cancelled from the day prior). If you spoke Spanish you had a much better chance of getting on that plane. As a result we lost 2 connecting flights to Cusco and our trip has been weeks by this disaster. According to airport staff and our travel insurance this is not unusual for Lan. I suggest that you do not fly Lan unless you have a lot of time and can allow for cancellations. I will also add crew service onboard the aircraft was particularly poor although I think we may have been unlucky in where we were seated. Out flight attendant couldn't seem to handle more than one job at a time and had issues with dispensing tea and remembering who had requested what when dealing with 2 people in front of her.

Absolute rubish - worst airline ever – SYD - Buenos Aires flight with one stop in Auckland (NZ) and one in Santiago (Chile). Once in Auckland, the departure screens were saying the flight to Santiago was delayed 10 hours. Arrived to destination 34 hours after scheduled time, in Santiago the airline had 4 useless bricks attending 360 passengers with connections (lost) to other… Read more

destinations and organizing accommodation.

Avoid !! flight via the US or Europe, trust me it will be cheaper at the end !!

Worst Airline in the whole world – Avoid avoid avoid. Staff can barely speak english, too sensitive, flights always late, poor service. They made me lose a flight after being abused by another passanger and did not evaluate the situation properly. Cabin is dirty. Seats are not comfy. Flight attendants are not well trained. Avoid this airline at all costs.

Hopeless- never again – Confirmed flight from Santiago on 4/10/13. Long queue at check-in. Overbooked; "confirmed" booking meaningless. Many passengers who were allotted seats were separated. Told to stand in another queue awaiting availability of a seat. Eventually given the last "left over" seat and had to run to clear immigration and get to departure gate. How Qantas… Read more

can enter into a "partnership" with this airline is a reflection on their credibility. On top of that a couple has to pay a "visa" fee of USD$190 just to stay in Santiago for 1 night which makes it a very expensive stopover especially when this city is a dead hole with a flying visit to the racecourse being the main sightseeing attraction. Never again Lan Chile!!!! Evening meal with salmon served hot (if you like mashed potato and very small green bean serve) Unbelievably slow check-in. Overbooking. Obviously still catching up with teh computer age.

Fly LAN - expect problems – Just spent 3.5 weeks in South America. Flew from Sydney to Santiago and return with LAN as well as 9 internal flights using their airpass. Started off badly as LAN cancelled the flight from Sydney 2.5 hours before departure after which we were offloaded to AirNZ to fly to Auckland to wait a day. LANs handling of this is terrible. Had to queue in… Read more

Sydney 1 hour before flight to NZ, at NZ had to wait 2 hours to find out what is happening. Next morning had to queue again to get onto the resumes flight and after a 12 hour flight had to queue for 2 hours in Santiago to find out what had happened to our connecting flight. Through all of this the communication from LAN was non-existent people had to rely on other passenger to find out what was happening. And did LAN offer the slightest apology for their incompetence and poor customer service .....No.

Having resumed our trip we soon learned that our bookings that we had made online (including reserving seats on all flights) had disappeared. I was no longer able to check my flights online (and was never able to use a Kiosk for check-in) every time I checked in was a major problem with the check-in staff always having to see their supervisor and it always took 20mins to get our boarding passes (that doesn't include the queue beforehand). Our seating was all over the place and the three of us only managed to sit together a couple of times. And through all of this did the LAN staff tell us what was happening...no they just stared into their terminals and looked perplexed. Never an apology or explanation for the delays.

We learned that we had to turn up extra early for our flights because it was always a problem. Which is just as well as some flights had been moved forward by LAN.

So LAN online booking: Big fail. While I was happy to have all my flights and seating confirmed beforehand the reality is that I had no such bookings at all.

Customer service: Exceptionally poor. Communication is non-existent and while a small apology would have been accepted they never once apologised for their incompetence.

On the plus side. Once you are on the plane things are reasonable. Planes are OK, on-board staff are friendly (although they are very poor at providing water on 12 hour flights) food is OK (for airline)

My recommendations:

- Fly someone else to South America - probably Qantas.

- Internal to South America their are few options so take print outs of your bookings and arrive early for your flights.

- Do not trust their on-line systems.

- Forget electronic check-in

- Expect really poor customer service on the ground.

Worst experience of my life – There are not many choices for air travel in South America, but if I had a choice I would NEVER fly with LAN! We had a terrible experience with several employees of LAN airline while trying to catch a flight between Ecuador and Chile. We arrived to the check-in counter 1 hour before our flight, and we were told my the firth person we spoke with… Read more

that our flight (which we had booked two months in advance) was closed 1 hour before and there was nothing she could do to let us in, even though the flight had not even started boarding. This woman sent us to a sales counter to change our tickets. The sales counter informed us that there was an alternative flight leaving in 45 minutes but that she could not change our tickets as they were booked though cheaptickets.com and sent us away to contact cheaptickets. We come to find out later that in fact the deal cheaptickets has with LAN requires all changes to be made by LAN at the airport or via phone. With this information we head back to the sales office and speak with a new person who says that now they can change our tickets for a fee, but that we have missed the only other flight leaving that day and will need to wait until tomorrow. I have flown many times, but this was the worst service experience I have ever had on an airline. I would never recommend to my friends or family to use LAN airlines especially flying through Ecuador!

