infrequentflyer0

So I just came back from a trip to Germany that was affected by Lufthansa's Sept 29th strike. I had booked a nonstop ticket from Boston to Frankfurt and they cancelled the flight. The only rebooking option available that day was a flight with a connection (via Munich). I had deliberately paid extra for a nonstop flight since my wife and I hate connections. The difference in value was around $600 since I booked only 3 days in advance. I booked through Vayama.

The rebooking was of course free, but I basically overpaid by $600. The Lufthansa rebooking agent said that she doesn't issue partial refunds or compensation and that I would have to contact Lufthansa customer service. I sent an email to Lufthansa about it that same day but have heard nothing back. I never contacted Vayama about it.

Anyone have any experience getting compensation for this kind of involuntary rebooking? The conditions of carriage don't talk about this explicitly but they seem to imply that there would be no obligation of compensation in this case since they did get me to my destination. Regardless, I'm going to try. I can't stand the fact that they pocketed that $600.

Would I have better luck phoning Lufthansa or Vayama? Vayama is the one that charged me, but Lufthansa is the one that profited from the bait-and-switch ...

RTW1

Get over it, and don't waste any more time on this. Just be glad they were able to reroute without much delay. And MUC is a rather nice airport for a transfer.

Your logic is also a bit flawed, you got to fly one way without a stop I assume. These things happen in situations like this. It's the cost of flying....

If you already have contacted LH be a bit more patient, it takes them a while to reply. But don't expect much beyond an apology.

Often1

OP was transported from BOS-FRA, although not under the conditions he wanted. But, that was due to a strike and beyond LH's control. The COC do cover this and do make it clear that extra stops, connections and the like are at the carrier's discretion.

If OP booked through Vayama, he will need to submit his request to Vayama as it is Vayama, not LH, which has his money. Telephone won't work here. Send in a complaint. There are tens of thousands of complaints due to the strike, so you can expect that this will take at least 8-10 weeks.

The chances that Vayama does anything her are slim to nothing. But, they are equally slim with LH. Although LH might issue some minor acommodating, but not in cash and no in any form of a refund.

Frankly, this isn't worth the effort and OP ought to get over it.

MSPeconomist

For a LH flight, a sufficient arrival delay due to cancellation and rebooking would normally lead to mandated compensation according to the EU261 regulations, but strikes are explicit exceptions because they are considered to be beyond the control of the airline.

At best you'll get a few miles from LH or something similar, with the amount of the "apology" probably dependent on status.

infrequentflyer0

For any spectators:

I sent feedback to Lufthansa twice and never received a reply from a human, so after 30 days I tried Vayama. Vayama at least replied, but they just forwarded the request to Lufthansa. 12 days later, Vayama emailed me to say that Lufthansa had denied compensation and had said that I would have to physically go to an airport desk to discuss anything further. There's no international airport close to where I live so this basically ends the saga.

I'm not really surprised that I couldn't get anything out of Lufthansa, but I'm surprised that they didn't even have the courtesy to say anything to me about it.

(For the record, the $600 that I felt would be appropriate was half of the total fare difference for a one-connection round-trip ticket, since my return flight was not affected.)

infrequentflyer0

I spoke too soon. A couple days after my above post (in total, 45 days after the flight), Lufthansa replied and offered 5000 additional Aeroplan miles for each passenger, which I accepted. They showed up in our Aeroplan accounts two weeks later. That's a total value of around $140 or so depending on how they're used. Not what I'd hoped for, but a lot better than nothing.