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During our recent Party of 5 team challenge, Tim and I took the team to South America. In doing so, we took advantage of several airline partnerships that exist in South America (both during and immediately after the challenge) that can be easy to forget. In fact, South America is a particularly interesting place for easy-to-forget partnerships. While many readers likely know that Avianca partners with Star Alliance carriers, it can be easy to forget that Star Alliance airline Copa partners with Air France or that Brazilian airline GOL, mostly owned by Air France and KLM, partners with American Airlines.
LATAM still partners with Alaska and British Airways
LATAM long partnered with American Airlines, but that partnership ended a few years ago when Delta took an ownership stake in LATAM. However, you aren’t stuck redeeming a bajillion Delta SkyMiles to fly on LATAM since LATAM still partners with Alaska Mileage Plan and British Airways Executive Club.
Alaska MileagePlan still offers the best deal by far for flying on LATAM since they charge just 45K miles one-way from the US to South America in business class and they allow a stopover on a one-way award. I believe that Alaska will still only allow you to mix at maximum one partner airline and Alaska-operated legs witin the US, so you won’t be able to fly domestically on AA to a LATAM gateway on a single Alaska award, but you could fly domestically on Alaska to reach one so long as the Alaska leg is available as a saver award.
This Alaska Mileage Plan sweet spot is the one we leveraged for our trip to South America, flying LATAM from Los Angeles to Santiago on the ~10.5hr nonstop flight and then continuing on to Buenos Aires after a stopover in Santiago.
The problem of course is that Alaska miles are harder to come by than many other types of miles since they do not partner with any of the major transferable currencies. However, it is worth keeping in mind that British Airways still partners with LATAM as well. British Airways charges by the segment, so they won’t be a great option for connecting itineraries. And given the distance-based award chart, long flights are quite a bit more expensive than via Alaska. For instance, British Airways would have charged 92,750 miles for the nonstop from Los Angeles to Santiago, whereas Alaska charged just 45K for that flight, the stopover, and the continuation to Buenos Aires. However, keep in mind that there are frequent transfer bonuses of 30-40% to the Avios ecosystem. With a 30% transfer bonus, that’s about 72K points transferred. If you catch a 40% transfer bonus, it would be just over 66K points transferred to British Airways Avios. Those prices are still significantly higher than Alaska’s prices, but they are simultaneously significantly lower than what Delta would charge for the same awards.
If you’re East Coast-based, the flight from Miami will be more attractive since British Airways charges 77,250 Avios from Miami to Santiago, whether you’re on the non-stop or the itinerary that stops in Lima (which is only notable because British Airways usually prices connecting itineraries separately, but I think since this is a single flight number it is charging the same price as the nonstop.
If you caught a 30% transfer bonus, that flight would be bookable with 60K transferred points, which might be a reasonable enough option if you don’t have the Alaska miles to book it for 45K miles in business class. And keep in mind that it’s still 4 or 5 times less than what Delta would charge for that same nonstop.
And the bottom line is that the LATAM on-board experience was pretty nice. There is no privacy and window seats don’t have aisle access, but the seats are spacious and comfortable, the wide ottoman means no narrow footwell, and both on-board service and catering were surprisingly good. I’d totally fly LATAM again to South America.
Of course, the most exciting part of booking via Alaska Mileage Plan is the ability to add a free stopover. For instance, you could fly from Miami to Santiago, stop over, and then continue on to the southern reaches of Patagonia for no additional miles.
The other thing to keep in mind with LATAM is that Alaska miles can be extremely valuable for LATAM itineraries that connect South American cities since LATAM has so many routes and cash flights within South America can be surprisingly expensive. Being able to take advantage of a free stopover on a one-way within South America can be huge. Pricing and routing can also raise an eyebrow from time to time.
Aerolineas Argentinas is a SkyTeam airline
When we looked at flights from Buenos Aires to Iguazu Falls, one of the best flight options was on Aerolineas Argentinas. Since Aerolineas Argentinas is a SkyTeam partner, we knew that meant we could use Air France / KLM Flying Blue miles. Flying Blue charges 10K miles per passenger on that route, which wouldn’t have been a great deal, but when the 100% transfer bonus from Bilt to Flying Blue hit, we realized that 5K Bilt points per passenger made sense.
Oddly, other SkyTeam airlines do not seem to have access to Aerolineas Argentinas flights. For example, flights we found via Air France’s website for 10K miles per passenger did not show up via Delta or Virgin Atlantic or AeroMexico. Still, it’s worth keeping in mind that Air France does show Aerolineas Argentinas flights given that they have a decent amount of reach across Argeninta, Brazil, and some parts of South America and the Caribbean. See a full list of destinations at Wikipedia.
