oliver2002

AFP reports that Jens Bischof stated to fvw that ASR in economy will soon cost extra:

http://www.sz-online.de/nachrichten/...n-2656516.html

volta

Really not sure what to think of LH anymore. LH looks more and more penny wise, pound foolish

Another wise thing
It will work only through real agents, not online. So add few more euros to that as well.

Are they targeting business travelers with this?

Concerto

It's like a piece of music that combines an accelerando and a crescendo at the same time. The new enhancements are appearing ever more quickly and are increasingly stupid.

N1003U

The implementation will be interesting, as there really is no ASR today, unless you book Y/B or are an LH status customer.

If they keep ASR as a free perk for status members (and full Y), the only downside I see is that it becomes an enhancement for people like me, who as a SEN, can now snap up the best Y seats from a relatively wide-open selection at reservation time.

With paid ASR I would have to compete other customers who are willing to pay for, e.g., 76A/K on an A380.

One more quick revenue enhancer, one less advantage to remaining a loyal customer...

oliver2002

Since I don't have access to the pay per view fvw report (which must have the detailled inf since its the TA industry trade magazine) let me speculate that this must be an unbundling measure, ie one or all of the following measures:

- ASR against cash for anyone booking economy on longhaul
- ASR available (again) in Europe for anyone against cash
- ASR still free for Y/B and SEN/HON
- ASR for exit rows against cash like at OS

hugolover

BA have had this for some time and I have not found that I have been unable to choose the seat I wanted. Those stupid enough to pay for ASR, go-ahead. Given how they will probably price it I don't think SEN/HON have too much to worry about.

Now if LH go in the direction of the op-ups and ASR becomes mysteriously difficult for status customers but possible for paid ASR...

econprof

ASR in the exit row is a huge benefit for me as someone who's been SEN for the last 5 years through self-paid flying in Y. If they start charging me for that, well... I'll be one unhappy camper.

GBM.flights

Next unbundling will be luggage.
Already being implemented in GVA for LX flights.

gojko88

I don't think it's a fair comparison, LX is only doing that to compete against ridiculously low U2 fares out of GVA. Although there's very little that would truly surprise me these days.

Rambuster

http://www.spiegel.de/reise/aktuell/...-a-920623.html
"Mit dem neuen Angebot reagiere die Lufthansa auf Kundenwünsche. "
(LH is reacting to customer demands)

Customers requested free of charge ASR ... not chargeable ASR...

TRAVELSIG

Well- let's not split hairs here- customers wanted ASR, they got ASR, now if they don't want to pay for it- are they "really" customers ?

totti

Well the best thing is, that they are not even able to offer it for online bookings. Maybe this is also on customer demands If they introduce such a "service" they should do it properly, as BA did many years ago.

TRAVELSIG

This is unfortunately starting to remind me of the O'Leary/Ireland (Dublin)/Bar joke:

http://sophlylaughing.blogspot.it/20...-bar-joke.html

oliver2002

Since LH system manages to jumble all seat assignments on simple aircraft swaps, I wonder how that will go down with people who paid 10-70€ for the pleasure of selecting that perfect seat? How does BA & AY manage that?

TRAVELSIG

AY I have no idea- over on the BA forum you can see this from time to time and then the customer has to ask for a refund from customer service. Again- if this service is sold to everyone then it is one less reason to want/need any level of "tiered" membership in a frequent flyer program (or frequent shopper program as they now seem to be evolving into).