nacho

After an hour and a half I finally got to talk to SAS and explained my situation to them and the checked bag situation. I told them we can't take the 0+1=0 airlines so the agent took a long time to find an alternative.

He finally booked us on MS via CAI one day later. I asked them to book us on TK as we have status with them but they said it's not available (they are widely available on Google flight).

FlyingMoose

I wonder what the logic here is. That train just gets you to Hamburg. Taking trains from Oslo or Stockholm instead of Copenhagen adds multiple hours to just the train journey. Then you spend another 6-8 hours on the train to get to the more leisure parts of Europe and likely another 8-10 to get to the sunny parts. Are people really traveling by train for 30 hours to get to Southern Europe that is otherwise a 2-3 hour trip away? I doubt many Scandinavians have Germany by train as their holiday destination.

I read an article not that long ago about a journalist that went by train from Stockholm to Amsterdam which took 25 hours just to fly back in 1,5 hour. Trains aren't even remotely an alternative to flying for folks based in Scandinavia. It works better for West/Central European capital-capital transport. However, I can reach anything in Europe from ARN by air faster than I can even just leave the country by train.

ksu

But they still do this summer!

The reasons?
Nostalgia (Interrail was BIG in the 70s and 80s)
"Flygskam"
Hype in media about resurrection of long-distance night-trains, making people curious to want to try
Plane strikes and other irregularities ("Fagligt møde" every summer at CPH probably just as important as the current pilot strike...)
Seeing the journey as a part of the vacation in itself (same logic for ferry to Germany and the Netherlands)

dingo

I just got notice of my cancelled flight from Copenhagen to Oslo, which is fine since I never made it to Copenhagen from the US anyway. I had an option to cancel and refund the flight which I did, but the refund amount is like $90 less than what I paid because of some of being not refundable. Why not a full refund if they cancel?

dark_phoenix

My experience with SAS cancellation/rebooking/etc

So I was scheduled to take a flight to Lisbon later this month. When I checked the flight a week ago, the flight was scheduled to be flown by SAS Connect so I thought I was in the clear. I was flying Plus from ARN-LIS and then business back with Lufthansa.

Got a message yesterday that my flight had been cancelled. Seems that SAS Connect was no longer flying the Stockholm - Lisbon route (or maybe they got it wrong and just corrected it now). They moved my flight out by four (4) days, which obviously wouldn't work.

Called them this morning (Central European Time). I am EBD and the hold time was one hour. Once I got to a CSR, they offered to rebook me on an LH flight on the outbound on my original date of departure, but only in economy (the CSR told me that booking class D is economy for Lufthansa which I guess makes sense) and the flight would have arrived 5h50m later.

Before making the change, I did a quick search on Lufthansa's website and it turned out that it was cheaper for me to cancel the SAS booking and book directly with LH in business in both directions (saved about USD100). So I told the SAS CSR that I would prefer to be refunded.

I am happy that I managed to sort it out myself and end up with a better deal at a cheaper price. I suppose asking the gods to bless me with EU 261 compensation based on the two proposed rebooking offers would be asking for too much?

GUWonder

Sounds like SAS shorted you or still are to figure out where/how to credit back the previously non-refundable part of the ticket payment.

There are some add-collect games that can work to some parties advantage more than others when there are multiple sources of partial payment applicable to a ticketed booking being refunded. And there may also at times be a forex dynamic aspect to a party being shorted when ticket refunds take place.

On some routes there is an aspect to the trains appearing to be sold out because the train ticket sellers won’t sell a single ticket for a longer journey if a passenger seat change would be required en route. So while there may be space available to go from A-B + B-C on a given train, there may be no seat being sold for A-C — thus making A-C to appear sold out even as it’s possible to do A-B + B-C on the very same train as is showing as sold out for A-C. Something to consider when searching for trains to fill in the gaps arising from SAS strike cancellations and making back-up plans.

jerry_greece

As I understand, the issue is that first they send an "announcement of cancellation". At this stage they are looking for alternatives and if you choose to cancel, normal conditions apply. That's why in your booking they do mention the following:

"CANCELED

Your flight is in the process of being canceled, please wait until you receive another SMS before you change or cancel your booking."

