And so it begins with the horrendous flights

[WinniWoman]

So I get an email today from Lufthansa stating they have to change our seats on the return flight from Munich to Boston. They shoved me into a middle seat and put my husband in another aisle seat. With my back I cannot be in a middle seat for 7 1/2 hours! This is basic economy!

So I go online to change the seat - and there are more aisle seats available up towards the front or not too far back also-so I don't see how they can say they gave us the next best seats-and they want to charge us more money to change the sets! $94 EACH! Are you kidding me? Why should we have to pay more money to change seats we selected them so long ago and THEY changed them on us for whatever crazy reason?

On top of this I just realized the travel agent put me in a middle seat on the flight from Munich to Catania! I am beside myself. Really. I told her from the beginning we wanted aisle seats as much in the front of the plane as possible. (I told her we needed wheel chair and all that because of my bad back I cannot run through airports.)

No one at the airline to talk to. Here we go with the phone numbers again! Can't find a phone number to call! Nor do they give you one in the email. I am sending an email to my travel agent. I honestly never felt so upset about taking a trip in my life. I really am sorry I booked it. I am not looking forward to this. but I don't want to risk losing a good chunk of our money by cancelling it. I should have cancelled before making the final deposit in July. That's what my gut told me. I would have only lost the travel insurance money.

But I really tried to want to be excited about going.

I was considering upgrading to premium economy on the way there, but now I feel I don't want to give this airline one single red cent more for this crap they put people through..

 

[Patri]

Is your husband as upset with all the trip problems as you are? I fear you are not going to enjoy it at all. Will he?

 

[WinniWoman]

Is your husband as upset with all the trip problems as you are? I fear you are not going to enjoy it at all. Will he?

He gets upset when I get upset. LOL!

We both will enjoy the tour I am sure. Its the damn flights. I don't have the stamina or the patience for this stuff. When you have a constant, subtle pain it makes you irritable.

 

[susieq]

On top of this I just realized the travel agent put me in a middle seat on the flight from Munich to Catania! I am beside myself. Really. I told her from the beginning we wanted aisle seats as much in the front of the plane as possible. (I told her we needed wheel chair and all that because of my bad back I cannot run through airports.)

No one at the airline to talk to. Here we go with the phone numbers again! Can't find a phone number to call! Nor do they give you one in the email. I am sending an email to my travel agent. I honestly never felt so upset about taking a trip in my life.

I was going to suggest that you call your travel agent - let them make it right. Then I saw that you are emailing them.............. Best of luck - this is NOT customer service!!!

 

[WinniWoman]

Well she wasn't in and I found a phone number someone gave me in a previous post. Took me over an hour, but the rep got us two aisle seats two rows closer than the original. No charge he said because we paid in advance for seat selection! Exactly what I was saying! We PAID to pick our seats back in April!

If you didn't speak to someone and didn't know any better you would have just used the app and picked new seats and paid the money!

And also he reinstated the aisle seats we had on the connecting flight from Munich to Catania. (Lufthansa never even sent me an email about that change, but I saw it online when dealing with the other one! I thought my TA made the mistake. But no- Lufthansa changed the seats on that flight as well).

Totally insane. The rep was very nice and he put me on hold like a hundred times. He claims I will get emails regarding the corrections. And before we hung up he thanked me specifically for having to wait on the phone for over an hour.

Still on the fence about premium economy. I hate giving these airlines any more money with all their bs.

 

[rapmarks]

A cautionary tale, you can’t count on anyone but yourself

 

[PrairieGirl]

Don't fret about not having a phone number to reach Lufthansa. If your TA booked the flights, it is quite likely that they wouldn't talk with you about changing your seats even if you could reach them by phone.

This appears to be standard for ALL airlines, they will only deal with the party who booked the trip. Used a travel agent? Talk to them for any changes. Booked online through Expedia? Talk to them for any changes. Booked with credit card points through their program? Talk to them......etc.

