Confirmed: KLM introduces Economy Comfort short-haul

Old Nov 18, 2012, 12:55 pm
  #181  
 
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Originally Posted by irishguy28
Yes, I'm not being asked to pay. But I'd like to be able to select from all the available economy seats - I don't like sitting in exit rows.

It's just so annoying that when I check every booking, I can only select from the "pay-for" seats.
Once you've "paid" as a platinum your zero euros for/by selecting a special seat, and clicking confirm, you cannot downgrade. The first time in you can select any seat.

This kinda makes sense when you think of economy comfort as a separate cabin, less so if it's just exit seat.
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Old Nov 20, 2012, 7:32 am
  #182  
 
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Originally Posted by KLflyerRalph
For 1 roundtrip, 2 legs.
I just received a phone call from KLM customer relations - after recontacting the by mail since they offered me nothing - and they told me that they could not do anything to compensate us. Short version of the short reality, they could not care less.

Will look into other options but on our most used route (AMS-GVA-AMS) there is not a lot of choice....
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Old Nov 20, 2012, 10:34 am
  #183  
 
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Originally Posted by pjhartog
I just received a phone call from KLM customer relations - after recontacting the by mail since they offered me nothing - and they told me that they could not do anything to compensate us. Short version of the short reality, they could not care less.

Will look into other options but on our most used route (AMS-GVA-AMS) there is not a lot of choice....
As Plat for Life?
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Old Nov 20, 2012, 11:14 am
  #184  
 
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Originally Posted by KLflyerRalph
As Plat for Life?
for those trips that we travel with our kids - that have to pay for the forward section.
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Old Nov 21, 2012, 12:17 am
  #185  
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Originally Posted by pjhartog

Will look into other options but on our most used route (AMS-GVA-AMS) there is not a lot of choice....
Dare I say... Easyjet?!

Not sure if they are much cheaper though if you are travelling with luggage. Booking in advance you can get a return AMS-GVA for 99 and up. If you add up the price for checked luggage in most cases they are pretty comparable.
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Old Nov 21, 2012, 1:06 am
  #186  
 
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Originally Posted by Gajan
Dare I say... Easyjet?!

Not sure if they are much cheaper though if you are travelling with luggage. Booking in advance you can get a return AMS-GVA for 99 and up. If you add up the price for checked luggage in most cases they are pretty comparable.
but the schedule - especially weekends - is not as good.

still - KL is slowly making us look more and more at them
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Old Nov 21, 2012, 1:22 am
  #187  
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Would have wished that Swiss actually could have some direct flights from GVA other than via ZRH which is pointless when doing a short intra EU flight but that's a different topic.

I never heard back from KLM after i sent my complaint to FB who sent it to KLM who in turn sent it back to FB. Getting close to 4 weeks now
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Old Nov 28, 2012, 9:27 am
  #188  
 
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so December 1 is around the corner and no answers yet about the short haul EC
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Old Nov 28, 2012, 11:37 pm
  #189  
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When its about money, they actually start early. My flight for Nov 30:



Note that row 6 is not paid, while row 7 is. Also note how many seats have been taken in EC. Almost unbelievably many. Would the auto-seat-chooser for the default seat been forgotten, and it still hands out seats from the first row by default?

Edit: And note that it says 15 EC seats free, while I only count 13?
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Old Nov 29, 2012, 5:17 am
  #190  
 
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Originally Posted by Xandrios
When its about money, they actually start early. My flight for Nov 30:
I thought the scam wasn't supposed to start until December 1?
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Old Dec 1, 2012, 10:19 am
  #191  
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Just wanted to post my first experiences.

Check in was like the screenshot above, riddled with strange behavior. After boarding the purser came through the cabin, manifest in hand, to welcome elites and offer an upgrade to the exit row, since aparently all exit seats were still free. All elites exept me of course, somehow he managed to skip either me personally, or all Gold elites.

So I was stuck in a row of three. Thankfully the guy in the middle seat was traveling with friends in row 22 and he moved after a FA OK'ed the request.

