Lufthansa Sues Missing Passenger

Easy solution for the airlines: don't make the flights with connections cost less than the non stop. Then there would be no need for the passengers to want to do this. I'm not really surprised the airline is doing this. The always have claimed they could and would cancel all of your frequent flyer miles and in effect ban you from flying with them. This person must have done the same thing multiple times for Lufthansa to actually take them to court.

A court in Spain already ruled again Iberia when it sued one of its passengers for doing this too.

I feel that as long as you don't have checked luggage which would inconvenience the airline by requiring them to remove your bag from the hold, what difference does it make? The airline can put one of its standby passengers in your seat when you don't show up and charge that person an inflated fare and make even more profit. You paid the fare and chose not to use all of it. Will they do the same to you if you become ill and have to visit the emergency room thereby missing the flight even if you wanted to be on it?

So next the grocery stores are going to sell a single loaf of bread for $1.25 a loaf, or a 2 pack for $1.10, And if you do not eat both loaves they will come after you for the difference?

"We sold the customer and he paid for a product/service and didnt use it all, so he owes us more".
That argument cries out for government intervention

You joke about the grocery, but there was a sushi restaurant that had a lunch special and when this one person ordered 2 of the specials and only ate the fish, leaving the rice, the restaurant charged her for sashimi at the regular price. Made the local news because the restaurant critic for the local paper was there at the time. The restaurant is no longer in business due to trying this with multiple customers.

I doubt LH is pursuing the case because it expects to win, and certainly not because it wants its €2,000 back. What it wants and will appeal until it has it, is a higher court judgement on what is acceptable ( including for its competitors). It can then write it's contracts to reflect that. Big corporations like LH want legal certainty more than success on minor money cases like this.

Edit - and I see the case they've chosen involves EU (Germany), EEA (Norway) and third country (USA). Pretty much chosen, I suspect, to get an ECJ decision if needed.

Nick - I am certain this is the case. They want legal precedent.

My local Walgreen's sells the movie theatre box candy at 4 for $1, or $1.59/each. So 3 boxes cost more than four. They will not let you just get 3 and they keep the 4th. The last time, by chance and unknown to us, one of our selections was on sale for about 79 cents. So my total was over $6. I asked them to charge me the regular price. No can do. Its a lot of work for just candy for the movies. . .

Buying two loaves of bread in a single pack is offered at Costco.

Travel + Leisure has some interesting points regarding hidden city ticketing:
https://www.travelandleisure.com/travel-tips/hidden-city-ticketing-consequences

Hidden-city ticketing can be harmful to other travelers…

...hidden city ticketing deprives other travelers of seats they
actually need, and can force them to pay higher prices. Over time,
airlines may need to further increase prices.

Because airlines often wait for passengers who are late for connecting
flights, travelers who use hidden-city ticketing can even cause flight
delays and muddle the travel plans of others.

Easy solution for the airlines: don't make the flights with connections cost less than the non stop.

Be careful what you ask for. Airline pricing practices are, I think most of us would agree, divorced from any human-understandable logic. They are determined primarily by computer algorithms set up to optimize profits. One way they do that is to have (seemingly) nonsensical pricing where if you skip the last leg to your destination, you save big over an actual ticket to your real intended destination. Another is to sell tickets at prices that are far below their actual cost. If you regulate airline ticket pricing, and demand that all ticket prices reflect the actual cost to the airline of getting you there, some of the things the public likes (those $29 fares, for example) will go away.

Chasing the absolute rock-bottom, cheapest possible fare has many consequences - some of those consequences make people happy, some make people do crazy things, some make flying miserable for nearly everyone.

In this era of heighten security concerns, I could see a problem with someone disappearing from a flight. Now I know that most of the terrorists are willing to go down with the plane but maybe a lone woof would not be so willing. You buy a ticket with certain rules and regulations - it is a contract - so why should you not be accountable for up holding your end of the contract? If the plane arrive late and you miss a connection you fully expect the airline to get you to your end point. It is a two way street. But I have also played that game. Interesting to see what happens.

You really want the government to tell the airlines how to manage their business? I understand there is a CA bullet train commission with nothing to do as of today. Maybe they can handle it?

Example, just done as trial on Lufthansa web site, as for the time of year where we have often taken similar open-jaw trips hubbing in Frankfurt:

Philadelphia-Frankfurt round trip Sept 17-Oct 1, $786
Philadelphia-Munich and Amsterdam to Philadelphia, same dates, and making use of the same Philadelphia-Frankfurt direct flights (LH426 and 427), $762.

