KLouis

AF doesn’t stop amazing me. I flew to London on Sunday via CDG for a one-day meeting, having paid an S-class (Tempo Challenge) ticket. On Monday morning I get a phone call on my cell phone (!), plus an SMS (!!), plus an e-mail (!!!), plus a message on my office phone in Greece (!!!!), plus a message to my TA (!!!!!) saying that my CDG-ATH flight was cancelled due to a strike in Athens and thet they’ve rebooked me on a later flight. Great service ^, but...

At check in in LHR I find out that the CDG-ATH leg was now booked in Tempo, and the agent refused to even see why this was so. Well, I guess that this was a small mistake of the person who handled the rebooking and I'm not particularly worried as mistakes can always be corrected. Upon arrival at CDG I walk to the AF “transfer” desk at 2E, explain the situation and after two phone calls and a few attempts on the computer, here it is, I get a new, correct boarding pass. The helpful and competent AF agent (^ ^) explained that indeed the colleague who did the re-booking had just made a mistake. Ha, I thought it was over!

When boarding the next flight the scanner peepses, and I’m given a newer, pre-printed BC, again back in Tempo, and this time sitting in the twenties. I start objecting, I show my ticket, but the agent at the gate says that even if she recognizes that there was an error (once already corrected) on AF’s side, there is nothing she can do because “the system will not allow for an upgrade from Tempo to Tempo Challenge at the gate” . I obviously remain adamant that I won’t sit in the back when I’ve paid more than 1000 Euro for my ticket, and especially when they're empty seats up front, and the agent finally agrees to call her supervisor. She shows up when almost everybody has boarded, recognizes the situation and she decides to upgrade me to business , since the “system” will not allow for a mistake, once made, to be corrected (I know, I know...).

Conclusion: the AF agents in Paris were both competent and helpful ^ ^ ^. On the other hand, who on earth designed an IT system that will let a mistake go through (downgrading from S to whatever) but will not allow for either its definite correction and/or an upgrade from Tempo to Tempo Challenge at the gate?

nicolas75

I hate situations where people recognize that there is an error but still can do nothing.
I would be nice if management / system let some margins of manoeuvre to the staff that has to face customer’s problems

KLouis

And to top it, I just found out that they credited 100% rather than 200% of the status miles . This will start a long stretch of phone calls/faxes with the FB people, as I really need those miles to re-qualify for PE!

KLouis

Tout est bien, qui finit bien After three faxes sent by me resulting in replies, in different languages, that the problem had been fixed (wrong!), finally somebody from FB called me in my office, apologized and promised to fix everything within two days. Not only did they do it this last time, they even made me a gift of a few extra award miles. Not bad, I really start enjoying their attitude! ^

MatthewClement

Glad to hear that you got the problem sorted in the end. But WHY OH WHY can Air France not seem to get Tempo Challenge tickets sorted out properly? The staff is poorly educated and their "CAN'T DO" attitude grows old very quickly.

Armchair Flyer

Had a similar experience today flying MUC CDG. Checked in at one of the machines at the airport to find the only seating options offered were in the 20's ~ in TC on a Y fare.

Checked with one of the counter lizards and she confirmed that the seating I'd been offered was in Tempo and not TC. "Ah yes, the machines do that sometimes" was the explanation.....

In my case I didn't have any other problems, either at the gate ot the plane, and got a seat in the single digits. What was really annoying about it though, was that TC was only 30% full and took up around 10 rows of the aircraft.

Oh, and as per usual (at both departure and arrival) we were force fed the usual "tour des terminaux par bus". Plane scheduled from 2D ~ I believe the D stands for "dump" ~ and we were bussed to/from 2F

The words "couldn't manage a piss up in a brewery" come to mind.

S//

Armchair Flyer

Deleted ~ duplicate post

San Gottardo

You were flying MUC-CDG on Air France today? So did I. Not sure we were on the same flight, but surely it would have been fun meeting you. If you are on that route often (I am), let me know, we'll catch up next time.

Armchair Flyer

I was on the 18:40 out of MUC.... Same as you?

I'd be delighted to meet. Tend to get to MUC once a month or so, should be out there again around the middle of the second week in Jan....I'll PM you once I have something defininte.

Cheers

Sim.

San Gottardo

Yep, indeed, same as me. The flight that left 10 minutes early, landed 30 minutes early - but still got you to the terminal at the scheduled time, with the 30 minutes being eaten up by waiting for the jetty, taking the bus (it was actually 2E, not 2F), just to arrive at the terminal where the escalator didn't work. The usual CDG experience I should say.

