Lufthansa has changed some of its Canadian & US flights to its ‘leisure’ partner Eurowings for the winter and I thought I would share our experience from a week ago as both LH and Frankfurt airport have had their share of operational struggles this year.
We originally booked Lufthansa several months ago & received notice of the change to EW in September; same plane configuration. We flew Business Class & have never flown LH before (but have flown BC on BA, AF, & Air Canada). We were a bit worried about the change as reviews indicated EW cabin crew are ‘younger’ & not as polished or organized. We were hugely impressed however, with the service. Beverages, meals, & snacks were all served in a timely manner (1 of the criticisms read elsewhere). The cabin crew were exceedingly friendly, professional, responsive & gracious. Near the end of the flight, the 3 BC cabin crew came to each person to thank us for flying with them & wish us well.
The arrival in Frankfurt was more challenging. Our flight had left late from Vancouver (after leaving late from Frankfurt earlier…). The jetway was not working so all passengers had to exit via stairs at the back of the plane and bused to the terminal. We were trying to connect to Rome on a LH flight. We had to take another bus, go through a line at Passport Control, & dash to our flight showing as 30 minutes late. As it turned out, they held the flight for us as several of us were going to Rome. Our baggage did not make it but I give full credit to LH who texted us upon arrival in Rome that arrangements had been made to put our 2 bags on the next flight. We had bought Air Tags to help us know where our luggage was too. As the suitcases arrived late evening, they were delivered to our hotel the next afternoon. LH communicated with us quite well by text and email. We had enough in our carry on to manage. We don’t do carry on only because of required liquids and other items so we knew to be prepared for a delay.
Overall we were impressed with how LH handled these various glitches.