Lufthansa
 

I know I am a new member to this board, but I had to find a place to vent and decide if there is anything I can do about tickets I purchased last week.

My husband and I decided to look into taking advantage of Lufthansa's air sale to go to our favorite place in the world - Italy.

After many calls and probably a collective 2 hours on hold, we managed to make reservations and pay for two round-trip tickets from the west coast to Italy for a grand total of $750, taking advantage of their special fares and companion flies free deal. We made payment on our tickets just over a week ago.

Today, I was called by Lufthansa. They told me that we could not have this fare - someone made a mistake (they can not combine the discounted fare with the companion flies free offer) and they would be willing to refund our money or we can pay an additional $400 and keep our reservation.

Maybe my thinking is wrong - but should their mistake be my problem? If it were the other way around, and I had made some sort of error in my travel arrangements, would they be so forgiving? Absolutly not! In paying for my ticket, I would have agreed to their fare rules and would be subject to change fees, non-refundable airfare, etc. In effect, by paying for my tickets I would have entered into a contract.

When they give me the price, and I pay them for the tickets at the price they quoted, have they not entered into a contract with me?

I am planning on talking to someone at the airline tomorrow about this to try to save my airfare from increasing. Is this thinking nuts? Is it worth a try?

I am not a lawyer, but...

If money has changed hands, you will likely be in a contract. But you'll probably find that, in the terms and conditions, the airline reserves the right to terminate it. In that case of a discount ticket, you don't have the right. That's the way it goes.

It's worth pursuing to see if you can get something from goodwill (it's not as if you were getting a $0.01 fare or anything), but I doubt you'd have any legal recourse.

[This message has been edited by stut (edited 10-21-2003).]

I don't know how universal legal principles are. I don't know what law would apply when you use a German carrier to fly from the US to Italy. But I do know that German contract law is the same as contract law here in the UK, and it works on the principle of "offer - acceptance - consideration". If you have made an offer to buy something at a certain price, and that offer is accepted, then there is a valid contract. LH quoted you a fare, AND they took your money... that's a valid contract, at least under German law.

They probably realised they'd made a mistake when they tried to issue your tickets and "the system" wouldn't let them. "The system" can be overridden (I used to work for an airline) - but in order for this to happen someone will need to own up to the mistake they made, and get someone higher up in the company to do the manual override. They are trying to bully you into backing down from the contract so that they don't have to own up to their mistake.

If I were you I'd fight. Don't talk to the reservations department - go straight to customer relations, and make sure you talk to someone high up.

Good luck!

(Edited for typos)

[This message has been edited by Aviatrix (edited 10-21-2003).]

Hi, and welcome to FT. Your post belongs in LH in FTMiles. The people who post there will know how to handle the situation.

I know it is not M&M, but the LH day to day people are at LH M&M.

Why have a LH thread, when we have Travelbuzz?

Thank you, I guess I didn't look around enough first. I posted a link to this thread over there.

Thanks to all for your thoughts! http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttr...orum/smile.gif