Once you get this new SMS that says we were unable to rebook you, then if you cancel, you get the full amount back. There are reports though that this second SMS never came through...

the810

Not everyone's in a hurry, as much as it can shock some people Before the pandemic when I was fed up with flying and everything it included (check-in, security checks, baggage limits, etc) I switched 95% of my travel to trains. Including very long routes like Rotterdam - Bratislava (that was before direct nightjet to Amsterdam/Brussels, these days it would be an easy trip with one transfer).
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The train connectivity for Stockholm will be massively improved by Stockholm - Hamburg night train from September which will allow for many connections to other European cities with minimal time waste. Although I have to say the outbound timing is terrible.

Tomas E

Today’s SK903 ARN-EWR actually flew (currently north of Iceland). It must be the first ”outgoing” long haul SK flight since the start of the strike. Possibly flown by the chief pilot and two(?) other pilots in managerial position?

It was listed as ”scheduled” unlike the other days which were ”likely to be cancelled”.

Tomorrow’s return flight (Thu 14 July) SK904 EWR-ARN is also listed as ”scheduled”. Just as you’d expect if the return flight is operated by the same crew after rest. So tomorrow’s SK904 should be safe.

CPH-Flyer

Is there a meeting at the UN, or the Royal Family had to go? There must have been some rather heavy reason for these two flights to be operated.....

Tomas E

The Royal family or modest-size government delegations don’t need SAS. They can travel with the Airforce and their two (possibly three) Gulfstreams that are used for VIP flights.

KiwiRob

I live just outside of Molde a small town on Norway's west coast, there is no rail alternative to flying, SAS and the pilots who fly for them have ruined my families first summer holiday in 3 years, for this I will never forgive them. I have flights this Sunday to Barcelona via Oslo. SK sent a rebooking notification today, for the following Sunday, this is not good the hotel I've booking in Barcelona is booked out the following and my older son and wife can't come because they are at back at work, neither can change their weeks off. The next issue is the dog hotel for our dog, that can't be changed to another week, we struggled to get her into a hotel due to the govt booking almost all the available places for Ukrainian refugees pets [mod edit]

FlyingMoose

Oh, I've been fed up with flying for 3 decades but I don't know many people that can justify spending 25 hours traveling when it can be done in 1,5. Perhaps students? I've taken trains between London and Paris, Paris and Amsterdam, various domestic high speed trains in Germany and I absolutely love the Shinkansen in Japan. I use them when they are viable near equal alternatives. Scandinavia, or at least Stockholm and Oslo are by train to far away from the rest of Western Europe to see it as a viable near equal alternative. In addition, the Scandinavia to Western Europe train journeys being more expensive than flying.

I did wonder about this as well. If anyone figures out the background or reason, that would be interesting to learn.

the810

First of all, if someone travels 25 hours, they're probably use night trains somewhere along the way, so not entire 25 hours are spent on travel, some of that is covered by sleep.

Anyway, I got to the age when I'm simply useless on my travel day. Even if it was a short one hour flight, to whole experience just destroys me and I won't do anything else on that day. So I might as well take a more comfortable option, I won't be missing on anything.

Obviously, YMMV, it's not for everyone. But there is some group of people who find trains better option even if they take significantly longer.

Im a new user

You don't need a reservation for Hamburg-Flensburg or Flensburg-Denmark (Flensburg must be the train's first/last station - be careful to book the right train). You also don't need a reservation for Hamburg-Niebüll, Niebüll-Bramming-Esbjerg or Esbjerg-Bramming-Copenhagen.

Direct trains from Hamburg to Copenhagen technically only require a seat reservation for the Schleswig-Flensburg-Padborg portion. I don't know if you could use this in some way.

Careful with the Deutsche Bahn booking. DB will happily sell tickets for sold out trains and won't inform you until after you insert your credit card information and try to pay.

I think the idea is that you don't cancel your original ticket but instead claim back the cost of the new tickets from SK for failure to rebook you.