BTW: I was the guy who came on board with his own bag of Bavarian delicatessen, just to make a point that people that would like to have a little bite cannot rely on their awful "Plateau designed by Christian Lacroix".

Great! Let's PM. But in 90% of cases I take LH on that route. Only with schedule constraints or tickets where I have an onward flight from CDG on Air France do I go with Air France on MUC-CDG. With the HON service on the ground in MUC (they park my car, I have a decent lounge where I can have a real restaurant dinner before, plenty of stuff to read, free WLAN, limo service to plane), the slightly more pleasant service on board, and no bussing at CDG this is just the better option. PM me, and then maybe we can do the run on LH next time. Just be warned, any subsequent shorthaul flight with AF will make you think "Why am I paying for this".

dg4255

Hmmmm.. Definitely a subjective point there. I travel often on AF and recently had to take several intra-European flights on LH. I was left with a very sour taste in my mouth about LH and will avoid them like the plague from here on out. Give me AF and CDG any time. As for the bus issue, one of the flights from OSL to FRA parked way way way way down the tarmac and we were sent by bus to the far far far far end of the terminal. Only to have to walk up 4 flights of stairs with carryon luggage (the line to take the elevator was ENORMOUS) and walk at least 20 - 25 minutes to get back to the Schengen gates for the connecting flight. With a 50 minute connection in FRA, I was darn lucky I even made the flight. I was sweating profusely and completely out of breath and I am a fit guy. Add in having to pass those disgusting smoking areas that reek of cigarettes, I will take CDG any day. Combined with the rude lounge dragons who would not let me into the Senator side of the LH lounge in FRA even though I was on paid C class and am BD *G. And the FA who started breakfast service FRA-HEL from the rear of the C class cabin towards the front, even though I was the only fare paying passenger in this cabin. There was a LH employee and 4 year old daughter and 2 other pax that had duplicate seat assignments in Y and Y was full, so they just plopped them into row 4 of C. That meant I did not get a choice of breakfast and got stuck with the world's most awful rhubarb crepes with apple chunks on top.
Having said all that, yes, AF has its problems too. All the airlines do. But in my experiences, AF has been much kinder and gentler to me than LH.

San Gottardo

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_2 like Mac OS X; fr-fr) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5G77 Safari/525.20)

A very subjective statement indeed, as I was referring only to me as an AF Plat/LH HON has as significantly better experience on that particular route, and that I was looking forward to maybe share that experience and the contrast with another FTler.

It was not a statement saying "LH is always better than AF for all travelers". That's another debate, in which my opinion would be more differentiated.

dg4255

As to the IT problems, this has been a nightmare with AF. It is so strange that even when flying AF, I can often encounter many problems when using the AF website, but have a completely different experience when using the KL website to check in for the same AF flights!
To me, the IT differences between AF and KL remind me of DL and NW. NW is far superior in every single way to DL. And for the most part, KL is also far superior to AF when it comes to IT, in my opinion. It will be interesting to see how this all changes with the DL/NW takeover and combining of systems. Thankfully, DL and NW use the same basic system for reservations. There are a few differences, but the root of both systems is WorldSpan. Hopefully, bridging between Amadeus and WorldSpan will be seamless and they will be able to fully operate well with each other, much like NW and KL do now.

MatthewClement

I would rather have that than the opposite, which I have encountered from time to time: four rows of TC, all stuff with full middle seats, while economy sits virtually empty.

Armchair Flyer

The reference is indeed to the "significantly better experience on that particular route" as opposed the the subjective issue of whether AF is better/worse than LH.

As an ex UA Premier Executive and having already had the pleasure ~ several times ~ (as opposed to the diametrically opposed experience with AF) of flying CDG MUC CDG with LH, I'll wholly agree with Creber. No IT glitches at check in, no nonchalant and flippant check in lizards; you get your ticket, it doesn't occasionally omit to show your status (unlike AF so causing grief if you haven't your FT card on your person), you get an outstanding MUC Lounge experience with decent local fare food (albeit it can be busy but hey this is LH in Mûnchen, right?), you board, good flight, get off, and you don't get bussed half way round Paris to be dumped outside a filthy, grotty terminal where you then have to lug your case up a narrow, busted elevator.

It just ain't apples and apples service.

And Mr C I'll glady and humbly take up your offer next time. Be in touch Sir.

Sim.