lufthansa
 

We are flying round trip Chicago to Prague in April, what are coach seats like, food and are they charging for drinks ?

we've flown Lufthansa several times, SFO-ATH and were quite comfortable considering we were in economy. Drinks are free. They keep you hydrated throughout the journey with choices of water or juice every hour or so... pretty civilized.

I actually found the seats rather cramped and I'm not very tall. The inflight service was ok.

Free alcohol which I was told includes after dinner drinks. Leave the $5 bills at home.

We have flown Lufthansa many times. If you like coffee in the morning make sure you have it before you board the plane. They don't serve it until after breakfast...not with it. Otherwise it's the same as most other airlines. Nothing bad nothing special.

We actually found Lufthansa's coach seats to be pretty uncomfortable (not much padding) and cramped.

Food was all right and the flight crew was pretty nice.

But if you have any problems or if they've lost your luggage you don't want to have it happen with Lufthansa. They are not very good at handling lost luggage (mine was lost for 13 days heading to Europe and for 4 days leaving Europe). We give them really low marks in customer service.

We flew Lufthansa to Frankfurt in December. Seats in coach seemed unusually cramped. Very uncomfortable. No personal entertainment screen, unlike superior AirFrance. And worse yet, the only movie the showed was "Flicka"!!! Truly a flight from hell.

LH is one of the few "major international airlines" that do not have any personal video screens in coach for any of its planes.

AF/KLM have them on most, but not their 747s.

My luggage was delayed on my outbound flight and lost on my return flight. To be fair...there were 3 connections and I was changing from Air Canada to Lufthansa. I found the luggage department in Rome quite helpful. The bag was put on another flight and it arriveed 3 hours later.

We've flown them several times in the past 3 years and overall found them above average. Seats were neither better nor worse than others. Crews were what you'd expect from a German airline - efficient and professional (on two trips crew was outstanding, but we may have gotten exceptionally good crews). Food was better than average with a couple of choices and in sufficient quantities. Drinks were free and served before, during and after dinner (on transatlantic flights). Several trips throughout the cabin during flight with water, fruit and snacks. Have heard several complaints about the IFE with no individual screens etc, but since we sleep, read and listen to music it wasn't an overriding problem with us.

Maybe I just had a bad flight, but one of my worst flight experiences was on Lufthansa.

First, the airline double-booked seats and actually printed double boarding passes for the seats. Once on the plane, the "foreign" passengers(American, Asian, Arab) who were double-booked lost their seats and had to wait for everyone else to board and then were assigned where ever there was an empty seat (fortunately, I got one).

If you read any of my other posts, I am NOT someone who whines about Americans being treated badly by foreign companies. But in this case, that seemed to be what was happening.

The airline also apparently didn't follow the reserved meals, because they had given out all the "special" meals (vegetarian, kosher) to passengers who didn't reserve them. Then, the passengers who did reserve the meals were out of luck and had to starve the whole flight (I was sitting next to an Arab-looking couple who could not eat the regular meals for religious reasons; they were very unhappy with the airline giving away their reserved meals).

The flight attendants spent most of the time in the back of the plane smoking, and would nto respond to passenger requests.

When I left the plane, I notice that every single aisle had trash, meal trays turned up-side down on the seats, and so forth, left behind by angry customers. I don't condone that, because the flight crew doesn't care what you do to the plane - they just leave and it becomes the cleaning crew's problem (not fair to the cleaning crew).

It was a surreal experience.

I flew Lufthansa to Munich in 2005 and vowed never to fly with them again. Seats were ultra firm and cramped, and in-flight service was nearly non-existent. Our luggage was checked through to Bern and we experienced no problems with that. I'd happily pay a few extra dollars to fly a different airline.

Melissa

Ah, these replies are disheartening. We're flying Newark-Franfurt-Venice on Lufthansa in June. I will miss the personal screens as I do tend to spend a couple of hours watching something. Well, I will just hope for the best.

Lufthansa will get you there on time. Very efficient. But from the ticket agents to flight crew its a cold sterile experience.

>whines about Americans being treated badly by foreign companies. But in this case, that seemed to be what was happening.
This is totally unthinkable. It's more likely that people who had reserved first (or online) or with only electronic ticket or transferred from another (local) flight or whatever rational reason, were served first. It must have been a reason beyond your knowledge. They are very sensitve about treating their customers equally. (even if it's equally bad ;-)

We flew Newark-Frankfurt last fall and the only complaint I'd have is no personal tv screens.

