[portabelly]

Prebooked and confirmed 5 flights in South America, 4 of which were with LAN. First leg from Buenos Aires to Lima on 2nd of April. Got to airport at 0605 hrs for 0840 flight. Waited in line till 0735 hrs. They had also split the line so that people behind me actually got processed before me. Got to desk: 'there are no seats left sir'. That is pretty much the repeated response to all my protestations. Had my wife and daughter with me. Than their management of the issue was also accompanied by a series of problems. But the best one, was an email I received 2 days later from my agent, while we were in the Amazon, wondering where we were, and that they were concerned as LAN had contacted them, telling them that we were a No Show, and they were planning to cancel the rest of the trip.
Call me naive, but I thought that overbooking was largely a US practice and that they managed it well so 'Forced Denied Boarding' (am better educated now, as have done a lot of research) does not occur. Why do we allow this industry to do what none of us can get away with in any other industry- denying a service already paid for, for pure financial gain!

[azstar]

Overbooking ought to be illegal, but it's not. In these days of electronic tickets and nonrefundable fares there is no excuse to overbook flights.

[portabelly]

It seems to me, that just have it their way in every way. They add a premium to the fare if you purchase a transferable flight, and they will not refund if you cancel too close to flight time. The argument is that it is too late to resell. Buy hey! You already have!!! Either make it illegal, or introduce significant cost to the airline for any forced denied boarding! That, at the least will make them try really hard to please their passengers, should they overbook to a non manageable level.

[jimworcs]

The justification for "over-selling" has long since passed. Fully transferrable, paper tickets meant airlines in the past had no reliable way of knowing how many would turn up. Today, the vast majority of tickets are direct sale, electronic and non refundable. What they do today would be fraud in any other industry. Imagine a Madonna concert where the promotors sold 10,000 tickets for an 8,000 seat arena. It would be a scandal and heads would roll.

[azstar]

Originally Posted by jimworcs

The justification for "over-selling" has long since passed. Fully transferrable, paper tickets meant airlines in the past has no reliable way of knowing how many would turn up. Today, the vast majority of tickets are direct sale, electronic and non refundable. What they do today would be fraud in any other industry. Imagine a Madonna concert where the promotors sold 10,000 tickets for an 8,000 seat arena. It would be a scandal and heads would roll.

Exactly right. Well said.

[xjcaptain]

Originally Posted by jimworcs

The justification for "over-selling" has long since passed. Fully transferrable, paper tickets meant airlines in the past has no reliable way of knowing how many would turn up. Today, the vast majority of tickets are direct sale, electronic and non refundable. What they do today would be fraud in any other industry. Imagine a Madonna concert where the promotors sold 10,000 tickets for an 8,000 seat arena. It would be a scandal and heads would roll.

Why then are there so many no-shows? Once the seat leaves the gate, its revenue that can never be made up or sold again.

[The_Judge]

What would happen is that the % of people that showed up over the capacity would be offered possibly even more than what they paid for their Madonna ticket, which in my opinion would be too much if they paid more than a nickel.

[jimworcs]

Xj....if the tickets sold are non refundable the airline has no loss of revenue. The seat is empty because it has already been sold and no one turned up... If anything the airline gains through less weight/fuel burn.

No airline should be allowed to oversell seats which were sold on a non refundable basis.

[jimworcs]

2,000 Madonna fans denied admission! I wouldn't want to be the person who had that job.

[The_Judge]

Are there still even 2000 Madonna fans around?

[jimworcs]

Yeah, and 1,990 of them are friends of Dorothy, so watch out!

[info_guy]

Originally Posted by portabelly

Prebooked and confirmed 5 flights in South America, 4 of which were with LAN. First leg from Buenos Aires to Lima on 2nd of April. Got to airport at 0605 hrs for 0840 flight. Waited in line till 0735 hrs. They had also split the line so that people behind me actually got processed before me. Got to desk: 'there are no seats left sir'. That is pretty much the repeated response to all my protestations. Had my wife and daughter with me. Than their management of the issue was also accompanied by a series of problems. But the best one, was an email I received 2 days later from my agent, while we were in the Amazon, wondering where we were, and that they were concerned as LAN had contacted them, telling them that we were a No Show, and they were planning to cancel the rest of the trip.
Call me naive, but I thought that overbooking was largely a US practice and that they managed it well so 'Forced Denied Boarding' (am better educated now, as have done a lot of research) does not occur. Why do we allow this industry to do what none of us can get away with in any other industry- denying a service already paid for, for pure financial gain!

Give us more context!!

Based on that i can tell you what i think.

Were you given a travel voucher?

Was the tkt actually a LAN tkt, or only the operating flights?

The no show status has to do with the system, it is not something entered manually, so it is only a response.-

How was this solved?

Regards