Horrible service

Bad – Poor customer service. I flew Business Class from Sydney to Santiago (Chile) and they stopped in Auckland for 8 hours on the way without explanation. Eventually I managed to get an answer from the Qantas lounge staff who were initially evasive, that the flight had been delayed to Sydney so the flight attendants had not received their rest time… Read more

entitlement. In other words when I left Sydney they knew there would be a long delay but they chose to hide the extent of the delay in Auckland.

On the way back there was no problem, except that the extent of English speakers was very limited and the service was tardy. Inexpensive Delayed stop-over in Auckland

I will not fly with LAN Airlines again if I can avoid it! – I have travelled with Lan Chile Airlines from São Paulo to Brisbane or Brisbane to São Paulo 3 times now. First time in July 2008, second in March 2009 and I arrived from my third trip on 8th April 2012. My 2 first travel experiences in 2008 and 2009 flying with LAN were wonderful for many reasons: the flight attendants were very friendly, we had… Read more

two options to choose from at each meal served, quality of the food was good and all the blockbusters still in cinemas were available to watch on board. Seat size, leg room and comfort I must say it has never been good so long flights like 12 hours from Chile to Auckland has always been quite uncomfortable while flying with LAN.

My return trip Brisbane - São Paulo now in March-April 2012 was the worst flying experience I've ever had. Comparing my two first trips to my third one, the only aspect that remains the same is the lack of seat comfort. In my last trip this year we had a single option for each meal served and the quality of the food was the worst possible. Let's be honest that unless one's flying first class, airline food has never been great but I've been served some decent meals at the economy class while flying LAN before. In my last flight we were served a ravioli pasta dish for lunch and an omelette for breakfast. The ravioli had a processed junk filling that did not resembled anything like meat and the omelette was so awful that I felt in a camp being fed rubbish. It had rubbery foam like texture and it looked like it had been made with some sort of artificial eggs. It looked and it tasted like unnatural and very bland food. After I had the 'unnatural' omelette I started to feel nauseated and I could not eat anything for the rest of the 10 hours trip. After arriving in Brazil I still had trouble to eat for three days.

Still describing the food experience, first two trips I flew with LAN Airlines, they would offer small milk cup sachets to have with your coffee. This year in both flights we were offered powdered milk sachets of very poor quality. The same "unnatural" omelette was also served on the return flight but I preferred not to eat this time to save me trouble.

As for entertainment, flying to Brazil we had no blockbusters available to watch, they were available only from São Paulo to Sydney.

Since the service on board for food, beverage and entertainment were pretty good in my two first trips with LAN Airlines, the lack of comfort of the seat was not an issue to me but the quality of the service on board has declined badly and I am not willing to compromise on service quality in order to fly cheaper. I will definitely consider flying with Qantas or Emirates next time I travel to South America. The arrival and departure times were pretty good even though some flights suffered changes both ways. The whole experience on board was very unconfortable: seats, bad food, average entertainment service. Also it was annoying to hear the pilot announce the Duty Free offers a few times during the flight.

Sydey to Santiago, excellent – I have flown Australia to South America many times, and its always a pleasant experience, nothing fancy, but has good safety standards and friendly staff. Note: The above review stated that the direct LAN fly from Buenos Aires to Australia was terrible, notice that LAN do NOT fly Buenos Aires to Australia and never did, so be careful with that… Read more

review. Clean, modern, safe , staff is not arrogant, very friendly, good entretainment on board Limited English Skills, not much of an issue for me.

Terrible – Though this flight was several years ago the pain of it is still burned into my memory. We were due to go back to Australia from Buenos Aires and our flight was delayed 18 hours with pretty much no communication apart from a vague "mechanical difficulties". Mmm, just what you want to hear before a 14 hour flight. We sat around at the airport,… Read more

voucherless, watching the time tick by until they booked us into a hotel at about 2am. When we finally got on the flight and the drinks trolly came around I timidly asked for tomato juice, which I was not aware is a rare commodity. The airline hostess hissed at me "tomato juice? That is for first class passengers only" and pushed the trolly away. Thankfully another airline steward managed to snatch a drink off her tray and pass it to me before she could leave for which I am eternally greatful for. Unfortunately they are the only airline that do direct flights to BA at the moment but if that ever changes I am first one to make a booking! Direct flights Sydney to Buenos Aires Flight delayed 18 hours. Poor service by flight attendent

Good – Recommend and will choose for future travel to south americia. Have used within south america without concern or problems. Option to code share journey with qantas is a positive. Clean, efficient and a very professional service experienced direct from sydney to buenos aires, 2009 without any delay (ahead of schedule arrival). Friendly and… Read more

professional staff. In-flight food and entertainment options very good (economy). Part of one-world program. Hope a melbourne chile/argentina direct service operates in the future.

Good – I will fly with LAN again when in the region, experienced no problems flying with them and even was upgraded to business class for free on one ocassion. Modern safe aircraft, friendly staff, I have enjoyed flying LAN throuhgout South America. Have airline lounges in most airports and all the flights I took were pretty much on schedule. LAN is… Read more

also part of the oneworld partner program so Qantas frequent flyer status is recognised for preferred seating, upgrades and points. More expensive than other carriers but worth it for the safety factor when flying in South America as there are a lot of old DC9's operating.