Basically the initial impressions were bad. All EC seats were taken, up till row 10 every seat was occupied. Only since some elites moved to the exit row some space was created, but still, this situation should never have existed. I guess I expected the front EC cabin to now be mostly empty.
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Old Dec 3, 2012, 1:00 am
  #192  
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My first experience were as following:

GVA to AMS (KL1928 01DEC12) on Saturday sitting in the first row behind the EC cluster of seats. B738 in row 8 and the legroom was unbearable. As luck has it, none sat in the row in front of us reclining their seat which would have meant pure torture. Anyway, there were 5 or so rows of EC and only 5 seats were occupied. The rest of the plane was pretty stuffed.

AMS - CPH (KL1131 01DEC12): Around 6 rows were available with orange "head rest covers" and one passenger who came in as the last one, decided not to sit at the very back in Y but took a seat in the empty EC section which fancied her. None of the staff reacted to it. 15 min after take off, her friend from the back came up and joined her for the whole flight and didn't go back before the seat belt sign came on. The crew didn't react. Again, around 5 passengers had occupied the EC seats and in the first rows. Again seated in row 8.

CPH - AMS (KL1128 02DEC12): One passenger boarding just before us was on stand-by and was given a seat in EC. This person was not a frequent flyer. Rows 5 - 9 were all EC and every seat bar one or two were taken. Was seated in row 10 (first in normal Y) but with ample leg room as it should be. Difficult to say if the EC seats were given to passengers checking in late or if they actually were Platinum FB'ers or had paid for the better seats. I somehow had the feeling that the first couple of rows were Plats and rest just given the seats at check-in (too many youngsters/students with backpacks if it makes sense).

AMS - GVA (KL1931 02DEC12): No option for EC as it was an E190. Got an upgrade at the gate which was a nice surprise which brings the upgrade from 0:25 to 1:26 this year...

Just like in Xandrios experience some passengers were asked (but only from EC) if they wanted to move to the exit row. No one accepted the "offer" and no one else were asked...

Side note: I have noticed how the questionnaires are being handed out quite a bit these days, and only to pax in EC and to me from AMS - GVA because I was upgraded?

Last edited by Cupart; Dec 3, 2012 at 5:38 am Reason: Added date(s) and flight number(s)
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Old Dec 3, 2012, 1:22 am
  #193  
 
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My first experience was yesterday on AMS-HEL. At check-in, EC was completely empty, just a few seats taken. By the time that boarding was completed, every single seat was taken, including all EC seats. I don't have any evidence, but must assume that most of those seats were assigned to the last people to check in, as many of them did not seem to be frequent flyers.

I'll be watching this closely. As a gold elite, I see no reason why KLM can't at least offer these seats for free at check-in. This seems a reasonable compromise as they'd otherwise just be given away to whoever needs a seat at the last minute. If I'm going to regularly be relegated to the back of the plane, I'll drop KLM like a bad habit.
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Old Dec 3, 2012, 4:57 am
  #194  
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Thank you for posting this Cupart & rwSEA.

Please continue to post recent experiences as it can be useful for KLM (preferably with flight number and date).

Gajan

Last edited by Gajan; Dec 3, 2012 at 5:04 am
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Old Dec 3, 2012, 5:36 am
  #195  
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Originally Posted by rwSEA
I'll be watching this closely. As a gold elite, I see no reason why KLM can't at least offer these seats for free at check-in. This seems a reasonable compromise as they'd otherwise just be given away to whoever needs a seat at the last minute. If I'm going to regularly be relegated to the back of the plane, I'll drop KLM like a bad habit.
We're very much on the same page here rwSEA... Only thing is that KLM would not want to give anything away for free if they initially tried to charge for it in the first place, then all Gold and then silvers would not ever want to pay for the seats and wait for them to become free. Next question is then, if 10 Golds are on the flight and only 4 seats are available, who should they go to? The passenger with highest "seniority" (i.e. had Gold for longest), ticket price or even those gathered most revenue for the company?

One thing that's for sure, and that is that no elites (or even pax without even having a FB account) should ever get these seats for free because they check in at the very last minute. It is really taking the p*ss on loyalty...

The whole concept is far fetched in my opinion, but might have said something different had I been plat... Don't know...
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