On a side note - sometimes when seats are changed, it is due to a change in aircraft for the scheduled flight. This has happened to us several times when booking flights quite far ahead of time. Whatever algorithm the computer uses to select the new seats is beyond me, and it can get really dicey if the class you are travelling in (for example Premium Economy) has less seats in it on the new aircraft.

Were there any other changes to the flight? There seems to be some good pricing available on flights to Europe right now. Maybe this can be a silver lining and your TA can find you a better flight and use the change to get you out of this one without penalty.

 

[PrairieGirl]

I see that while I was typing my response that you DID get through to Lufthansa and they DID speak with you and even resolved your issue. YAY! That alone makes me want to fly with them in the future.

 

[WinniWoman]

A cautionary tale, you can’t count on anyone but yourself

Yes. Why I jumped on it this morning.

 

[WinniWoman]

Don't fret about not having a phone number to reach Lufthansa. If your TA booked the flights, it is quite likely that they wouldn't talk with you about changing your seats even if you could reach them by phone.

This appears to be standard for ALL airlines, they will only deal with the party who booked the trip. Used a travel agent? Talk to them for any changes. Booked online through Expedia? Talk to them for any changes. Booked with credit card points through their program? Talk to them......etc.

On a side note - sometimes when seats are changed, it is due to a change in aircraft for the scheduled flight. This has happened to us several times when booking flights quite far ahead of time. Whatever algorithm the computer uses to select the new seats is beyond me, and it can get really dicey if the class you are travelling in (for example Premium Economy) has less seats in it on the new aircraft.

Were there any other changes to the flight? There seems to be some good pricing available on flights to Europe right now. Maybe this can be a silver lining and your TA can find you a better flight and use the change to get you out of this one without penalty.

I actually had paid to pick our seats and for refundable tickets back in April.

I did ask the TA see if she could find better flights but I know from checking a little myself there really aren’t for various reasons.

As for the premium economy seats- that’s one reason I hesitate to upgrade. You would think you pay all that money and they wouldn’t be able to change the seats due to them being two together and less of them, but as you said if they change aircraft then you are out of luck. And at that point where do they seat you as everyone else has already booked their seats?

The rep told me our connecting flight back home on the return from Munich is leaving 15 minutes earlier but that doesn’t show in line. Of course, since we only had a one hour and 15 minute connection and now down to only one hour! Just great! How come the connecting flights are never late with departure?!

 

[CalGalTraveler]

Good for you @WinniWoman for catching this error and having the persistence to get the seats you paid for. Many people would either not notice until they were on the flight in a middle seat or wouldn't remember what they bought so would pay for upgrade. What a hassle!

 

[WinniWoman]

Good for you @WinniWoman for catching this error and having the persistence to get the seats you paid for. Many people would either not notice until they were on the flight in a middle seat or wouldn't remember what they bought so would pay for upgrade. What a hassle!

My TA’s fee was $200 when she originally booked the flights.

 

[mbh]

My personal opinion is to go for the premium economy if it is in your price range and you can get aisle seats. You mentioned back problems and it is a long flight, so to me it would be worth the splurge. You deserve some extra comfort on your trip! All airlines cause their customers aggravation.

 

[CalGalTraveler]

My TA’s fee was $200 when she originally booked the flights.

I am disappointed your TA didn't catch this and fix. This is the reason I rarely use TAs.

I also agree on Premium Econ if it is reasonably priced. Not important for your connector flight. But your flight from NY is much shorter than ours from Calif. I only book PE because it is a 12 - 14 hour flight.

 

[elaine]

I was considering upgrading to premium economy on the way there, but now I feel I don't want to give this airline one single red cent more for this crap they put people through..

If you want to upgrade, do it. Don't let being "mad" at the airlines affect what you would otherwise do.

 

[PigsDad]

With a bad back, I would absolutely go for the premium economy. You don't want to start out your vacation with back problems that you could have prevented. You also said this is your last time ever taking a flight, so why not splurge? It's not like you are going to have much in the way of travel expenses in the future.

Kurt

 

[WinniWoman]

Thanks everyone! So the TA did respond to my email and said she would have handled everything but I beat her to it! lol!

She said she was late coming in to the office because she had to take her dog to the vet. Totally understandable, of course.

