Originally Posted by
Flying Lawyer
Why should the burden of evidence for the savings rest with the airline? The airline - well advised - would state as long as seat is still unsold 0,2 l of Coke, a chocolate bar, probably certain luggage handling fees and this is it.
That's only a friction of the costs an airline would save. You forgot the bigger parts..
-Extra fuel a pax (and it's luggage) is burning. Most efficient bird is still the A380, iirc, about 3l/person/100km flown. I think they calculated that number with a pax incl. luggage @ 100kg.
-Airport taxes (can be really high in some countries, especially in C/F (yes, UK, I'm looking at you) )
-Lounge access (which, if the pax hold status, can definitely be thrown in.. how much is LH internally charging? 25€?)
-> Let's assume some 1000km, intra-European flight. Fuel would (on a not-so-savvy A320) be about 60l (each way) at least. Starts/ground operation on shorter flight increase the number as well. Lets use 50 Cents/litre (reality should be a bit higher) making it 30€
-> Taxes, can be really different from airport/country to airport, let's assume 30€ all-in. Too high or right?
That would be 60€ alone, for a one-way flight, that LH does sell <100€ frequently. I've not yet taken in a lounge visit or two (people that would indeed sue LH for their money back tend to know a bit, and might have status..) which would already drive it over 100€ costs..
Nope, an airline might indeed have trouble to prove they're NOT saving at least 50-60€ if someone isn't flying (even if the seat goes unsold)
Of course they could say - especially in the case a plane WAS sold out for a while (resp. oversold enough so they didn't sell any more seats even in full fare) - that because of that booking they couldn't offer it to anyone else, which would have paid much more.
That, and common sense regarding the pricing structure - cheap fares just wouldn't exist anymore if all tickets would be flex - dictates that even if airlines can save a lot of money if some people decide not to fly, that they shouldn't get money back, on non-changable tickets.
Yes, I'm taking the side of the airlines here, and as much as I dislike LH, it would be an absolute disaster if the law would be too customer "friendly". Because the end result would be an absolutely customer-unfriendly world.