Lufthansa is good, but inconsistent
Written: Jun 02 '07 (Updated Jun 02 '07)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: service, new planes, on-time, food, clean cabins
Cons: staff can be rude, legroom, no PTVs, hard landings
The Bottom Line: A good airline, but it's reputation is better. Lufthansa is great for business class and first class, not for economy.
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| rohank4284's Full Review: Lufthansa |
Recently I flew Lufthansa from Denver-Frankfurt, Frankfurt-Delhi and back. In addition, I have flown Lufthansa 10 times and find this review consistent with my experiences.
Booking:
Since most of my family lives in New Delhi, I fly there often and my flight options out of Denver are pretty limited. For instance, Denver has only two direct international flights: British Airways to London Heathrow and Lufthansa to Frankfurt Main. Lufthansa was the cheapest direct flight out of Denver, so I booked through a travel agent and almost everything went smoothly. I was able to get my special meals and my seats for three out of four flights, however, the Lufthansa staff refused to allocate seats for the Denver-Frankfurt leg and I was stuck in the back of the plane.
Check-in in Denver:
In Denver the check-in was fast and efficient and I got on my way. Unlike many other airports Lufthansa had over 8 agents working and managed to move lines very quickly. A friendly check-in lady gave me a free Lufthansa bag to put my extra magazines and books in. Wow what a nice touch from an airline. Security took about 30 minutes, but arrived at the gate with an hour to spare. One thing that I did not like was that Lufthansa refused to let my travel agent book my seat for the Denver-Frankfurt flight and I was stuck in the back of the plane, despite making my reservation THREE months in advance.
Return trip check-in in New Delhi:
While the check-in in Denver went well, my check-in in New Delhi did not. Lufthansa had 3 ticket counters with 6 staff members serving the 100 or so people in business and first, and had only 4 staff members serving the nearly 300 people in Economy. I had to wait in line for nearly an hour to be checked-in. Despite the busy time the check-in agents were friendly and got me on my way.
Boarding Procedures:
In Denver the gate agents boarded by zones, which were determined by your check-in order and the boarding went very smoothly. Within a half-hour the plane was ready for take-off.
In Frankfurt, for my flight to New Delhi, all passengers were required to pre-board. Basically, this where Lufthansa forces all passengers to enter a gated area and if you want to leave, you must give your boarding pass to an agent. Lufthansa claims that pre-boarding speeds up the boarding process, which helps makes its operations at the busy Frankfurt Main airport go more smoothly. According to me, pre-boarding is just another silly excuse for Lufthansa to make passenger's lives more miserable. After about an hour, a Lufthansa agent called for priority boarding and all of the passengers, including those in economy, jumped up and began pushing each other. The agents did nothing and we just boarded the aircraft in a horribly disorganized manner. Now, I understand that some Indians are rude and pushy, but the agents should have done more. Also, the overhead bins were full of heavy baggage and the process took over an hour.
The return trip:
The boarding at Delhi was again atrocious, as the staff maintained no control over the rude and pushy passengers and the overhead bins were again stuffed to the brim with overweight baggage. Despite starting the boarding process one-hour before our scheduled departure time, we took off over 40 minutes late.
The planes:
Lufthansa has one of the newest and most technologically advanced fleets of any airline. Currently the airline flies a mixture of Boeings and Airbuses. Here are the fleet numbers:
14 Airbus A300 (domestic flights; 217 passengers)
19 Airbus A319 (domestic flights; 132 passengers)
45 Airbus A320/321 (domestic flights; 150-180 passengers)
10 Airbus A330 (mid-range international flights; 221 passengers)
28 Airbus A340-300 (long-ranger international flights; 221-266 passengers)
17 Airbus A340-600 (newest plane in fleet; extra-long international flights; 306-345 passengers)
63 Boeing 737-300/500 (domestic flights; 111-127 passengers)
30 Boeing 747-400 (extra-long range international flights; 330-390 passengers)
20 Boeing 747-8 (currently on order will be delivered by 2010; ultra-long range; 400 or more passengers)
20 Airbus A380-800 (currently on order and will be delivered by 2009; ultra-long range; 500 or more passengers)
Also, Lufthansa is looking to order either the Boeing 787 or Airbus A350. These planes will probably enter service in 2010 or 2012.
Condition of planes used on my trip:
Denver-Frankfurt and Frankfurt-Denver: Airbus A340-600
This aircraft is the newest in Lufthansa's fleet and is an update to the Airbus A340-300. The Airbus A340 was designed to be a long-range plane that was smaller than the Boeing 747-400, but larger than the Boeing 767-300. The plane was first flown in 1989 and actually did very well, but the arrival of the Boeing 777 ended that. Then in 1997 Airbus announced that it was updating the Airbus A340 and created the Airbus A340-500/600 series. These planes had quieter engines, a new cabin, and longer-range capabilities.
