LH finalises to abandon IATA fares

Old Aug 7, 2007, 7:14 pm
  #1  
Moderator: Lufthansa Miles & More, India based airlines, India, External Miles & Points Resources
Original Poster
 
Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: MUC
Programs: LH SEN
Posts: 48,001
Post LH finalises to abandon IATA fares

Earlier this year, LH decided to go it alone and no longer participate in the IATA YY fares in Europe:


Changes of IATA Fares
The European Commission has terminated trust immunity of IATA-Fares within EU countries. Therefore, IATA-Fares of the past are being discontinued and replaced by a new procedure for travel from 01.03.2007. Lufthansa is not participating in that new procedure.

Therefore IATA-Fares within Europe will no longer be displayed when LH-Carrier fares are concerned.

Lufthansa continues to offer interlineable fares for all its direct services as well as all destinations served by partner airlines. The full flexible Lufthansa CRT-Fare remains also interlineable with non-partner airlines.
Now they have gone one step further and included the longhaul:

2/333 01.08.07: Veränderungen bei den IATA-Tarifen zu Interkont - Zielorten

Die europäischen und amerikanischen Behörden beenden die kartellrechtliche Freistellung für IATA-Tarife zu Interkont - Zielorten. Dies hat zur Folge, dass es die bekannten IATA-Tarife in dieser Form nicht mehr geben wird. Die IATA hat ein Ersatzverfahren eingeführt, an dem Lufthansa nicht partizipieren wird. Als Konsequenz daraus werden ab dem 1. August 2007 in den Fare Displays bei der Abfrage von LH-Tarifen die IATA-Tarife nicht mehr erscheinen und können auch nicht mehr auf Lufthansa – Dokumenten angewendet werden. Auch dürfen die IATA – Tarife nicht auf Lufthansa – Flügen angewendet werden, selbst wenn sie auf Dokumenten anderer Airlines ausgestellt werden.

Die unter LH veröffentlichten IATA - Tarif - Duplikate bleiben bestehen. Somit bietet Lufthansa mit dem FRT, CRT und YRT weiterhin in jeder Klasse einen mit allen Airlines interline-fähigen Tarif zu allen Zielorten im Lufthansa -Streckennetz sowie zu vielen weiteren Zielorten an.

Für Rückfragen steht Ihnen Ihr Lufthansa-Serviceteam wie gewohnt gerne zur Verfügung.
Essentially it means:

- LH will no longer accept tickets issued by other airlines using YY IATA fares
- LH will offer full-fares that can be interlined with any other airline
oliver2002 is offline  
Old Aug 8, 2007, 12:45 am
  #2  
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: ZRH
Programs: LX HON Circle
Posts: 3,227
...a question of time until LX will (have to) do the same I guess.

How is this new IATA procedure working? What are the differences between the old and procedures? Is there already a relevant thread on FT somewhere?
f4freeJunior is offline  
Old Aug 8, 2007, 12:54 am
  #3  
 
Join Date: May 2001
Location: BKK/YVR/EWR
Programs: SQ TPP, LH Senator, TG Gold, AA Platinum
Posts: 454
I am not intimate with this rule. However, everytime I have tried to book an SQ ticket using 'YY'..I have zero success...SQ always seems to be 25-30% higher...maybe I am just unlucky??
yvrguy is offline  
Old Aug 8, 2007, 6:28 am
  #4  
 
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Switzerland
Posts: 28
Originally Posted by f4freeJunior
How is this new IATA procedure working? What are the differences between the old and procedures? Is there already a relevant thread on FT somewhere?
I couldn't find any recent thread concerning this topic.
The IATA website offers some information:The new term: Flex Fares
IATA must change its previous way of calculating these fares: "Flex Fares are new multilateral interline fares derived from published carrier fares. The concept is simple: for a given market, a base fare is calculated using available carrier fares in the market, and an interline premium is added which reflects the flexibility in an IATA fare."

The block exemption for tariff agreements:
  • within EU ended in December 2006
  • between EU-USA and between EU-Australia ended in June 2007
  • between EU and the rest of the world will end in October 2007 though that date may be reviewed
I interpret the decision of LH as a one-way solution: Obviously they have enough passengers on routes where LH is their first choice and the pax are willing to pay an even higher amount than for IATA (so the fare is still transferable to all the other airlines). You can call that self-confident or "taking what the lucrative market is offering and renounce the rest".
aceto is offline  
Old Aug 8, 2007, 6:55 am
  #5  
Moderator: GLBT travelers, India-based Airlines and India; FlyerTalk Evangelist
 
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Asia
Programs: Yes!
Posts: 15,512
Yup, LH were Tip-toeing towards this move earlier, but now they are firmly slamming the door shut all over.
AJLondon is offline  
Old Aug 8, 2007, 3:26 pm
  #6  
 
Join Date: Jan 1999
Location: Too many
Programs: Lots
Posts: 5,760
This is disappointing news. There were some great YY fares in markets that LH didn't publish any fares for.
Axey is offline  

Thread Tools
Search this Thread

Contact Us - Manage Preferences - Archive - Advertising - Cookie Policy - Privacy Statement - Terms of Service -

This site is owned, operated, and maintained by MH Sub I, LLC dba Internet Brands. Copyright © 2024 MH Sub I, LLC dba Internet Brands. All rights reserved. Designated trademarks are the property of their respective owners.