American Airlines matches big LAN fare sale: Up to 50% off to South America
Keep your friends close, and your airlines alliance partners closer. Last week (American Airlines partner and oneworld member) LAN launched a big fare sale with some fares dropping by as much as 50 percent from New York, Miami, San Francisco, and Los Angeles to many destinations in South America.
From the LAN “Big Deal of the Year” offer on their website:
Our BIG DEAL of the year is the biggest and best sale yet! So grab your seat before December 12, 2011 to travel between March 1 and June 30, 2012 to beautiful destinations including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela. There is no better time to plan and book next year’s vacation with saving of up to 50%. Hurry, the BIG DEAL OF THE YEAR will only be around for 2 weeks!
Bad news: These fares book into Q class, so they don’t earn AAdvantage miles on codeshare flights. Correction: I was wrong (see the comments section). These fares will earn AAdvantage Miles.
Good news: American has quietly matched the fares so you’ll earn full mileage on AA numbered flights.
Here’s a sample of some of the fares:
Miami to Lima – $399 round-trip, plus tax/fees
New York JFK to Buenos Aires – $799 round-trip, plus tax/fees
You must purchase you’re ticket by December 12, 2011 to travel between March 1 and June 30, 2012
Go here to the LAN US site to see a full list of fares and destinations, then go to AA.com to search availability.
A hat tip to The Travel Abstract who writes “I may be making a quick 3 month layover in the city where steak and wine porn is not taboo. Hasta Pronto Buenos Aires!” for writing the post that brought this sale to my attention.
Some other news:
• From Points, Miles and Martinis: If you missed out on buying a oneworld MegaDo ticket, there’s still hope: Randy Peterson is giving up his seat and he and the other milepoint founders are giving it away in a random drawing. Go here for details.
• Speaking of contests, several Boarding Area bloggers are supporting Passports with Purpose. You can support building two libraries in Zambia and maybe win one of these great prizes:
From Points, Miles and Martinis: Win Two Free Nights At The W Hotel Atlanta!
From Mommy Points: Win a $100 Best Western Gift Card!
From Deals we Like: Win a 2-Night Weekend Stay in NYC!
Loyalty Traveler: Win 110,000 Hyatt Gold Passport points!
I thought Q class for LAN gets you 100% EQM but only .5 EQP on international travel for AAdvantage program?
I think this is an amazing deal by LAN and by AA fare matching. Btwn the two most nonstop flights to South America are available at huge discounts. One in particular that you mention, JFK-EZE, is notoriously expensive. I wrote it up on my blog because it is a flight I watch for any price movement on and try to pick it up on the slide down.
I was a little confused about earning miles on codeshare LAN flight numbers, my reading of this page was that only international flights booked in Y, B, H, K, L, M, V class earn miles. What do you think?
The last row has an empty cell for “class of service”, which I think implies its the same as the cell above it (deep discount economy), has G, N, O, Q, S. Which is why they only get .5 EQP but still get the 100% EQM.
But that could just be me assuming more than I should.
@ The Travel Abstract – (Clouds of confusion parting:-) I think you’re right. I was looking at line four (/ Economy Class / All / Y, B, H, K, L, M, V / 100% / 1.00 /) rather than the last line. I interpreted that to mean all economy fares, booked into those classes, not otherwise listed on the chart. Now I see that I was wrong.
Thanks for catching that!