Confirmed: KLM introduces Economy Comfort short-haul

Old Mar 29, 2013, 5:53 am
  #346  
 
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To be introduces too on the Fokker 70's. Yhey will feature new style slim seats.
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Old Mar 29, 2013, 7:29 am
  #347  
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To clarify the above: KLM will retrofit their Fokker 70 fleet with new "Slim Style" seats. With this change they will also introduce the Economy Comfort section.

If I am not mistaken the seat pitch is currently the same throughout the whole cabin, right? So I suspect that this means that business class will also get an improved pitch..

Having said that, I suspect that KLM will not want to give up seats. So the normal economy seats will most probably see a reduced pitch..

Also the E190 will get an EC section. This will be achieved by "restructuring" the rows. Which kind of confirms that normal economy will see a reduction in pitch (Where else can the additional space come from...).
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Old Mar 29, 2013, 7:45 am
  #348  
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Originally Posted by Xandrios
To clarify the above: KLM will retrofit their Fokker 70 fleet with new "Slim Style" seats.
Yikes! The one nice thing about the F70s are the old seats, which have decent padding and are a lot more comfortable that the slim ones.

Johan
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Old Mar 30, 2013, 4:42 am
  #349  
 
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Originally Posted by Xandrios
To clarify the above: KLM will retrofit their Fokker 70 fleet with new "Slim Style" seats. With this change they will also introduce the Economy Comfort section.

If I am not mistaken the seat pitch is currently the same throughout the whole cabin, right? So I suspect that this means that business class will also get an improved pitch..

Having said that, I suspect that KLM will not want to give up seats. So the normal economy seats will most probably see a reduced pitch..

Also the E190 will get an EC section. This will be achieved by "restructuring" the rows. Which kind of confirms that normal economy will see a reduction in pitch (Where else can the additional space come from...).
Is any of this actually making money? There seems to be a huge investment, as lot of p!ssed off Frequent Flyers and no real return. In an age where people wear ridiculous "vests" to avoid baggage fees, where is the market for this premium seating?
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Old Mar 30, 2013, 6:02 am
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Confirmed: KLM introduces Economy Comfort short-haul

Most likely they were planning on introducing the lighter slim seats anyway to save on fuel. So monetizing seats as EC might be just an added financial benefit.
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Old Apr 3, 2013, 5:11 pm
  #351  
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No doubt KLM have been agog with yesterday's news from Air Samoa.
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Old Apr 4, 2013, 3:45 pm
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Originally Posted by irishguy28
No doubt KLM have been agog with yesterday's news from Air Samoa.
Actually, I would rather like that being introduced by KLM. ^
Less seriously, as a next step they will start serving burgers and fries in the lounges, to encourage weight gain among frequent fliers.

More on topic, today was the first time that when I booked a KL flight with EC on short haul I could select an EC seat, got row 6 on AMS-VIE... in all other previous instances I could not get anything in EC rows.
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Old Apr 7, 2013, 1:46 pm
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When I checked in online today (with difficulty, the Android app has been stroppy since the last update, not displaying seat maps, etc), I was offered a choice of 35 EC seats. I was already in the 36th, and thus the only one in EC 21 hours before departure.

Huge success, obviously. They must be making millions, what with economy pax fighting over these seats, prepared to pay any price in their desperation.

Johan

Last edited by johan rebel; Apr 7, 2013 at 2:07 pm
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Old Apr 7, 2013, 2:03 pm
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Originally Posted by johan rebel
When I checked in online today (with difficulty, the Android app has been stroppy since the last update, not displaying seat maps, etc), I was offered a choice of 35 EC seats. I was already in the 36th, and thus the only one in EC 21 hours before departure.

Johan
Don't worry - I'm sure it will be completely full tomorrow, probably with a bunch of split up families that will want you to change seats with them so that they can sit together.
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Old Apr 8, 2013, 12:54 am
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Originally Posted by rwSEA
Don't worry - I'm sure it will be completely full tomorrow, probably with a bunch of split up families that will want you to change seats with them so that they can sit together.
Still the only one in EC. They've got a couple of hours to start squeezing the families in, with a screaming 4year old in the middle seat next to me, no doubt.

Johan
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Old Apr 8, 2013, 6:35 am
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What was the outcome, Johan?

A kindergarten in EC and you kindly asked to sit in a middle seat so that you could watch over your two neighbours?
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Old Apr 8, 2013, 12:44 pm
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Originally Posted by Milkman
What was the outcome, Johan?

A kindergarten in EC and you kindly asked to sit in a middle seat so that you could watch over your two neighbours?
Nope, EC actually worked beautifully, at least from my perspective: KLM made no money, and I had to share 36 seats with one other elite pax (who did of course end up in the same row as I). After take-off I did notice that a little old lady had somehow snuck into a middle seat in the last row of EC. She was very inconspicuous, maybe the FAs never even saw her. As far as I could see, there was one pax in each of the EERs. Don't know if they were asked to move there prior to departure.

Priority boarding actually worked this time. I boarded as the seventh or eighth passenger. Of those ahead of me, two took a seat in EB (one of these was a deportee. Somewhat surprising, but it transpired that he was in the wrong seat), one sat in the same row as I, and the others were presumably unwilling to pony up money for the extra comfort I was enjoying, so they proceeded towards the back.

Johan
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Old Apr 8, 2013, 12:50 pm
  #358  
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I am still noticing weird seatmaps for EC. Especially in regards to the new retrofitted B737-800.

The old model with 30 rows has row 6-9 as EC configured. The retrofitted model has one extra row in front, and therefore I would expect row 1-10 to have the extra leg space.

However the new model with 31 rows allows to pick a seat free of charge from row 7. Only row 6 has been marked as EC, row 1-5 as EB. This is the case for multiple of my upcoming flights.

My initial thought was that they needed to create more space for the extra row, and had converted some EC rows into regular economy. But the exit rows have actually shifted from 12+14 to 14+15, so in fact one row extra. If extra space was created by converting EC seats this would not have been the case I guess.

Last edited by Xandrios; Apr 8, 2013 at 1:00 pm
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Old Apr 8, 2013, 1:07 pm
  #359  
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The 738 I was on had EB in the first three rows, and then 4-9 configured as EC.

I did not check, but the EERs would logically have been numbered 10 & 11?

Johan
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Old Apr 9, 2013, 12:25 pm
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CPH-AMS B737-800 i was on last week had 12+14 as EER., 6-9 EC..10-11 regular economy.

90 minutes for take off EER row 12 was transformed into regular economy 'non-paying' seats during a check on my android app.
Confused if this was a glitch or someone/thing can change EER and maybe EC seats into regular economy seats when deemed necessary.
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