What does "operated by" mean really with Aegean / Olympic
Hello,
I booked an economy flight from the Swiss website for a Geneva-Athens flight and Athens-Alexandroupoli flight. I was on a Swiss aircraft for the flight segment (GVA-ATH) as expected. The next day I was taking my ATH-AXD flight.
At Athens' airport I tried getting into the lounge (I am a frequent flyer, silver status), and I am told that I cannot enter because the flight is operated by Olympic Airlines, and Olympic airlines is not part of star alliance... Not cool, but fair enough.
But! I eventually get to the airplane and I was surprised to see that the airplane was from Aegean Airlines (which is part of star alliance). All documentation on board was from Aegean, the crew was from Aegean and there was a huge Aegean logo on the plane...
So what does "operated by" mean? Because clearly my flight was operated by Aegean Airlines!
Could someone explain, please?
Thanks a lot!