FD1971

Do you expect them to have any problems with that?

Many of the non-refundable fares within Europe are between €5 and 50, the amount they calculate for the average call center customer interaction is appr. €4.

A plane sitting on the ground for an hour is close to a full fare C ticket (across the pond )

And in this case, we are talking about a Jungle Jet.

Lack

For all those who think this will push German aviation back into dark ages, quoting fares before any deregulation I'd suggest looking at more recent history. Just a couple days ago, when fuel pricing was soaring, YQ was pushed sky high, but remained refundable. You could easily get 75% back on your lowest fares. Not only LH wasn't am boden, but I got invoices to prove fares on my regular routes were 30% or so cheaper. And gave more miles...

Fares might be. By total cost of tickets includes the taxes (which are already refundable) and YQ, keeping which might be hardly justifiable if the passenger doesn't travel.
Oh, and you can cancel tickets online too!

But I'm sure between all the lawyers and consultants they have on retainer one might have a bright idea how to circumvent that, or at least delay it till another court challenges their idea (same as with random segment sequence).

I was thinking actually in the same direction - slap on a heavy processing fee.

fassy

So, where does it stop?

All non-refundable hotel bookings will need to be refunded now? The hotel can always sell the room to somebody else. Concert tickets? Sure... if you're not going they can let in somebody else...

To be honest, you don't need to read the full fare rules. LH shows in their booking system very nice icons for "refundable", "refundable for a fee", or "non-refundable" and if you want to save the money just accept that you won;t get it back if you change your mind. For important things like sickness there is always the insurance option

FD1971

Finally, you made the most important point. ^

We can def. complain about a lot of things in Germany, but we should not complain about air fares being too high.

This would be ridiculous considering what we pay these days. So we can only hope that LH continues on the path set by Franz, that some sheiks continue to subsidize aviation like crazy & Erdogan follows their approach. And as long as we continue to support struggling local airports as well, we do not need any change at all destroying this beautiful business case for the German citizen.

We have to accept that LH's dividend will be lower due to all these factors, but as long as they offer DXB at €99 ex CGN, we should ignore the dividend as well.

I really feel for the average Nekkie who has to pay for the Homann potatoe salad now instead of getting it for free at the Sen lounge, but 400g @ € 1,11 at your local Rewe even gets you a few miles via Payback these days.

Add a Humana milk powder double coupon to the mix and you are already on a good way to a Fly Smart award.

Hagbard Viking

and if you order a bottle of wine in a restaurant which is marked up by a factor of five or more compared to a liquor store, you can drink most of it, return the rest, and only owe the restaurant what the bottle costs in the liquor store plus whatever costs they can prove to have had to serve it to you...

Flying Lawyer

If you were right, which is not as clear as you phrase it, we will face the end of non refundable non re-bookable tickets on the German market and DB, LH and AB will sell Y tickets only. Good news for all of us.

Lack

Like 5 years ago, when you could buy 99 EUR tickets with 97 EUR in extra charges that were voluntarily refunded by LH?
Yes, that would be good news.

keretey

Off-topic a bit:
With refunds and cost to airline - it's one discussion.
But it would be interesting in some cases to make rule 'you have to flight all flights in bought order' ineffective. Now it's even more ridiculous than with ticket returns - you are late to outbound flight and get there somehow else but then you cannot board inbound flight... And in this case could be really hard to justify 'additional cost for airline'.

Lack

That's why there's an option box to tick if you want to take flights in non sequential order. I'm sure the airlines will find a similar solution to the refundable issues.

The proposed changes to EU261 actually take on this issue:

irishguy28

It's out of LH's hands. (And this won't impact just LH, but all tickets on all airlines sold in Germany. Or is this "ruling" somehow restricted JUST to Lufthansa?).

If, as the OP implies, every ticket sold in Germany has to become almost completely flexible, then all airlines will suddenly find that their old model - where differentiated pricing was offered on the basis of differentiated tickets (after all, the seat/journey is the same, the only "difference" are the restrictions applied) has suddenly been torpedoed. As regards cancellations, there is no longer any differentiation allowed in the German market.

As such, they will be under pressure to increase the ticket prices. Flexible tickets are charged at a higher rate, because this was an add-on. If they don't adjust their prices, why would anyone buy a higher-priced ticket? The cheapest discount-economy ticket will do - they can change their mind at any time, and cancel for a full refund.

There will be no incentive anymore for the airlines to offer cheap tickets, because every ticket they sell will now actually have the main feature of their most expensive tickets - full flexibility.

htb

Come on... Even most of the bottom-low fares are flexible. You can rebook them if you pay a fee. No need to buy a higher fare for that.

Only very expensive fares are refundable now. And how many people actually refund tickets? That must be in the range of <5%. Rebooking is probably in the range of 10-20%.

As such we're actually talking about a non-issue for the airline. Either continue as is and make sure that none of the <0.01% of non-refundable cancellations taken to court go higher than "Landgericht", or find some other way to recoup some money from cancellations.

HTB.

htb

YQ on non-refundable fares is non-refundable.

HTB.

