overbooked flights ex LHR
 

Hi,

Am flying out of LHR tomorrow on KLM. My flight and all subsequent KL ones are showing all 0's in availability. BA & BD have about 3 seats between them tomorrow afternoon....

Does anyone have any experience of what KL will do in these circumstances? I'm connecting beyond AMS (just another hop up to Norway) - do they look to reroute people via other carriers

Thanks

Tony

In my experience ex-LHR, when I was a GE, you should be fine. They're pretty good at making sure élites always get on board at LHR (used to get op-upped a fair bit on LHR-AMS, which, of course, became annoying with Europe Select, being moved from an exit row aisle seat to a middle seat up front...)

I was told in no uncertain terms by a supervisor at the AMS transfer desk, in a similar situation, that GE (and later, PE) would always 'protect' me from being bumped (with some harsh words to the agent who wanted to delay me). It may be worth reminding them of this if they try to bump you. I think that they would be very reluctant to re-route you.

Similarly, I've been in a queue for one of the regularly way-overbooked AMS-LCY flights on a Friday evening (really, can't they use an F70 from time to time?) where they basically said, if you're not an élite, you're not getting on.

Well I suppose I should be grateful for this, but what really p*sses me off is that when we bought these tickets, I didn't have my *G status and KLM still offered some service down the back :mad:

Well, I suppose they could, but does it have the appropraite ratings for LCY??

Thanks anyway - will report back what happens next week!

To operate into LCY an aircraft must be able to make a =>5.5 degree approach. The F70 can do this and as far as I know is approved for LCY.

Indeed - this is confirmed here. AF Régional used to run them to LCY, apparently.

Indeed it can! According to this page http://www.lcacc.org/aircraft/index.html air france has operated them into LCY too.

[uber geek]Having looked into this a bit more, LCY assigns an ATM value to each type of aircraft. The F70 is in band A so has an ATM of 1.26, whilst the F50 is in band B so only has an ATM of 0.63. This means the airport is permitted to handle twice as many F50's in a day as they are F70's, but would mean that an airline can't just switch planes at the last minute, lest the airport go over its limits and then everyone is in trouble...

I assume that the higher the ATM, the more expensive the landing fee???[/uber geek]

In addition to which the cockpit crew must be qualified to carry out such an approach into that specific airport.

johan

Good link posted further up the thread that confirms this.

Funny to be talking about LCY as I flew into there on Tuesday and back out today, BA on an RJ100, really good flights/cabin crew too.
Always like that final steep approach into the LCY runway.

My favorite airport is Nelspruit, South Africa (NLP). Unfortunately, commercial flights have been moved to Kruger Mpumalanga International (MQP).

To build NLP they must have shaved the top off a hill. The 900 meter runway ends in a sheer precipice, so overruns are not recommended. SA Airlink had certain qualified pilots who flew J41s into NLP. After a rather complicated dogleg descent (at each stage the aircrew had to visually identify certain geographical features, such as hills and mountains, before they could proceed), the aircraft had to touch down exactly on the runway threshold, after which full reverse thrust and maximum braking power were applied. To add to the excitement, NLP is very susceptible to strong crosswinds. Quite an experience.

johan

Also flew out of LCY yesterday, Augsburg Airways (under Team Lufthansa colours) in a sparkly new DHC-8, and it was an excellent flight. If only other LH crew could be like the Augsburg people!

I love LCY. 30 minute taxi ride, 10 minute check-in cut-off, the friendliest staff throughout (yes, even at security!) It, bizarrely, means that for me to fly anywhere in Central, Eastern or South-Eastern Europe, it can often be quicker to fly via LCY and FRA (or LCY and AMS) than direct from LHR! (Plus, it's good for my miles :))

Just saw that written down now... Sounds like a fine concept for an airline docusoap in the style of a 1950s sitcom ;)

Last time I saw a situation like that they were asking pax with destination of AMS if they were willing to take the RTM flight instead and accept 200 Euro voucher. Connecting passengers were largely untouched although I think one guy heading to CDG was bumped onto BA.

[b]B747..[b] Thanks for that - a quick check shows all the RTM flights zeroed out this afternoon/evening too. I suspect a reroute for us is even more unlikley given that you can't fly direct to our destination anyway. Oh well, just guess we can watch the chaos unfold as many people's plans for a long weekend get off to a rather poor start.....

I'm regularly flying out of LHR on Thursday and Friday evening when the flights are full. They regularly call my name in the Holideck lounge and I receive an operational upgrade LHR-AMS. Or if I'm not in the lounge, they call my name just before boarding. (And sometimes they operate a B767 :) )

Due to a snow storm in January, the flights were delayed. They still "put" me on the flight but I wasn't able to reach my onward connection in AMS (which was already clear in LHR; I then received in AMS a hotel voucher + breakfast voucher + dinner voucher + telephone card). The staff will try to put you on the plane to AMS. If the staff in LHR will (have to) reroute you, they will have to ask in AMS for permission.

(You will also get a sticker on the boarding pass for fast track in LHR - if you don't use the machine to check-in. But often there are also not many people in the regular lines for security)

Never understood why they insist on getting yu to Amsterdam to sort out you re-route when more often than not, especially if flying to the states, they could get there far more easily from the UK such as a London airport, Manchester etc.

They spend a fortune putting people in the Van Der Velke hotel which is alright if you dont mind loosing a day, but when you are running a schedule of trips like I do over say 21 days, to loose one day causes complete chaos.

I have so many overnight bags from them in Amsterdam I offred last year to bring a load of them back as I now had a emergency kit in my carry on at all times.