Aerolineas Argentinas Es Una Porquería

Before climbing on my soapbox, I should apologize for the lack of posts over the past few weeks. Between moving twice in one week, hosting parental visitors and traveling to Patagonia and Tierra Del Fuego, things have been a tad hectic.

Now I'm back in Buenos Aires and ready to resume my social commentary (aka endless complaining). Normally I'd stay away from topics like airlines. Who doesn't hate them? Incompetence is par for the course, right?

Well, I'm willing to make an exception in this case. Aerolineas Argentinas has taken incompetence to new levels.



In case you're not familiar, Aerolineas Argentinas is basically the national airline in Argentina. Although the federal government currently only owns 5% of the company, Aerolineas Argentinas apparently remains steadfast in its commitment to bureaucratic incompetence. For those interested, Wikipedia has a surprisingly thorough history, including details of the airline's privatization and corruption-laden buyout, followed by years of mismanagement and a near-collapse in 2001-02.

For my part, I've assembled a laundry list of problems, difficulties and negative attributes. Keep in mind that I only used Aerolineas Argentinas for one flight. I shudder to think how long this list could be if I was a more frequent traveler.

- Reservations can be made online, but purchases can not. Actually paying for tickets requires going to a local Aerolineas office or calling them up to pay by phone.

- Paying by phone does not actually complete the transaction; processing the payment takes several more days. The final confirmation finally arrives via e-mail days later.

- Aerolineas has two-tier pricing, with one set of rates for Argentinian residents and another for everyone else. People who live in Argentina but do not have a DNI do not qualify for the resident rate.

- Only a certain number of non-resident seats are available for each flight, despite the fact that non-residents pay significantly more just to get on the plane.

- Confirming your flight online on the scheduled travel day is impossible. The "flight reconfirmation" option requires submitting your information and waiting for an e-mail response. These requests are only accepted up to 24 hours before the flight. The "departures and arrivals" option only allows flight status to be checked after the scheduled departure/arrival time.

- Carry-on bags are limited to 10 kg, meaning that almost any bag needs to be checked. Not surprisingly, the enforcement of this rule appears to be totally subjective.

- Airport monitors for Aerolineas continue to say "En Hora" (On Time) for flights that are delayed, even 30-40 minutes after their scheduled arrival/departure time.

You get the idea. On the plus side, I can say that for some reason my seat had an unusually large amount of legroom. It was a nice surprise after all the hassles just to get a ticket and get on the plane.