This is one of the less extreme examples I have found over the years.

However, it seems the passenger being sued made a tactical blunder by booking a flight to his actual destination ON LUFTHANSA! So their reservation system detected duplicate bookings for the same passenger -- to his stated destination AND to his actual destination. If you're gonna try to get around rules, at least be careful about it.

However, it seems the passenger being sued made a tactical blunder

Yes by violating the terms of his contract with Lufthansa.

Not that I haven't thought about doing this too. Especially when a RT ticket was cheaper than a one way ticket (Lufthansa again). My plan however was to call the airline and announce that I missed my flight. I would be ashamed, but I didn't do it.

I guess not many of you were around when flight costs were regulated? Prices came down considerably when the government stopped interfering. But, I know, it would be different this time.

Yes, I really want the government to tell the airlines how to manage their business. They (governments) in Europe do so more than in the U.S. As a consequence, passengers get much better treatment there when flights are canceled or delayed. I won’t even touch on safety issues, though I think it’s obvious what would happen if governments stepped back from “telling the airline’s how to manage their business” on that score. I’ll also refer fans of unregulated business to the experiences we in California have had with power companies skimping on safety measures, and remind everyone what deregulation of banks led to in 2008.
As to ticket pricing, it’s so mysterious, that no one that I’ve seen has come up with any convincing explanation for how to know when you can get the best price. Maybe that is the underlying rationale. If there is no way to know, a significant percentage of passengers will wind up paying a lot more.

You really want the government to tell the airlines how to manage their business?

Yes, why not? If it means better treatment and protection for its customers where's the problem with that?

Government intervention results in protection laws such as EU Regulation 261/2004, something that has benefited many passengers and no doubt resulted in airlines reconsidering frivilous flight cancellations.

Example: RT March 20 to April 3. Chicago to Paris is $580 taking a Delta connection in Detroit. But fly from Detroit, same flights minus the the connecting flights is $1009.

From Chicago they have to discount off United's $680 nonstop. Detroit is a Delta fortress hub with no competition.

"But for the life of me I can’t understand why it is cheaper to fly to Europe from Philadelphia and Toronto and at least a half dozen other airports then it is from Detroit Metro."

It is call the law of supply and demand. Where the demand is high and the supply is low (could be just one air line} the cost will be high.

How successful are appeals in German courts?

This is a strange one because when people drop the last leg, they find a different way to return to the city of origin typically either on a DIFFERENT non-partner airline or by some other means to do what they can NOT TO STAND OUT and thus not get caught.

He wasn't the brightest bulb in the bunch; the money he saved breaking Lufthansa's Conditions of Carriage contract is now spent on legal fees plus more out of pocket. Worse, he chose to take another LH flight to Berlin making it very simple for LH to catch him breaking the Conditions of Carriage.

Philadelphia-Frankfurt round trip Sept 17-Oct 1, $786
Philadelphia-Munich and Amsterdam to Philadelphia, same dates, and
making use of the same Philadelphia-Frankfurt direct flights (LH426
and 427), $762.

When open-jaws have lower airfares than roundtrip, what good fortune especially if you're traveling within the continent. This doesn't always happen. It could have to do with the level of airline competition between the cities or higher taxes levied from one European airport over another? Or lower demand on one or more of the routes?

Re my Lufthansa Open Jaw example: In the past I had seen where longer flights from Philadelphia to wherever through Frankfurt were a few hundred dollars less than just the Frankfurt flight.

or to offer another ridiculous example: The fist time we flew to London, we were able to get a Virgin Codeshare with American, it was offered on Virgin, their flight from Newark to London and return on American to Philadelphia (Virgin does not fly out of Philadelphia. Pretty good price, and we had daughter drive us to Newark. But I also discovered we could have had this through Virgin on a code share with American for both directions if we started in Newark and had them fly us to Philadelphia to get on their code-shared American flight to London. -for about $300 less. But of course they would not simply let us get on the flight here without coming from Newark.