There was more food/drinks given to us at our seats than we really needed plus they had water stations set up all over the plane that you could get up and help yourself to at any time.

The seats were comfortable. It's one of the few flights I've actually been able to fall asleep on.

logos -

I really do not jump to these conclusions lightly (really. :-) ). But in this case, that really seemed to be the case.

The airlines gave out two boarding passes for the same seats. On the airplane, there were a couple dozen of us with double-booked seats. The flight attendants selected who would get the seat and who had to stand around (on the plane, with people trying to squeeze by you) and wait to see what was left over after everyone else was seated.

Now, if this happened at the gate or when we were checking in (where the employees have access to a computer), then I can see what you are saying. They could determine who reserved first, who was a frequent flyer, etc.

But we were singled out on the plane. There is no way the flight attendants could tell which of us booked first, just by looking at us. And no, the first person to sit down didn't always get the seat. I saw an Asian couple removed from their seats, and they had to stand in the aisle like the rest of us so others could sit down.

Like I said, it could just be that I had the one bad flight in the airlines history (that's just the kind of luck I seem to have). But this incident was so bazarre that I never flew with them again.

Edited to add: the flight attendants didn't even ask our names. Somehow they just "knew" from looking at us who booked first? That was a neat trick.

Has anyone flown on one of Lufthansa's BAE 146-200 planes? That is what they use on their Germany to Naples route. I guess it's smaller than a 737?

Bae146 is a smaller 4-engine jet. Lufthansa seem to put 6-abreast in economy, while I know many airlines usually put only 5.

They sit about 90-100 passengers.

Do they have an OK record? I don't like small planes, although I guess this isn't all that small....

We flew Lufthansa just once -- Paris to Munich. We were put in first class because our original flight on US Airways was screwed up (usual case I might add).

If that was first class, I would hate to experience cattle class.

I don't want to start "profiling", but the members of the flight attendant crew had a few personality deficiencies in my view.

I agree the flight got us there. Too bad US Airways cannot let the Germans run the airline and retain the usually cordial US flight crews.

jag1jag1 - Yes, the Bae146/AvroRJ have excellent safety records. Can't think of any major accident. It has extremely good performance (lots of power, large wings for its size), so airlines have long used them for "difficult" airports like London City and various mountain airports in Colorado. It can land and takeoff at places many other planes cannot.

Hi,
We flew Lufthansa Oct. 2006 from Newark, NJ to Munich via Frankfurt. Very pleasant, uneventful experience. The food was typical airline fare (IMO) and drinks were pretty much offered the entire flight. We flew SAS on the return and I really didn't notice a difference as far as comfort (or lack of) service, etc. We did fly coach both ways.

Paul

Interesting about double booking of seats. I believe if I had my boarding pass in hand, and sat in the right seat first, then NO ONE would be able to get me to move.
Double booking is REALLY a sad, bad situation..but I'd like to think is doesn't happen very often.

The complaints written about Lufthansa could be written about any other airline.

I have to put Lufthansa at the bottom of the list of those airlines I have flown with. It's nice to have the personal video screens but I can live without and playing 40 year old Mickey Mouse cartoons instead of the advertised modern movie I can also cope with.

However, what I will not put with again is the number of times they changed the flight time of the plane. It would have been changed six times in the four months prior to the flight, generally only by an hour or so. The final straw was when I logged onto the Lufthansa site about 3 weeks before we left to find out that our 2 hour layover in Frankfurt had become a 24 hour lay over and I had to redo all the Paris/Vancouver flights in order to avoid the layover. On NONE of these occasions had Lufthansa notifed us. If I hadn't been checking the reservation website myself I wouldn't have known until we got to the airport.

Interesting I should see this thread....We are booked on Lufthansa in May heading to Italy with friends.I booked thru expedia, she thru the airline, tho more $$$$...In the past week, my tickets have been changed twice, tho hers have not. We are leaving from Bos/ Munich to Venice. She from NC to Mun to Venice. They will arrive in Venice 2 hrs before us..Same on the return flight from Pisa. She is still on the original flight and we are now leaving 2 hrs later which means a 4 hour layover in Munich. Do they bump passengers at will who do not book thru them? Seems that way...They will not explain this to me on the phone explaining that I did not book directly with them.

Halcyon, in relation to our flights kept getting changed, we were on a very cheap RTW deal so may be that had something to do with it, I don't know. However, they were booked direct with Lufthansa and not through an intermediary.

