Felixberlin

No, BA does not even plan to refit the new cabin fleetwide.

I am not positive about BA's new F, but as far as I know it's not taking pace at light speed either (but then they don't have F on all L/H aircraft).

Rambuster

Same as LH then! (only a few 777s don't have F btw)

NewbieRunner

What makes you think I haven't seen it?

Actually, I haven't but hope to see it soon and have just had an award waitlisted. Let's hope it will clear.

From what I have read (and I'm not talking about the marketing gibberish like this - OK the quote is about the "new" business seat but you get the idea) the new First Class seat is as good as any competition IMHO. I may be biassed since I happen to like the uncluttered design of LH's new First Class seats but I don't think I'm alone. Where LH is ahead of competition is the features like sound absorbing curtains, cabin lining and flooring, and humidity control.

Who knows what air travel is like in 10 years. I wrote I didn't think the seat would be obsolete in 5 years. People might laugh at the seat in 10 years' time? Possibly. But what aspects of LH's First Class seats in your opinion compare poorly against competition and will be laughed at in 5 or 10 years' time?

LHPII

to all critics of LH retrofit schedule, a few facts:

- LH is one of the few airlines to offer consistent product accross its long-haul fleet weather it was a few hours hop FRA-TLV or 13h+ FRA-EZE
-LH new First class cabin is highly custommized and it takes longer to retrofit on the rest of the fleet.......so comparing it with UA with pure generic cabin is out of the place. Also there are only a few premium cabin manufacturers around and LH can not have its seats delivered all at one time.
-During that "up to 5 year time" all 15 A380's and all 20 B748i's will be delivered and a few B744 will leave the fleet as well, so the new product will be in place sooner then later
-LH has quite a good idea of what their customers think of its products and it monitors it on regular basis........ it definitely scores higher then many of critics here would rate it. Don't consider yourselves as a benchmark!

NewbieRunner

Will it be just the seats which are retrofitted on the rest of the fleet or will other new First Class features like noise and humidity control also be added to the existing fleet?

dre_techie

I'm glad you pointed this out. It is in LH's interest to have a competitive product. Now the thread can go on about bashing the cabin

I don't understand why every other thread get invaded with discussions about cabin quality / comparisons. We're getting some good info, but it quickly becomes enveloped in: "they should have..." when all or most decisions have obviously been made.

weero

If you are just interested in the pamphlet why do you insist coming to a discussion board and then wondering why people complain?

The LH webshite has it all - it releases the lip service, I mean the decisions of the emperor to the public and you can watch the 'made decisions'. Or at least the decisions they want you to believe are made and set in stone.

demue

Interesting facts. Thanks for that.

Okay fine it is consistent to a large degree. However in my book that is consistently outdated whether in Y (e.g. 747s), C or F.

Great but anything else but this approach would have been ludicrous.

Alright then so nothing to worry about for LH (though I wonder whom you are asking). For most the people that replied in this thread are not the whining kind but give honest feedback and input. Yes we may not be the 'navel of the world' but it is mostly constructive arguments and valid questions so even though it sounds like a large percentage of customers score LH cabin products high overall it still can't hurt to understand where some of the dissatisfaction comes from.

oliver2002

I think LH has consistently shown the industry it is possible to run an airline profitably without government support in the last 12 years (in which they had at least 5 major downturns). What this proves is also that the latest inflight system and the latest seats also are not a major factor in getting profitable customers. LH scores high on reliability and the schedules they offer to their customers and being smart on buying aircraft at a decent price at the right time.

The insinuation in this thread that LH's management is completely unaware or the world and doesn't know what is going on is ridiculous. Just like a car fleet management company doesn't go out and buys the latest car and dumping their rest of the fleet the moment a new model or facelift comes along, LH also takes their time and prefers to have their real estate up in the air earning money (or atleast paying the bills).

Now as a customer I surely want to sit in the most comfortable largest seat with all the entertainment of the world for the lowest prices for the shortest time. I always factor in the comfort and the travel time when deciding on price. Unsurprisingly LH wins most of the time when you fly out of Germany, just like probably BA does when you fly out of the London area or SQ when you fly out of SIN. Life is tough.

