Lufthansa is adopting a new policy for ticket flexibility that I can’t help but find to be a little questionable, as flagged by FrankfurtFlyer…
While it’s often outrageously expensive, airlines typically provide the option to book a flexible fare, which is refundable to the original form of payment up until close to departure. Sometimes airlines will have a very small administrative fee to cancel these tickets, but the idea is that these tickets offer flexibility.
For example, take a “First Flex” fare from Munich (MUC) to Chicago (ORD), where you’ll see that under “Refundability” it shows “Allowed,” so the ticket can be refunded at no cost.
However, due to a new policy, Lufthansa Group airlines are now charging significant fees to refund the most flexible tickets in select regions. This policy applies exclusively to flights that are to & from Asia Pacific (excluding China, Japan, Malaysia, and Singapore), along with flights to South Africa, Mauritius, and the Seychelles. So as you can see, the rollout of this is limited so far.
If you’re looking for a cash refund on the most expensive (flexible) tickets in the above regions, you’ll now pay the following:
- Economy tickets have a €400 fee
- Premium economy tickets have a €700 fee
- Business class tickets have a €1,000 fee
- First class tickets have a €1,500 fee
What’s Lufthansa’s motive for this policy change?
It goes without saying that airlines don’t actually want customers to refund their tickets for cash. At the same time, the whole reason for offering tiered fares is to provide incremental perks in exchange for a higher ticket price.
A great solo travel tip spotted this week on One Mile at a Time.