The Airbus A340-600 was clean and had the typical gray and yellow Lufthansa seats and the legroom was extremely cramped, the seats were tiny, and the only in-flight entertainment was a few small overhead LCD TVs. A few good things about the plane were that the cabin was sparkling, the plane was quiet, and the seats had good support. In fact, during the cruise I think the plane was even slightly quieter than the Boeing 777. One interesting thing about this plane was that the lavatories were located below the main cabin.
Frankfurt-Delhi and Delhi-Frankfurt: Boeing 747-400
The Boeing 747-400 is Boeing's latest update of the classic Boeing 747 series, which became extremely popular in the 1970s, due its unique shape, which allowed for a small upper deck, large capacity, and long range. The Boeing 747-400 entered service in the late 1980s. This variant of the plane had a new digital cockpit, a larger upper deck, a new cabin, a new wing design, and more powerful engines. However, this variant of the Boeing 747 is also infamous for its loud engines.
The Boeing 747-400 aircraft is the international workhorse of the Lufthansa fleet, but it is also the oldest. The cabin was good condition and the seats had slightly more legroom than the airbus, but it wasn't anything great. Also, the overhead bins have a rectangular shape, unlike the curved shape you find on many modern airliners, so this compromises some of the space above the seat and the overhead bins aren't as spacious. Also, the plane was extremely loud on take-off and was loud throughout the duration of the flight.
Livery:
Most of Lufthansa's planes are painted white with a light gray underbelly. The tail is mostly blue with a large yellow Lufthansa logo in the center. Also, the plane has a small Lufthansa logo near the front of the plane and the word "Lufthansa" is painted in blue. In my opinion the livery has a nice classic look, but I would have liked some more color.
The Flight Attendants:
DEN-FRA and FRA-DEN:
The flight attendants on these flights were very welcoming and even seemed enthusiastic about serving passengers. After take-off there was a drink service and dinner was served. Throughout the flight the staff made sure that passengers were hydrated, as water and orange juice was offered every half-hour through the flight. However, the staff on Lufthansa never responds well to call buttons and often forgets about requests. Also, on Lufthansa it does not pay too be extra nice or rude to flight attendants. The best way to make sure that your requests are fulfilled is to be firm, but polite to the staff.
DEL-FRA and FRA-DEL:
On the Delhi to Frankfurt (DEL-FRA) leg the flight attendants were polite and they came around fairly often. Also, the bathrooms were kept very clean. On the Frankfurt-Delhi leg the staff was surly and many of them seemed disinterested. On this flight, water was hard to come by and I had to go the galley to get some. However, bad service on Lufthansa has been very rare and this case I can understand how the staff can be turned off on a flight from India, as Indians tend to be notorious for their rude behavior and excessive requests.
Food:
Lufthansa serves some the best airline food I have ever had. I ordered special meals (Asian Veg.), but they were spicy and had nice deserts. Good work Lufthansa. Lufthansa also still serves free alcohol and will give you more coke or sprite if you request it. On both flights we were served a small snack, a full meal, and a large pre-landing snack.
Hubs:
Frankfurt Main is Lufthansa's main hub. The airport is a maze and the majority of the staff is unhelpful and will send you in circles. Otherwise once you get a grasp the airport is not bad and has nice waiting areas and shops. In Frankfurt, I would recommend that you be very careful of gate employees in Frankfurt, as they all seem very frustrated and ready to explode.
Baggage:
All of bags arrived safely with me in Delhi and in Denver. However, in Delhi it took me nearly 2.5hrs to retrieve my bags, but this is more to do with the airport's old technology than the airline. In Denver my bags arrived in 40 minutes.
Note:
Most of the time my bags arrived free of scratches, but when I landed in New Delhi, one my suitcases was completely destroyed and it had been wrapped in plastic tape. The latch was completely bent and broken and the suitcase was cracked in a few places. I have traveled with Lufthansa many times, so I hope that this was an isolated incident. In addition, the airline offered no compensation for the damaged suitcase, but none of my stuff was missing either. However, I was very thankful than Lufthansa baggage handlers bothered to wrap the suitcase after it broke, as many airlines will just toss the broken bag into the cargo hold and let your stuff fly all over the place.
One thing I liked about Lufthansa is that during the movie the F/As come around with trays containing water and orange juice in Economy! If US airlines gave such good service I would have no reason to fly Lufthansa.
