Part of me feels like I went too easy on Lufthansa in the 747-8 first class review from Frankfurt to Los Angeles I published this morning. Sometimes, there is a fine line between being objective and being so overly picky to the point of lacking a proper perspective. Other times we can be far too forgiving when such forgiveness is not warranted. I struggled with finding that balance in my recent review.
My Overall Wonderful Flight In Lufthansa First Class Could Only Be Called Bad In Relative Terms
Ultimately, the only perspective that matters on this blog is mine. I don’t say that in a haughty way, but the point of 11 years worth of airline reviews on Live and Let’s Fly is to help guide people by offering insight grounded in consistency. If my metrics change for each airline, it really becomes difficult to compare one airline to another, especially in terms of service.
On my recent Lufthansa flight, there were two major service lapses.
First, my lunch dishes were not promptly cleared (it took 10 minutes). That may be common in economy or even business class, but flight attendants are supposed to continually monitor the first class cabin precisely to avoid dishes or glasses sitting for extended periods when a guest has finished eating or drinking.
Second, when I was ready to sleep, I pushed the flight attendant call button and no one showed up. After waiting three minutes, I stood up, pulled back the curtain to the galley between first and business class, and popped my head in. There was no one there. I stood in the galley for five more minutes before returning to my seat. There I sat another 10 minutes. Yes, I waited nearly 20 minutes in first class for a flight attendant to show up.
Ultimate First World Problem, But…
Obviously, many readers will roll their eyes and be dismissive. Indeed, issues of clearing away dishes and making beds are ultimate first world issues.
But I’ve flown Lufthansa dozens of times over the years in first class and if I am evaluating first class versus historic Lufthansa flights and versus my experiences on other airlines, it is little details like this which are essential in offering insight and potential trends.
I could have gathered my dishes and silverware and brought it to the galley, but that would have put me in the uncomfortable position of embarrassing the flight attendants.
I could have gone up to the front closet, pulled out a duvet and mattress pad, and made my own bed, but that’s not why I splurge for first class – this is part of the package.
But there were also mitigating circumstances at play. I eat slowly and eat every course. Everyone else had gone to bed and the cabin was dark by the time I finished my lunch. Part of me can understand why the flight attendants stopped patrolling the cabin.
But part of me thinks they should have known I was still eating and continued to check on me until they knew I was finished.
Same with the bed. I did not go to bed early like everyone else. I watched Silence of the Lambs first then wanted to go to bed. My turndown request apparently came between shifts because there was no flights attendants present and the flight attendant who finally showed up was one that I had not seen before.
All this to say, part of me is so uncomfortable even mentioning these services lapses because overall I thought the flight was fabulous. But at the same time, I would not be offering an honest review if failed to mentioned them.
This is the struggle when writing a review. How important are these issues of detail to the overall flight experience? As best I can, I try to put them in the proper perspective.
CONCLUSION
Reviewing first class products is an inherent first world issue and so the complaints, when they occur, are going to involve first world problems.
As for how those service lapses should have impacted the overall assessment of the flight, I’ll let you be the judge. As for me, I was willing to overlook them based upon the totality of the flight experience. But I do wonder if I cut Lufthansa additional slack due to my strong affinity for the German airline…
I agree with you on the perspective…. I had one flight from LA to FRA recently on LH First where I selected the caviar then the soup and the salad and the starter and the main dish by ending with desert….. I was told “I eat a lot” by FA! It left me thinking she rather trash all that food than giving to a passenger who actually “splurged” for this specific reason!
It’s funny, because I received a similar comment on UA EWR-HKG business class from Norma, the most senior United flight attendant at the time. I then replied that I don’t do long-haul business class often, and she continued to offer all aspect of the food and beverage service.
Cool that you got to fly with Norma!
It’s an old trick when I worked at the airport 20 years ago, first class flight attendants fill up their purses with expensive food like kavair to enjoy at hotel. I fly AA business class and it was a big deal to order a port wine. She try to give me some cheap sparkling wine 🙁 Later on she forget to give it to me
You clearly enjoy LH – so do I. In my humble opinion you accomplished both goals: you did a great job through your words and photos describing the delightful reasons LH First is a great product. But, you also were critical as needed, mentioning the lack of privacy vs other first products and the services lapses.
In summary, it was a very well done piece.
