Confirmed: KLM introduces Economy Comfort short-haul

Old Jan 2, 2013, 12:45 pm
  #256  
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Originally Posted by Gajan
KL 1009 (B739) tomorrow:

Flight seems full, as all regular Economy seats are taken. Buy up to EBC is offered for € 70 (two seats available, EBC is only until row 3). There are currently 20 EC seats & 8 extra-legroom seats available.

Interesting to see what the actual situation is.
My mother informed me that there were many people seated in the EC zone that would not appear to be frequent travellers (young people, children etc).
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Old Jan 2, 2013, 1:37 pm
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Originally Posted by Gajan
My mother informed me that there were many people seated in the EC zone that would not appear to be frequent travellers (young people, children etc).
Exactly my experience. Why it always are young people/children/seniors, I don't know.
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Old Jan 2, 2013, 2:01 pm
  #258  
 
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flying GVA-AMS on Sat - so now T-72 and therefore seeing if I can move us a bit to the front, which indeed is possible for our kids (no status) and my wife (plat) but I cannot get myself out of the EER.
Just like on the flight AMS-GVA a few weeks ago, I called the reservations line and they did it without a problem but it is so annoying that you have to keep an eye on this at T-72 and then the f... system wants to please me out of my own preference.
Let's keep reporting - perhaps they will change (back) - nagh - that won't happen with KLM..
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Old Jan 2, 2013, 4:05 pm
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We seem to have two active threads about this Economy Comfort lark, both now containing very similar posts... I wonder if it would be helpful to either merge them, or alternatively have a third thread where people report their experiences?

Fortunately most of my flights are Cityhopper flights which don't have Economy Comfort seats (and I sincerely hope it will stay that way). However, out of my eight KLM flights since 1 December three were in 737s, and what I saw on those three flights largely matches what others have observed...

HAM-AMS 6 December - every seat taken in the back, lots of random people sitting in EC, nobody in the emergency exit rows until two of us (yes, I was one of them!) got upgraded. Don't know why they picked me - whether it was because of my status (Gold), or because I was sitting in the row behind, or a bit of both

MAN-AMS 27 December - the flight wasn't full, EC was more or less empty, every seat was taken at the back. One thing I noticed is that boarding seemed to take an awful long time... in the past people would have peeled off into rows near the front, this time everybody was heading for rows 16 onwards, and it all got very congested and very chaotic, especially towards the end of the boarding process when the overhead bins were getting full and people were heading back to the front to stow their luggage above the empty EC rows.

AMS-CPH 28 December - something strange happened here. When I tried to check us in everything from row 9 onwards was showing as normal (i.e., non-EC) seats... yet when I tried to move us there the system wouldn't let me. When we boarded all those seats were indeed normal seats... so I wonder if perhaps they've realised already that they vastly overestimated the demand for EC seats??

This was a 737-800 with twelve emergency exit seats rather than six, and only two of them were taken. Just before engine start the purser came up to us and invited us to move into the emergency exit row, but not until after take-off, on Captain's instructions apparently. Surely the time when it's most important to have people in the emergency exit rows are the two critical phases of flight, i.e., take-off and landing? And surely the Captain, of all people, should realise this?

The fact that on our last flight most of the EC section had been downgraded to ordinary Economy gives me some hope that maybe KLM are starting to wake up to the stupidity of it all, and are starting to make some changes.
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Old Jan 2, 2013, 4:45 pm
  #260  
 
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Confirmed: KLM introduces Economy Comfort short-haul

So... the last row(s) of EC seats are then again labeled as normal seats and free, but with the extra legroom? Utter stupidity.
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Old Jan 3, 2013, 10:09 pm
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Does anybody know if all 737 are reconfigured?

I would also really like to know if row 1 on 737 now has more legroom than before, it was not so good previously. If the seats behind got more room they should have moved these seats back as well. Any reports on this?
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Old Jan 4, 2013, 1:50 am
  #262  
 
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Originally Posted by KLflyerRalph
So... the last row(s) of EC seats are then again labeled as normal seats and free, but with the extra legroom? Utter stupidity.
Is this a confirmed change, or just another of the many bugs on the KL website? If the former, I might consider booking KL again in February (all of my usual business travel in January has already been booked away from KL and onto Star Alliance carriers).
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Old Jan 4, 2013, 3:01 am
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Originally Posted by rwSEA
Is this a confirmed change, or just another of the many bugs on the KL website? If the former, I might consider booking KL again in February (all of my usual business travel in January has already been booked away from KL and onto Star Alliance carriers).
The EC-coloured headrest covers stopped at Row 9 on my last flight (CPH-AMS on 30 December).... so this can't have just been a website bug as it takes a human to change those covers.
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Old Jan 4, 2013, 4:14 am
  #264  
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Originally Posted by Aviatrix
The EC-coloured headrest covers stopped at Row 9 on my last flight (CPH-AMS on 30 December).... so this can't have just been a website bug as it takes a human to change those covers.
Every time I have checked in and gotten a seat in the first row of "normal" Y it has been defaulted to start at row 10, row 9 being the last of EC. Then when actually seated the orange EC covers have been swapped by blue from anything between 1 to 4 rows.

Lesson learned for E and E+ (bar plat) don't get your seat until the very last min, unless (as in my case) you are already defaulted seats somewhere in the plane at random and won't change at any cost (well except for whatever it may cost to get the EC seats)...
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Old Jan 6, 2013, 3:16 am
  #265  
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On the AMS-SVG of Wednesday last week, I was in EC as it was, for some reasons, free when I booked the tickets. It was as full as the plane, but clearly a mix of elite flyers and non-elite.
The flight was nearly full, as well as the EC section.
Concerning the seats themselves, I can not say the difference in leg-rooms compared to before, but there was clearly more reclined and a slightly better pitch.
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Old Jan 6, 2013, 3:28 am
  #266  
 
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Originally Posted by Cupart
Lesson learned for E and E+ (bar plat) don't get your seat until the very last min, unless (as in my case) you are already defaulted seats somewhere in the plane at random and won't change at any cost (well except for whatever it may cost to get the EC seats)...
Could you not change your seat later [online/kiosk at the airport]?
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Old Jan 6, 2013, 3:32 am
  #267  
 
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Confirmed: KLM introduces Economy Comfort short-haul

I tried, won't work.
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Old Jan 6, 2013, 4:00 am
  #268  
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Originally Posted by KLflyerRalph
I tried, won't work.
Once you have selected a seat, the seat map will not show the free EC seats.

I suppose in that case you could chose to cancel your OLCI, but there is no guarantee that you will get a desirable seat.
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Old Jan 7, 2013, 12:09 am
  #269  
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Originally Posted by jms_uk
Could you not change your seat later [online/kiosk at the airport]?
As said by others it's not an option. Besides, if it had been possible, I just adds insult to injury as it would involve more work to get desirable seats for Elites which non members get for free

Also, we're always two people flying together so could be very risky...
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Old Jan 7, 2013, 12:13 am
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when flying with our family of 5 I can usually select seats for our kids (non status) after T-72 in the front rows, but not for my wife or me, or just one of us (we are both plat) and then all available seats grey out. I called the elite reservations line a few times now and they could always get the last remaining person(s) a seat in the same rows as the rest of us. So perhaps better to call than to try fiddling online

Still - the system stinks and the whole concept too.

More work than before so more frustration.

If only LX would start to fly AMS-GVA vv...
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