Gol (Brazil) partners with Air France / KLM (?), American Airlines, Avianca, Air Canada Aeroplan
Four of us flew Brazilian carrier Gol from Igauzu Falls (IGU, the airport on the Brazilian side) to Sao Paulo on our way home from the Party of 5 challenge. The interesting thing here is that not only does Gol serve a wide range of airports in Brazil (and even a couple in the US and a number of other places in South America), but they have a bunch of airline partnerships that I either hadn’t known about or hadn’t remembered. Find a list of destinations on their Wikipedia page.
On the way home from our trip, Greg, Carrie, Stephen and I flew Gol from Iguazu Falls (IGU) to Sao Paulo to Miami and onward to Philadelphia and Albany. I flew American Airlines flagship first from Sao Paulo to Miami and then business to Philadelphia followed by a short all-economy-class leg to Albany.
I personally didn’t realize that Gol partners with American Airlines until after I had already booked a ticket home from Sao Paulo, Brazil using American Airlines miles. I surely could have booked my ticket starting at Iguazu Falls (IGU). Instead, I booked the leg from Iguazu Falls to Sao Paulo separately using 7,500 American Airlines miles. At the time, I was pleasantly surprised to use American Airlines miles for that flight because that was a pretty good deal compared to cash prices.
However, in hindsight I found that Gol also has other partnerships I had missed, so I had quite a few options. In fact, only when I began to write this post did I use Point.me and realize that I had far more options for booking Gol than I had known.
The best price for that short leg from Igauzu Falls (IGU) to Sao Paulo would have been via Avianca LifeMiles at 6K miles one-way, though with the $25 partner booking fee it would be debatable as to how much better a deal that would have been vs booking with 7,500 American Airlines miles.
Yet another option that I never knew to explore during the challenge would have been using Air Canada Aeroplan. That short hop from Igauzu Falls to Sao Paulo would have been 10,000 miles one-way, but I think the key reason to consider Aeroplan in this region would be to take advantage of a stopover on a one-way award for 5,000 additional miles. Within South America, Air Canada Aeroplan charges 10K miles in economy class for itineraries covering up to 1,600 miles flown or 20,000 miles for itineraries covering more than 1,600 miles flown. That leg from Igauzu Falls to Sao Paulo covered just over 500 miles, which would have meant it would be possible to stopover and continue to another city within about a thousand miles for another 5K Aeroplan points. That may not work out to be better than American Airlines unless you’re flying internationally, but it is a good option to know.
Qatar Airways also partners with Gol. The same flight from Igauzu Falls to Sao Paulo would have cost 15,000 Avios, which isn’t much of a deal, but perhaps there are scenarios where Avios could come in handy for travel on Gol. Update: I had based this part on results from Point.me, but I think it was inaccurate. Qatar does not appear to partner with Gol.
What I find perhaps most fascinating is that Gol is branded together with Air France / KLM. See the logo hanging at the front of the cabin:
And yet you apparently can not book these Gol flights from Iguazu Falls to Sao Paulo with Air France / KLM Flying Blue miles.
I searched a number of dates via Flying Blue that were available to Air Canada and Avianca with no luck (and to both GRU and CGH since Gol serves both from IGU). I didn’t run exhaustive searches between other Brazilian airports via Flying Blue — perhaps you can indeed book some routes with Flying Blue miles (I would expect it to be possible at least sometimes).
Azul partners with Air Canada Aeroplan and United MileagePlus
Another Brazilian airline with a wide reach within Brazil that also serves a couple of US routes is Azul. While I haven’t ever flown Azul, this is worth keeping in mind for your South America award tickets since Azul partners with both Air Canada Aeroplan and United MileagePlus. Again, this would have given us yet another potential option for a stopover had we incorporated Air Canada Aeroplan miles in our South America strategy (though the trip was pretty packed as-is and I’m not sure we’d have had the time to properly leverage a stopover on this trip).
In fact, between Azul and Gol, award within South America should be pretty easy to snag via Air Canada Aeroplan since they both seem to serve a decent range of places. United could certainly present another option, though without the stopover.
Copa partners with Air France / KLM Flying Blue
Star Alliance Airline Copa is one that I closely associated with United and Star Alliance since United long owned a controlling steak in Copa and the Copa logo is very reminiscent of the old Continental Airlines logo. However, a couple of years ago, a friend’s need to fly between Brazil and the United States led me to run a couple of award searches at Point.me that reminded me that Copa partners with Air France / KLM Flying Blue.
Copa does offer some routes with lie-flat business class, so they are an option to keep in mind. This example flight is not in a flat bed product.
Still, it could be worth keeping your eye on this option, particularly because Air France appears to have access to flights you can’t book with other miles. For instance, that Copa flight above is not available to United, Air Canada, or other Star Alliance partners. It’s worth searching Air France or using a product like Point.me, Award Logic, or Roame.Travel to find options like that one.
