2035

Hi
Looking for constructive advice from community on how to escalate a complaint to Swiss, as I've reached a brick wall with customer service.

I booked family of 4 in business class to US last year. For overnight return flight SFO-ZRH, 2 of the seats were inoperable for the whole flight (apart from last 30 minutes or so..) - no recline, no IFE, no lights, no lumbar control (seat were rock-hard on hardest setting).
Purser/Maitre de was extremely apologetic, and could not have been nicer. Gave me extra blankets, F amenity kit etc. There were no spare seats in F or C class at all - and in Y only middle seat right at the back. He gave me a code for USD 300 per person eVoucher (ie total USD 600) as goodwill on the spot (this the highest he was allowed to give) and told me to write in the customer service for 'substantial compensation', as the experience was completely unacceptable for 11 hour business class flight and I was largely unable to sleep - or even watch IFE...
Customer service refused even to redeem the USD 300 code - instead giving me 4 separate vouchers to use on different tickets (2 x USD 100, 2 x USD 200). I have asked to be creditted with cash/vo9ucher or points for the value of difference between Y and C on this sector - say USD 1500 or 35K miles per person, but they refuse to provide any additional compensation, saying

'Kindly allow us to explain that the seat does not form part of the Contract of Carriage. We regret that we are unable to provide additional compensation or goodwill.
We hope for your understanding of our position regarding this matter.'

Any advice on how to escalate? Seems ridiculous...

Nic33

Difficult to give advice on how to proceed, except to insist with customer service. I would claim the price difference between C and Y on those legs for each broken seat. It should be at least USD 1000 per seat, I suppose.

airoli

Agree with Nic33 - I don't think you have any legal claims here (unlike in the case of EU261 etc.) so you can only try to continue engaging / arguing with customer service for more compensation.

Or you can vote with your feet and not give LX any of your business in the future.

Fabio Cardinale

2035 - I have a similar situation. Earlier this year I had a broken business class seat with deflated air cushions on my flight from JFK to ZRH and I was hence sitting on the metal interior of the seat. No free space in business or first class unfortunately. The crew was super nice and tried to repair the seat even before take off but no luck. The maitre de cabine offered a voucher for 250 CHF which was the most he could give on the spot. After several emails and phone calls with the customer service I did not get any additional compensation. The only additional thing I got was 3,000 award miles to honor my status as senator. The main argument they provided for not giving a higher compensation was that they have to follow a standard compensation protocol for a broken seat, which is 250 CHF and the same for every guest (regardless of the booked class and/or status). I was surprised and disappointed about that argument. Were you able to ultimately get out more? I'm about to give up but I'm also getting a little bit frustrated with the customer service.

Dave_C

If you’re based in the UK, then you may be able to take Swiss to the small claims court here, under the UK Consumer Rights Act 2015. There are several provisions in the legislation requiring goods to be as described. There’s a fair bit of discussion over on the BA Board about it.

I suspect if you were to sue for the amount of the ticket, that a few days before your hearing was due, you’d get an offer from Swiss to settle for the amount.

Fabio Cardinale

Thanks Dave. I live in the US but am originally from Switzerland so not sure how this approach would be applicable. I think I generally went the wrong way and reached out to the customer support in Switzerland instead of the one in the US. Should not make a difference theoretically but I feel the customer service is much better (or more generous) in the US. When I talked to others who had similar issues with US airlines they were compensated significantly better.

Tafflyer

In your case I would instruct a Swiss layer to initiate action against Swiss. The service you received was not as advertised. Despite what Swiss tell you, the seat (and flat bed) are in fact the main point in flying business class and Swiss themselves advertise this fact. This is just another example of shoddy service from the Lufthansa group.

However, I would wait and see if Swiss still exists after the Corona pandemic before committing to lawyers fees as you would be liable for these costs if the case falls flat due to Swiss being insolvent.

momoflyingguy

wondering if anyone had any luck getting more than the 250 CHF / 300 USD in these cases?

BinSabai

I was at the end of 2019 on a longhaul in F. Seat could not recline at all. I got 1200 CHF compensation; could sit for start, landing and meals in F and for sleeping, I was offered a free J seat, which can also fully recline but of course is not so spacious as the F seat...

warakorn

Good luck in finding such a lawyer in Switzerland, where you can afford the lawyer's fee.

BinSabai

to get a lawyer in such a case is only advisable if money does not matter and if you do not mind any costs and time to take revenge against the airline...

Concerto

It's a shame SWISS has become like this but it is, as I have said too many times now, the reason I don't book LX any more apart from short flights to NCE or DUS for example. What could be done to bring it back up to standard? I get the ever so slight feeling that they are deliberately putting people in broken business class seats here, knowing they are broken. But I could be wrong.

ced_lx

FYI, I’ve had this happen twice and both times the lack of seat functionality was due to some item stuck behind the seat. In both cases I just reached and pulled out a water bottle and the other time one of the metal trays they serve with in F. purser was grateful and gave me a bottle of wine.

BinSabai

in F or C?

ced_lx

Was in F as I recall. Though something similar happened in C as well but it was the belt that was stuck in the seat somehow and it took some elbow grease to get it free. Again I did this as the staff’s reaction is always “it’s broken, nothing we can do about it”.