So upon discussing everything with my husband we decided to do the Premium seat upgrade. At first the TA was thinking she’d have to cancel and rebook, but I told her no- the app and online you can just upgrade. She proceeded to do it but got an error message so she was going to call Lufthansa and then confirm all with me. I see the charge went through in my credit card.

This expensive trip is actually lowering my credit score! lol!

I had mentioned to her back when we booked the flights in April that maybe we would get a better deal closer to the travel date on premium economy - maybe even at the gate- and she said “ good luck with that!”. Now today she’s telling me what a good deal it is and the tickets will still be refundable according to the fine print based on our original paid for tickets.

She is right in that back in April booking refundable premium economy tickets was much more expensive than doing it this way!

I guess I knew what I didn’t know! Ha! Ha!

So after all that work and aggravation this morning reinstating our aisle seats, now we are $1680 more in the hole for premium economy instead! How crazy am I?

This is just for the long haul flights Boston to Munich and Munich to Boston. The short ones from Munich to Catania and Naples to Munich will remain aisle seats.

As for better flights she keeps saying that the only other flights involve changing planes twice. Not sure how she figures that one, but I think maybe she’s just trying to keep me in one airline.

 

[Talent312]

IMHO, premium economy is the way to go on any long-distance flight.
DW has told me that she'd like business class for any transatlantic leg, regardless of cost.

 

[PigsDad]

So after all that work and aggravation this morning reinstating our aisle seats, now we are $1680 more in the hole for premium economy instead! How crazy am I?

This is just for the long haul flights Boston to Munich and Munich to Boston. The short ones from Munich to Catania and Naples to Munich will remain aisle seats.

That's a really good price, at only about $400/per person/per segment. Congrats!

Kurt

 

[CalGalTraveler]

I agree with @PigsDad. $400 per segment is a great price and I would have jumped on that. It's not worth ruining your expensive vacation because your back is out of whack or you are so tired that you miss the first few days.

 

[WinniWoman]

Just waiting for seat assignments now. TA said the airline is going refund the previous seat selection fees and then we have to purchase seat selection for premium economy.

Seems ridiculous. Why not just keep the fee and let us pick the seats? I wonder if the fees are more for selecting Premium seats? Why is everything so hard? Then again, if they are all just 2 together why pick seats at all and save the fee?

I don’t get it.

 

[CalGalTraveler]

Call me skeptical but I think the runaround is so your TA can earn a higher commission.

 

[WinniWoman]

IMHO, premium economy is the way to go on any long-distance flight.
DW has told me that she'd like business class for any transatlantic leg, regardless of cost.

Wow! Business class is way crazy money, but I do like that you can lie down.

We need to buy some stuff for this trip and money is flying out. Thankfully we could borrow the suitcases.

Today we went out to get better sneakers. Our son suggested the Sketchers outlet store about 25 minutes from here. I immediately found a pair of trail/ walking slip ons with memory foam. I usually need a 9 wide but they didn’t have the size so I got 9.5.

Surprise at the cash register. It had been marked down to $65 from $75 but rang up $35! Yay!

Unfortunately hubby’s wrang up $90 as shown on the box. He wears a 9.5 wide and he did have more choices, but was looking for more tread like the ones I bought. We figured with all those cobblestone streets plus the ruins and Mt Etna we needed a sneaker that could do it all .

When I tell you we have never purchased shoes or sneakers that cost that much- seriously. We are Walmart shoppers. lol!

But again- for this trip hopefully his feet will thank him!

 

[WinniWoman]

Call me skeptical but I think the runaround is so your TA can earn a higher commission.

Gosh. hope not!

 

[Talent312]

We need to buy some stuff for this trip and money is flying out. Thankfully we could borrow the suitcases.... We are Walmart shoppers. lol!

Is this a women's thing...
DW: "We're going on a trip, so we have to go shopping!"
Me: "I bet that you have what you need in the closet."
-------------------------
A guy goes to Walmart. But he can't find what he wants.
He goes home, takes a shower and changes out of his PJ's.
So he can go to Target.