“Law” of supply and demand is way too simple an explanation for air fare variations, as my recent ticket purchase illustrates. I started checking prices for a SFO - MAD, Casablanca - SFO trip. For several weeks they ran $1300 - $1400. Then they dropped to $1100. I didn’t buy, because we were still around 5 months out from departure. The return to around $1350 made me vow to jump on it if $1100 appeared again. One day, to my amazement, a price of $626 appeared. That was directly with the airline. I got 2 tickets, including premium economy seating on one transatlantic segment for what one might have cost. Being in Delta’s FF program, there was no charge for 1 checked bag/pp. The times are good; no bizarre itineraries.
This was not an advertised sale, so the thought that it was intended to move tickets doesn’t apply. In fact, by the end of the day, prices were back up, and have stayed so. I have looked at the seating charts a couple of times, and there is still plenty of availability.
So what gives? I stand by my assertion that air fare prices are a mystery wrapped in an enigma.
I have concluded that the best strategy for getting a good price is to check daily, not any of these semi-legal (?) ploys. Thank you to the forum posters who repeatedly give that advice.

"He wasn't the brightest bulb in the bunch; The money he saved breaking Lufthansa's Contract of Carriage is now spent on legal fees."

How could you possibly know that? LH lost their first claim and in this appeal, the passenger may well be getting legal aid. Or even if LH win, they likely won't pursue costs.

Incidentally, breaking a term in a contract is entirely fine if that term is unenforceable according to a court. Finding out if it can be enforced is what LH are now testing. I'm sure I'm not the only person here who has ignored a contractual term safe in the knowledge that the other party can't or won't use it.

The fist time we flew to London, we were able to get a Virgin
Codeshare with American, it was offered on Virgin

How many years ago was that? British Airways has a codeshare relationship with American Airlines under the OneWorld alliance.

Virgin Atlantic has no codeshare partnership with American as its codeshare/interline partner in the US is Delta under the Skyteam alliance.

Delta also has a significant ownership stake in Virgin Atlantic these days

The Virgin Flight was in July 2013. When we purchased this, they still were allied with USAir (I erred, looking at my notes, I see this was with USAir, not AA). About two months after the purchase, I was for some silly reason checking on the price, and it had dropped a couple hundred. The alliance had been terminated, and my best guess was that they had offered those seats out via USAir and wanted to make sure they got them filled. of course, I could not get them to pass on the savings.

Hard to believe that we did this for $1200 or so in July 2013 and though this was a good deal. We have Newark->London and Edinburgh ->Philadelphia for $480 this Fall. BA and AA.

How could you possibly know that? LH lost their first claim and in
this appeal, the passenger may well be getting legal aid. Or even if
LH win, they likely won't pursue costs.

I wasn't even thinking about the defendant having to pay LH's legal fees if LH wins on the appellate level which the courts gave Lufthansa permission to do. Being allowed to appeal is not a given. I don't know how legal and court fee cost reimbursements are applied under German law (or is it EU law?). If LH were to win in the appellate level and thus were allowed to recoup all legal and court costs, I bet they WOULD go after these fees especially to make a public example.

Outside of all of that, he'd have to pay HIS own legal fees which are probably significantly higher than the cost savings from throwing away a ticket. Perhaps THIS was one reason why Lufthansa chose to litigate. I'm curious how it goes on the appellate level.

Legal aid in Germany is offered for free in criminal litigation and, according to Wikipedia,, specific listed areas of civil litigation. Contract law was not included on that list and this lawsuit is a contract dispute involving the defendant breaking LH's conditions of carriage contract. Even if contract civil cases were covered by legal aid, he is someone who could afford to travel overseas. Legal aid provides the applicant prove need. Who knows how stringent they are for German or foreign legal aid applicants in civil cases again assuming contract cases were covered. I wish we could hear from German civil litigators!

The media would have reported if the passenger were represented by free legal aid. It is unfortunate how sparse the reporting is. More information about what the passenger spent and why the court allowed for the appeal is reported by RT. The latter portion I'm including below.

"The local court initially ruled in favor of the customer in December
2018. However, it gave Lufthansa an opportunity to appeal as it reportedly said that the reason the company is trying to sue the
passenger is valid. At the same time, the court ruling said that while
the Lufthansa price calculation lacks transparency, the passenger was
aware that the ticket he chose was cheaper."

It's not so much supply and demand. It's competition and monopoly power. Chicago has multiple airlines, Detroit, Minneapolis, others are pretty much dominated by Delta so we pay more. We are indeed lucky now that airline prices are more attainable by the "masses", but if you live in Chicago, LA, New York, DC, etc., you get far better pricing than the rest of us. Good thing Minnesota is pretty darn nice, for at least part of the year. ;)

I can save $300 by driving to an airport 3.5 hours away, sometimes I do it. Supply and demand or competition, its business. If company A doesnt provide the service the people want, then company B will step in and do it, but only if its profitable and government regulation permits.

Here's Fodor's article on the topic, interesting in spite of the plug for google.