Rambuster

LH management seems to think their customers are stupid?
The sad bit is that they are probably right.

oliver2002

The customers are content with what they get and feel great with the product they currently 'enjoy'. Why should LH educate them otherwise? Sure they (we are talking LH's core customer base here: the german businessmen/women flying C) know there is another product out there, but like to fly direct with 'german' service. As long as you keep that going, the profitable customer base stays.

SMK77

I think we need to look at the 5 years: The Airbus fleet might get the refurbishment a lot faster (although even 3 years is not impressive...) and only the 747 fleet might take longer...

What I don't like is that LH was changing plans all the time (new F with or before A380; wait/don't wait) and then waisted time by waiting till the A380 was rolled out and then still take more than 9 months before the first refurbished aircraft is presented...

The current F product is not impressive at all and I am still puzzled that people are paying full fare for it...

NewbieRunner

I guess that's the main reason why I fly LH on my regular trips to NRT. If I fly via LHR there's only one *A carrier (NH) to NRT without involving another connection. Flying out of MAN via a European hub I have a choice of two daily flights on LH, one on LX and another on SK, taking not any longer than flying via LHR.

I agree if I lived near London my choice of carriers might be different.

Not being a German businessman/woman, I thought a reality check might be in order. I have checked LH and BA prices of flights to NRT over Christmas and New Year. Not the typical time for business travel but pricewise it does not make much difference compared with other times of the year except possibly during the summer. Japan is not a winter vacation destination so the price does not suddenly increase over Christmas and New Year and seats are readily available on most days even at a short notice.

Lowest fares 23 Dec (+/- 2 days) - 6 Jan (+/- 2 days)

LH MAN-FRA-NRT
Y £565 (U)
C £2,296 (Z)
F £5,236 (J,A)

BA MAN-LHR-NRT
Y £884
C £2,521
F £4,221

I've always thought the relatively low C (Z) fare that LH charged ex-UK was in competition with BA but was pleasantly surprised that it's actually lower than what BA currently charges. BA fares are considerably lower in F.

The difference is even more remarkable when you compare what LH charges ex-UK with fares ex-Germany.

LH FRA-NRT
Y €843 (W) = c. £689
C €3,762 (Z) = c. £3,073
F €12,310 (F) = c. £10,056

So travelling on the same flights (LH710/LH711) between FRA and NRT the price difference is between 22% and 92%! And that's including the exorbitant UK APD which will go up to £150 for this route in November. Incidentally NH fares ex-MAN to NRT are even higher than LH fares ex-FRA. There must be enough Japanese people who fly on NH because it's Japanese!

What has this got to do with refit of LH F or LH C? I think I'll burn my LHPJ/US DM/BMI miles and eVouchers on F awards/upgrades on LH/LX for now until LX's refurbished 343s with new C seats start flying to NRT some time during 2011. I'd love to try NH's new C seats but the price is too high and awards are next to impossible to get.

mamb0

Welcome to my world, although we have a rebated company tariff (z prices for D fare rules).

But that is also the reason, why I seldomly can make use of a cheap positioning flight to somewhere in Europe start a long haul trip there and profit from cheap fees. Our company has to hit certain goals with money spent on LH and only tickets bought within germany are applicable.

ogepma

AZ has no choice, they have to win passangers back

I am just wondering, if Wolfgang has lost touch with reality why is LH doing so well in almost everything atm? Why have they grown so big and why are they still a prefered carrier to people who don't care at all about lie flat, fully flat etc (which is the majority of the 50+ million people that flew LH last year). INfact I can tell you that he is very much in touch with reality. LH is a REALIABLE AND CONSISTENT airline (I THink it is high-time everyone got that in their heads!) and being such an airline does not mean introducing new products every 2 to 3 years and introducing fancy stuff everytime whilst sacrificing service standards and other things that really matter to the average passenger. This is why LH is a successful airline today. Their management have a strong business plan which is working very well for them. They are very balanced and fair well in almost everything they do (at least the most important ones). LH's business module is like a mix of american airlines and asian airlines however, there seems to be some kind of balance were they are still very coperate but they still have very decent service and at the end of the day, they have still been voted as the best airline in europe by SKYTRAX

Btw, Swiss has only 15 a340s to refit with their new cabins which they introduced over a year ago and i don't think even one has the new cabin yet. LH has 98 with 33 more on order. so........