Lack

Used to be refundable though. And LH was just fine.

irishguy28

And in some cases it may even be cheaper just to buy a brand new ticket!!! But the ruling, as I understand it, does not apply to changes - just to CANCELLATION.

Precisely. All airlines, everywhere, require you to pay a premium for this additional "service". Most air passengers anywhere in the world should be aware of this fact. That's why I find it so strange that a German court would require that ALL tickets come with this "convenience" built in. It's something that people are used to paying extra for.

Well, whether people use the facility or not, it's not such a non-issue. The ability to cancel is the number one aspect that allows an airline to charge a premium for a ticket that is, afterall, in every other way indistinguishable from the cheapest super-apex bargain-basement discount ticket. You will both be sitting in a similar seat in the same cabin, regardless of whether you paid next to nothing for your ticket, or whether you paid a handsome premium for the ability to be able to change/cancel your ticket with the minimum of fuss. (OK, one of you would get more FF miles, but that's outside the scope of this discussion).

Why, then, would an airline continue to sell tickets at such a range of differing prices, and with such a range of increasing/decreasing restrictions? Once the main "prize" - the ability to cancel without penalty - has been granted to all tickets, then the ability to differentiate between these various virtual "levels" of ticket attractiveness has been sabotaged. The existing wide differentiation between ticket "levels" and pricing has therefore been compromised. No-one will pay the higher prices to obtain the "pricier" tickets to obtain a degree of flexibility regarding cancellation - their cheapest super-apex bargain-basement discount ticket already allows them to cancel.

That means that Lufthansa's customers' willingness to pay higher fees has been sabotaged by this ruling. It means that Lufthansa's ability to sell considerable numbers of higher-priced tickets has been compromised. It means that Lufthansa's revenues have therefore been negatively influenced - they can no longer expect to sell the same range of tickets at various prices that they previously would have expected from the current model, given that the demand for the more expensive tickets has been suddenly removed. Therefore, Lufthansa would have no choice but to raise the ticket prices across the board, particularly at the lower end, as they need to achieve the same revenue but from a cabin where fewer people will want to pay for the higher ticket prices. With fewer "high-price" tickets sold, which help to subsidise the cheapest tickets, then the average/median ticket price will HAVE to rise to compensate.

Lufthansa can no longer sell the cheapest, restricted tickets. Everyone must now buy a more "premium" ticket. The prices will HAVE to rise to compensate. (Unless they are allowed, as they did with the "I will use all coupons in sequence" tickbox, to introduce a tickbox saying: "I want to see the most keenly priced tickets available. I hereby waive my right to cancel the ticket without penalty, in order to see cheaper ticket prices".)


How many people cancel, you say? Well, that's a little beside the point. Going from a situation where, maybe, 10% of customers in the economy cabin were entitled to cancel for free, suddenly, every passenger in the plane, in ever cabin class, is suddenly entitled to cancel at a moment's notice and get a full refund. That will certainly have an effect on the numbers that cancel. Previously, most customers were aware that their cheap ticket came with restrictions - I, like most customers, was happy to have this tradeoff, knowing that I could buy a cheap seat but that I was then locked into taking that flight. NOw, however, I can decide on the day before travel that really, I don't feel like going away for the weekend after all, and so I can cancel and get my money back. When every passenger now has the ability to cancel, then the numbers that actually do cancel are likely to rise considerably. People who previously just no-showed will now call up and cancel. And people who would previously have travelled, just because they had booked the ticket and there was no way to get out of travelling despite having changed their minds in the interim, can call up and cancel at any time. The ruling will make all travellers change from a mindset of: book early, commit to a date, and hope that the dates remain good because I won't be able to change; to: book early, commit to a date, or to several dates if the prices aren't too high: decide later which flight I want, and cancel the others; or cancel them all if I just change my mind.

By making all tickets refundable, customer behaviour will soon change. Any ticket can be cancelled, at any time; this is an entirely different situation to the current one, where most customers put a lot of thought and effort into picking the right flights, and buying only when they are absolutely committed to taking that flight, no matter what. The consequences of purchasing are now not as final; the customer can always change their mind, and back out again at any time. Even when they are committed to travel, they can still continue to monitor prices, on LH and on other airlines, keeping watch for an even better price - and buy a new, cheaper ticket elsewhere (should one become available) while cancelling their original purchase. The purchase of a ticket, which previously signalled the end of an (often long) process of research and study, will no longer be the end of the saga. The buyer can renege on the deal at any time, once they find a better offer, or just change their mind. The money is not Lufthansa's, until the passenger takes off on that flight!

htb

@irishguy28: more people may cancel, but I'm sure that can be used to generate a new stream of revenue. After all, by law reservations are binding. If you cancel, all you are supposed to get back is the amount LH saves because you are not traveling. I.e. fees and taxes, food etc. For hotels the courts have established some percentage values (10-20% for rates with breakfast, 30% with one additional meal, 60% with two meals). All LH has to do is to play along.

And seriously: most people don't buy an expensive fare because they want to cancel again. Most people buy an expensive fare because the low fares have sold out.

All in all a non-issue. Works perfectly with hotels, and hotel prices are not sky-high as some people here try to make them to be. Less so than in the US where non-refundable means non-refundable.

HTB.