Lufthansa/ United anticompetitive alliance can be a travel nightmare.

I booked transatlantic using the Lufthansa alliance with United Airlines. Some perks were good, but the hassles weren’t worth it.

Airlines love to tout their partnerships as being great for travelers.  And yes, getting mileage and having bags checked through are both good perks. What airlines don’t talk about is how this anticompetitive alliance results in reduced competition and higher non-discountable fares. And in the Lufthansa Group’s case, their alliance with United often results in travel nightmares.  Like this one: My clients needed to book relatively late, in August for a trip to Italy in business class. Found them tickets from San Francisco to Bologna — a United flight to Munich then a Lufthansa flight from Munich to Bologna. They were returning on Swiss, part of Lufthansa Group, from Florence to Zurich to San Francisco.

The first flight was on United, but the next three were with the Lufthansa group. It turned into an anticompetitive alliance nightmare.

Our travel agency ticket, because it started on United Airlines, was on United ticket stock, which means United is ultimately in control of the ticket. (It’s complicated, but with any ticket with airline partners issued as one ticket, one airline, usually the outbound carrier, has to be in control.) The nightmare started when, on their day of departure from San Francisco,  Lufthansa canceled the Munich to Bologna flight and put the travelers on a flight the following day, with over 24 hours in Munich. They didn’t want that. So, after a couple of hours of discussion, Lufthansa agreed to put them on a flight from Munich to Rome instead. United had them reissue that part of the ticket. Eventually, I arranged a hotel in Rome. It was all good. We thought. the clients even emailed me how much they liked the hotel.

Next, the anticompetitive alliance nightmare got worse!

Then, the nightmare really began. Lufthansa told me they had canceled the return flights because my clients had no-showed the Munich-Rome flight. Uh, they flew the flight. They were IN Rome!  Called Lufthansa. At first, they insisted the clients had not checked into the flight. I thought I could convince them that my clients had checked in …. how else would the travelers have gotten to Rome? Lufthansa admitted that it must have been an airport mistake. But the flights they had were now sold out. They asked me to put it in writing and email our help desk to have them forward it to headquarters in Germany. We did this. Lufthansa came back with. “We have one person confirmed — in full-fare business class.” (For those who don’t know, as with coach, there are 4-6 different booking code in business class  Lufthansa said that they would honor the fare in the higher class due to their error. They said, “Just get a waiver from United.”

United agreed to take control of the ticket and reissue it.

However, United does not give ticket waivers for other airline ticket issues. Finally, hours later, United agreed to take control of the ticket and reissue it themselves. The second agent noted, however, that Lufthansa could not confirm the reservation. They told me she was waitlisted, and if they could get it back, we would need to go through the same process. Lufthansa also told me it needed to be reissued within a day of confirmation or it could be canceled again. So, we needed to monitor over the weekend. Saturday morning, Lufthansa got the space back for the second person. So, we had to go through the procedure again to have United reissue the ticket. Fortunately, the first agent had made notes. Except then, Lufthansa also switched the first ticket that United had fixed back to the original lower business class code. (Same business class, lower fare type.)  And they demanded we reissue the ticket or have the reservation canceled. United Airline’s initial reaction was no — this is ridiculous.  But I explained to them that the passenger would have no way home. United finally agreed, then an agent made a typo putting in the flight number in reissuing one ticket — which, for the sake of not turning this into a novel, I will not repeat. But it took several more hours.

After a weekend of work, there were still issues.

So, in the end, I am writing this before the passengers actually fly home. All appears to be well. But this so-called seamless partnership is anything but seamless. United and the Lufthansa Group (which includes Swiss and Brussels Airlines) may have joint fares, and when one raises fares, they all do so instantly, but they do not have the same reservation systems. And Lufthansa’s can be particularly awful. I’ve spent hours on the phone when Lufthansa changes a return flight time by 15 minutes for an intra-Europe flight on a United ticket. Because they claim if the ticket doesn’t match precisely a passenger will be denied boarding. And sometimes, even United can’t get the ticket adjusted to Lufthansa’s liking. A few other anticompetitive alliance problems still haunted these changes.

• United Airlines allows free seat assignments for all but basic economy. Lufthansa charges for seat assignments in coach and premium economy.
• Lufthansa, unlike United, demands tickets be reissued instantly at the time of change or cancellation. (This last requirement is particularly rough if someone gets sick because they often don’t know when they might travel again.)  Both carriers are easier to deal with if a ticket only has THEIR space, i.e., all United or all Lufthansa metal. (“metal” refers to the airline operating the plane.)
• Then there’s the connection issue, where airlines are less likely to hold planes for their partner airlines than their own.
• Travel agents can often but not always help bail our clients out with problems, though while I’ve heard stories, I have no idea how many people who book directly get stranded.

The bottom line is that booking alliance travel is simpler when only one partner airline is involved.

Short version: While it’s not always possible when booking travel, it’s simpler IF you can keep a ticket with one actual airline and not an airline with their partners. Sadly like many other anti-competitive arrangements airlines enter into, I sense that Lufthansa’s arrangement with United benefits Lufthansa’s bottom line much more than it benefits consumers.

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