On-time:
Almost all of flights aboard Lufthansa have been on time and I have only experienced one delay in my 12 flights with the airline. In fact, the airline has one of the best on-time records in the business. As, they say, Lufthansa does a good job resembling German efficiency. Another, nice thing about Lufthansa is that they will hold up most flights if needed to allow connecting passengers to board and even most of these planes arrive on time. In my experiences, for the most part Lufthansa departs about 10-15 minutes late, but on all flights that I have been on Lufthansa has arrived at the gate early or on time.
According to flightstats.com Lufthansa has an overall on-time arrival percentage of 73% and below I have listed the on-time arrival percentage for my flights.
Denver-Frankfurt (LH 447): 78%
Frankfurt-Delhi: (LH 760): 61%
Delhi-Frankfurt: (LH 761): 70%
Frankfurt-Denver:(LH 446): 71%
Delays and Problems:
In my twelve flights with the airline on this route we have only been delayed twice. Once we were held up for an hour, due to connecting passengers and amazingly we actually arrived in Denver early. The other time occurred when a cargo door malfunctioned and we were delayed for over an hour and half, but we arrived in Delhi only 35 minutes behind schedule.
Pilots:
One thing I hate about Lufthansa's pilots no matter how good the weather will always slam the plane on the runway, except while landing in Frankfurt. I wish Lufthansa would fix this problem as I do not like being jolted up and down twice each time the plane touches solid ground. I have flown many other airlines such as, United and Singapore and have never experienced such hard landings.
Also, Lufthansa's pilots don't communicate that much with the passengers throughout the flight. So, unlike many airlines the pilot will not keep you that informed about the progress of the flight or nearby weather conditions.
Denver International Airport:
DIA is a brand new airport and serves as a hub for United and Frontier Airlines. The airport is very clean and has plenty of seating in the waiting areas and has a good selection of restaurants. Due to airport's large footprint our plane taxied for nearly 30 minutes prior to takeoff. Otherwise, everything from immigration to security went well here. Lufthansa currently flies only non-stop to Frankfurt, but will start a new service to Munich soon from Denver.
Indira Gandhi International Airport, New Delhi:
IGI is a very old and moderately busy airport. Most international flights take-off from Delhi at night, so this can be an inconvenience. The airport was mostly clean, but lacked proper seating areas, as I had to go the adjacent gate to get a seat while waiting for my flight. The airport does not have a lot of restaurants and only has cafes in the departure area. Currently the airport is undergoing improvements to handle the additional traffic of 2010 Commonwealth Games. Lufthansa has two non-stop flights from IGI one to Frankfurt and one to Munich.
Thoughts about Lufthansa:
Overall, Lufthansa has good service and clean aircraft, but their economy class lacks proper IFE and the legroom is smaller than most airlines. Nevertheless, they are efficient and will get you to your destination(s) on time and the airline is also home to Lufthansa Technik, which is a world rewound aircraft mechanic company. Even some other airlines prefer to use Lufthansa Technik over their own mechanics, so you'll always be sure that the plane are in good condition and Lufthansa also has an excellent safety record. Lufthansa has better service than most US airlines, such as American and Continental, but their planes are less comfortable. Also, Lufthansa tends to be a little more expensive than many US airlines.
If you are flying from America on Lufthansa you can count on great service, but if you're flying Lufthansa to India, I would recommend you choose a different airline, as the staff tends to be very indifferent on those flights. Another thing that bothers me about the airline is how the airline has a luxurious business and first class, but only has a basic economy class. For instance, Lufthansa does not have PTVs on any of its flights, unlike many other airlines, nor does the airline give passengers generous amounts of legroom. If you want in economy class there are definitely better ways to fly than Lufthansa.
Final Evaluation and Recommendation:
I would recommend Lufthansa to anyone looking for an airline with good service and an excellent on-time record. However, Lufthansa's economy class is tighter than most and the Frankfurt Main Airport hub is a maze, so Lufthansa may not be the best airline for everyone.
Ratings:
Overall: 3.5/5
Booking (travel agent): 3.5/5
Check-in Speed: 3/5
Check-in Staff Quality: 4/5
Boarding Procedures: 3/5
Service: 4/5
Seat Comfort: 3.5/5
Legroom: 2/5
Cabin cleanliness: 5/5
Abbreviations that I used:
IFE= In-flight entertainment
PTVs= Personal Televisions
DEN= Denver International Airport
FRA= Frankfurt Main International Airport
DEL= Indira Gandhi International Airport
NOTE: For those interested, I have also reviewed United Airlines, Denver International Airport, IGI airport, and the city New Delhi. Please click on the links below if you want to read them.
http://www.epinions.com/content_302450052740
http://www.epinions.com/content_333811912324
http://www.epinions.com/content_360480411268
http://www.epinions.com/content_342078819972
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
rohank4284
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Location: Denver, Colorado
Reviews written: 18
Trusted by: 13 members
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