You will enjoy your trip. That is an order.

jag - we flew a LH BAE 146-200 two years ago from FIR - MUN. It was fine. It was comparable to a 737 and certainly better than an RJ. Because the wings are attached to the top of the fuselage, we had spectacular views of the Alps. BTW, we were served a hot meal - pretty simple but decent and more than I expected on such a short flight.

I wonder what the difference is between an "uncomfortable" seat and a "very firm" seat?

Don't you wonder what the flight attendants say about some of the people they have to "serve?"

I would agree about the lack of personal TV screens.

I do hope there aren't any board members sitting directly behind you who have decided that you are not allowed to recline the uncomfortable firm seat even though you paid for one that DOES recline.

I've often felt "uneasy" about booking flights and hotels with the discounters..ie, expedia, travelocity and others.,,though we have never done it. Many people do use them and do well..
AFter hearing the airline story above(about having her flight changed,.. when her friend who booked directly with the airline did not have this problem) , AND reading OFTEN about poor rooms in hotels etc...do you think it IS because reservations were not made directly with the airline or hotel.???
Of course the hotel or airline is NOT making as much money....and I guess it is understandable for them to do what they do sometimes. But as I said, a LOT of people never have a problem.

Just throwing out a question for a little input!
(this should probably be on another topic, or under "general information".

OMG, please tell me the smoking was a long time ago. You cannot smoke on Lufthansa can you?

No you cannot smoke on Lufthansa. Rhey have even decided that their lounges will now be non-smoking unless there is a separate room for people to smoke.

Now if that could just be aplied to Frankfurt airport that woudl be great

My flight on Lufthansa was in 2001, from Frankfurt to San Francisco. Supposedly, it was a non-smoking flight. Which is just one of the reasons I have not flown with them since.

I admit this could have just been the one bad flight in Lufthansa's entire history of great service. And that the problems could have happened with any other airline too. And that maybe the employees were wanting to strike or had some other beef with the airline? I just don't know.

Hi Dukey

Generally an "uncomfortable" seat is one that has needed replacement for awhile as the padding has probably collapsed. Whereas "firm" most likely has firm padding and that would have been much better than our uncomfortable, lumpy seats on Lufthansa's 747 last September.

I prefer flying Lufthansa over United mainly due to better cabin service. I find KLM service was inferior to Lufthansa until Air France took it over. As far as seat comfort, it depends on which plane you're flying on, an old 747 or the newer 777 or the airbus. Truthfully that is the case with any airline. On interesting observation I have is the comments I heard when German passengers fly on an American carrier for the very first time: Why are the flight attendants so old; they look like they are in pain or so cranky; they should really retire. Then I would tell them how they can't afford to retire with the United ghost retirement plan.

We have experienced a flight cancellation from Lufthansa due to lack of passengers in which case I negotiated a different city return departure & date (open jaw) on Lufthansa. We could hardly believe that they agreed to it though with many consultations and being put on hold a few times.

However, what I will not put with again is the number of times they changed the flight time of the plane. It would have been changed six times in the four months prior to the flight, generally only by an hour or so. The final straw was when I logged onto the Lufthansa site about 3 weeks before we left to find out that our 2 hour layover in Frankfurt had become a 24 hour lay over and I had to redo all the Paris/Vancouver flights in order to avoid the layover. On NONE of these occasions had Lufthansa notifed us. If I hadn't been checking the reservation website myself I wouldn't have known until we got to the airport. snip

We are booked with them in April, SFOto Venice. United is doing the flight as a partner but we also have had our seats changed 3 times so far and we booked in June of 06. We are wondering what the deal is we seem to be getting further back in the plane.

Lufthansa changed the gate AND the terminal we were flying from in Frankfurt. Because they had lost my luggage for 13 days we took our carryons with us (so that we wouldn't lose anything else). With that in mind we wound up climbing stairs, changing terminals, going through security again, and getting exhausted with it too. Unfortunately one bag did not have wheels on it and had to be carried so DH wound up with a strained groin. Our Lufthansa trip was not at all pleasant or convenient so we'll do our best to fly with another carrier.

In case you feel that we should have complained - we did time after time after time and repeatedly. So now I forewarn you be aware that Lufthansa is NOT the airline it once was and what happened to us could happen to you too!

So, I posted this question on the airline thread, but I'll put it here, too. We've decided to fly from SFO to Rome round-trip. United (one free ticket for 100,000 miles), Lufthansa (who I assumed would be the best and has the best times), or Air Canada (cheapest)? After reading the posts here, I'm wondering about Lufthansa, although we haven't had a bad experience with them. Who would you choose?