Bottom line
South America doesn’t get a lot of love in the miles-and-points community in part because there aren’t many aspirational airline products flying to/from South America. The Party of 5 challenge was my first time in South America since spending about 9 months in Ecuador about 15 years ago (during that time I also traveled to and within Peru and Colombia). I had very much missed it. Despite our mishap in Santiago, which could have happened in a lot of major cities, I was impressed with the brief glimpses I got of both Santiago and Buenos Aires. I’ve always wanted to go and I had a great trip — so good, in fact, that I’m looking to rebook my trip to Europe this weekend in part because my flight to Europe is currently booked with Alaska miles but I want to keep my Alaska miles for a future South America trip. If and when I make that trip happen, I’ll certainly keep in mind all the ways I could bounce around to multiple destinations with South America for a very reasonable number of miles.
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@Nick Reyes
I think it would be a great idea for a post listing all (non-alliance) airline partnerships.
Would be a great add to the resource section!
LATAM usa-s America redemptions are very close in cost on Avios vs SkyMiles, depending on the domestic DL leg. Not every BA phone agent knows how to make a LATAM booking so huca. Obviously book via AS if you have the points. AM used to partner with AV but i no longer seems to be the case, at least online.
Per Flyertalk, until just recently, Alaska required a call to book LATAM, Now well confirmed you can book on the site (and its great, free stopover!). Supposedly Avios can be booked as well w LATAM but very few DPs. South America and Africa are the Wild West and I was hoping the latest FM Challenge would hit this area hard, but they hinged off that awesome (and expired) sweet spot to Tokyo. Just goes to show the game is always changing….even Nick cant keep up! That was my fav part of the latest challenge…..no one can keep up w Nick!
Really glad to see this coverage! Looking at a trip to Machu Picchu in a year or two and this gives some ideas on points to stock up on in the meantime.
With Alaska miles being hard to come by I’d love to hear more about how you accumulated enough for the LATAM flights for all 5 of you. Bountiful Boatloads of Marriott points?
Greg has had them for years I think – from old travel packages and the days when you could open several of their cards at once. These days, it would be a bit of a slog for multiple passengers.
This is great! I’m from Brazil and fly my family of 4 there every year, including a domestic Brazilian flight. So far I’ve used MileagePlus to fly United+Azul and Aeroplan to fly United+GOL/Azul. I’m in Houston, so United is the only carrier with a direct flight there. Curious how these options compare to the US carriers. What would be the best options considering all carriers?
Thanks for giving S.A. And Brazil some love. I am running all these options now to fly my mom from GRU to with NYC or BOS, who refuses a connection. If I could easily come by Alaska Miles keep finding quite a few 45k J on Latam direct to BOS.
Yesterday I booked a flight from IPC to SCL to MIA in business class. Both legs had award availability but they wouldn’t marry (stopover in SCL). I called in to Alaska Airlines and they said they were looking for errors like this. Within hours I was booked on the above biz class flights for 35K in total. I couldn’t have done this without your Party of 5 blog contest. Thanks.
We used to fly our family to brazil every year (inlaws live there) prior to covid. We did a lot of AA flights via BA miles. Now they are much harder to find, but LATAM sometimes popup with BA miles but its either full availability or none. Seems very glitchy.
Long story short, don’t try to remember all the airline partners, just use point.me to search for award space and see which airline partners are available on each route.
Some other great destinations to visit in South America are: Galápagos Islands (GPS) in Ecuador, Manchu Picchu / Cuzco (CUZ) in Peru, and Salar De Ayuni salt flats (UYU) in Bolivia.
When I flew from Colombia to Peru it also surprised me how expensive the flights are. I guess South Americans don’t travel among each other that often, so there’s not the volume to make things cheaper, unlike Europeans.
Way to get everyone thinking of South America! Europe is gonna be wildly crowded this summer, so it’s great to have you outline all these great (inexpensive) places, thanks Nick!
I believe the British Airways/ LATAM option no longer exists but you can use Iberia miles on most routes (just not where they directly compete), I haven’t tried for a while so this may be incorrect.
See the screenshot in the post of the LATAM flights available via British Airways for photo evidence that it still exists 😀
Clearly i am wrong then unless you have been doctoring it! Perhaps you can’t earn BA avios on a LATAM paid flight but you can earn Iberia avios? Also worth noting that Iberia often has different avios/ surcharge rates as BA and also different peak/ off-peak dates.
When Delta removed its award chart several years ago, I immediately booked one way flight in business class from Ushuaia to USA for only 62,500 SkyMiles. I flew Aerolineas Argentinas for the USH-EZE route and Delta for the EZE-ATL route.
Of course, I was in Ushuaia for my Antarctica trip. I am just wondering if we still can find an award flight to/from Ushuaia nowadays. I haven’t thought of using Air France until I saw this post.
Another option I didn’t look into is Etihad. I know they have some code shares with Aerolineas Argentinas, but I’m not sure if you can book awards with Etihad miles.