Have a great weekend Matthew and thank you for what you bring us. Don’t be so hard on yourself!
Thanks Mike!
I think part of the reason you fly first class is the customization of the flight experience. That is a big difference between first and business class. On a 10+ hour first class flights (especially to Asia), my wife and I found we now enjoy starting the main meal 2-3 hours after take off. Having a drink, appetizer and watching a movie first before the big meal. The rest of the cabin might eat right away and sleep. Sometimes i feel bad to make the attendants do the meal service twice, but that’s why they are there in first class to provide that service level and thats you pay the extra miles to get it. On your flight, they should have stayed on shift and waiting until you were ready for bed. For business class it would have been acceptable, but not first class.
I appreciate your honesty. Couple years back I flew F EWR-FRA and a person asked if she could have breakfast later than at most 1.5 hours before landing and the flight attendant said No, it’s not possible. I was shocked! The whole flight the personnel wasn’t very attentive, so once again, thanks for pointing out the flaws which DO matter in F.
Oh wow that is pretty shocking for F class. Contrast it with my most recent CX F from JFK-HKG, when I woke up 90 minutes before landing, having slept a lot longer than I thought I would, and the senior purse serving the cabin came to me to say she’d prepare anything I wanted (as long as I could finish by 45 min before landing).
That example is an outlier for Lufthansa First Class…
It would indeed be easy to mock you for complaints such as these. And I can see people comparing you to Paris Hilton, a Kardashian or some other overindulged and spoiled individual. But, that’s not being fair. To fly LH first class, you had to spend 100,000 miles plus taxes and fees. That’s not nothing. And, you did that with expectations of value for the money spent (and yes, miles are money in that you spent a lot of money to earn them). So, if those expectations are not met (based on a fair and objective standard), it is worth pointing out in a review.
Once, the LH ticket counter agent asked me twice to get out of the First Class line. Then she found out I had a paid F ticket. She said sorry more than once.
Didn’t dress the part, eh?
My greatest concern with this story is that you watched “Silence of the Lambs” before bed!
First time watching it. Maybe that was the reason I could not sleep, not the espresso!
Are you trying to get your miles refund for those bad experience on aboard?
Not at all. Overall, it was a great flight.
Your complaints are valid. If you’re going to offer a three cabin aircraft, you should offer three cabin service.
Somewhat tangentially related… What’s with all the forced sleeping on Westbound TATL flights? Personally I’m not really much of a napper, and I’m always amazed by how many people are perfectly content just going to sleep in the middle of the day.
You never know what type of week the person had leading up to the flight, or what is facing them when they land. My business travel tends to be exhausting and when I get home, I am back on duty as Dad. So, I look forward to a nap on the return flight where no one can bother me.
*four cabin aircraft! 🙂
Well, much ado about nothing, really, since nobody was bringing up the issue of your criticisms in your comments section for the actual review itself.
“As for me, I was willing to overlook them based upon the totality of the flight experience. But I do wonder if I cut Lufthansa additional slack due to my strong affinity for the German airline…”
Well, next time you fly first on another airline and there is an occasional service mistake, ask yourself “Would this bother me as much of I was on Lufthansa?”…
I know no one brought it up in the comments of the review, but for whatever reason it really bothered me.
Did you ask the crew after you took their picture that you were going to publish a negative review of the service on the flight and would they mind if you showed their faces? Did you mention your disappointment in service to them directly rather than them finding out on the internet?
That’s pretty unfair to them.
If you actually read what I wrote in this piece and the review, the ladies that were pictured in my other post provided incredibly good service and were not related to the service lapses I detailed. Yes, they knew why I was taking a picture. These two are to be commended for their wonderful service. It was a joy to fly with them.
I will rephrase/widen my comment from the FCT review: LH F offers good value for award redemptions, but is probably not worth the substantial premium over business class when buying a ticket with money.
Well as an infrequent reader, I am perhaps ill-informed, but….
Isn’t the lack of an attendant for ~20 minutes a safety concern as well as a service concern?
I mean, I have heard the common refrain repeated by travel commenters (not directly from an attendant) that the attendants are there for safety first/foremost….even in first class.
So with a call light on for ~20 minutes with no attendant even locatable for your class of service? That seems unacceptable for both reasons that there are attendants.
Agreed that this is unacceptable in any cabin.
