Open letter to Lufthansa
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Dear Lufthansa,
I often fly over the Atlantic and then connect to one of your intra-European flights from Frankfurt. Whenever I check in, nearly 24 hours before that short flight is to take off, you always give me a craptacular seat. Then you tell me it can’t be changed until I get to Frankfurt.
Typically you assign me to the last row, at the window, right side. That is, it’s called a window seat, but as in this last instance, sitting in 24F on a 737, there was not even a window there, just a wall.
Since I’m coming from another continent, I’m checking in early, when there’s virtually no one else checked in to that flight. Your airline doesn’t provide advanced seat assignments for short trips, so I can’t pick a seat beforehand. Star Alliance Gold status obviously doesn’t help. And it’s not just me: You seem to put all the people connecting from long-haul flights into the back of the bus. The people around me were connecting from Detroit, Chicago, Singapore, or Bangkok. In other words, they checked in a long time ago. Meanwhile, the middle of the plane was nearly empty.
So why do you so consistently and predictably give such lousy seats to connecting passengers?
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October 10th, 2006 at 7:38 am |
I’ve noticed the same on Lufthansa myself, but I usually get the front of the bus BUT I prefer aisles and they seem to love to stick me in windows.
ANA has been a similar offender in coach even at time of check in at Narita for me as a Star Gold.
October 10th, 2006 at 12:48 pm |
I fly Lufthansa all the time connecting in either Frankfurt or Munich and have never noticed this. I almost always get the seat I selected on booking.
October 10th, 2006 at 6:29 pm |
This happens to me too when I fly from the US to Europe. Coming back from Europe to the US, never a problem.
How does the other anonymous commenter get a seat selected on booking? There are no seats to select for short flights within Europe?
October 13th, 2006 at 7:56 am |
This has happened to me each time I’ve connected in Frankfurt as well, and is obnoxious! However, it has also happened with SAS, who claimed that other stations (even within Scandinavia) cannot issue seats and that any seat printed on your boarding card (which you have to hand-in to fly intercontinental from CPH, even if connecting from another SAS flight) is merely for show…
October 15th, 2006 at 7:27 am |
THAT IS SO TRUE! I used to fly Lufthansa back in ‘03, now I just fly KLM/NWA… it’s easy to book your seats when your a member.
April 18th, 2007 at 8:32 pm |
So weird, I fly every other week, and I only get bad seats about 16%, maybe you are just very unlucky.
March 16th, 2008 at 9:29 am |
[…] Dave S. writes in: I read your “open letter” to Lufthansa with some interest. I’m also frustrated with Lufthansa, but for slightly […]