Complaining about “first world problems” is so facile. Context matters and it’s good to be honest about the issues you encountered. Otherwise, why bother reading a boring review?
Yes, your complaints are about first world problems – but long-haul F is by definition a “first world” experience, and so the criticisms are valid. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect something close to perfection when spending the miles or cash needed for F. These types of honest assessments are why I was drawn to your blog in the first place, so I say, keep doing what you do.
Your comments totally fair. First class long haul, I’d expect what you expected. At lest you got to fly the queen of the skies, a 747 !
Finally the much touted airline got its due!!!
. I flew cattle class on LH from Delhi to New York on the 3rd of August. I was sorely disappointed with service, attitude and the type of food that was served . There was this goon anti vaxer fake Covid type family who flew the whole leg from Frankfurt to NY with their masks below their nose .
The hostess did nothing to reprimand them. Honestly this is the last time I will ever fly LH or recommend it to anyone. Finally they served a horrible 3rd rate beer bas quality food on the Delhi Frankfurt leg . Morning breakfast was an ice cold insipid wrap . Enough!!
I personally thought it was a very fair review. It took into account both experience in the past and the variables of crews. It was not some rant or entitled piece at all. These are the kind of reviews companies love, I know I do, ones that are balanced in understanding the nuances out there (especially in today’s travel world) and not something entitled. It’s the type of feedback that you want to share with your staff, to help them better understand a drive for quality and consistency.
+1 PM and Stuart
I was fortunate enough to fly LH F once VIE-FRA-IAD (I was booked direct in OS J but saw LH F award space open up and knew I had to make the change). Since they’re normally on-point with everything, all aspects of your review are 100% warranted.
This is easy. The higher the class of service, the greater the expectations. Service lapses that might get a pass in economy class or a 2-3 star hotel are inexcusable in first class or a 5 star hotel.
I have worked in the industry for over 26 years,
I thought your review was honest and on point. If the industry is short staffed and cannot give 100 percent-this is all classes. Then stop selling full flights at a high premium.
Safe travels!
I have worked in the airline ticketing industry for 37 years, Lufthansa, British Airways and Air France being my three biggest carriers. Perspective matters. I was amazed that the author was not thankful that his flight was not cancelled and operated on time, unlike so many other trans Atlantic flights in the last year and a half. He should have been thanking his lucky stars for this alone, no matter what he paid for his ticket. I was also amazed that the author did not attempt to account for the service lapses. After having obviously flown F on Lufthansa many times before, why would he not consider current operating conditions after Lufthansa and everyone else laid off countless staff last year and earlier this year? The airline industry is in chaos. Lufthansa just sold a 1.9 BILLION bond to repay a German government Covid bailout loan that kept them out of bankruptcy last year. I would think this well travelled author would know about these Lufthansa issues, but no, he can only complain about a ten minute wait to have his dishes cleared. Here is one guy I will not be following for any current airline news.
Um…. He should be “thankful” that the airline actually provided the services he paid for? In what world do we give any industry such forgiveness? Providing the service you paid for is a minimum expectation. No way in “H E double hockey sticks_ should anyone feel “grateful” that the airline did what they promised…..
You are out of line baby G…..
Out of curiosity, decades after US based airlines eliminated first class cabins from their trans Atlantic flights, can anyone here offer an explanation about why only Lufthansa, British Airways and Air France continue to offer first class cabins on their trans Atlantic flights?
These are legitimate service issues you have brought up Matthew and there is no need to defend the way you felt. The lapses are unacceptable in long-haul first class and the review should ding Lufthansa accordingly.
You are reviewing a luxury product with a significant price point. Part of purchasing an item or service isn’t just an idea of can I afford this but also is this worth the cost involved? Even if spending $10K on a flight means nothing to me, I will still expect a certain level of service, otherwise why spend that money to get a lower class experience. Airlines need to realize they are competing against private flights for first class dollars. An FA not being available for 20 minutes in FC is a pretty serious breach of service.
Of course, before this review was written, I assume you checked that the brief absence of the crew was not because they were dealing with an emergency in a different part of the aircraft?
Of course service in F should be exemplary however when there are lapses particularly on LH or AF, I have found there is always an excellent and totally justified reason for it. Perhaps you should have asked if everything was OK if you were unhappy.
The flight attendant was clearly embarrassed when she finally showed up to make my bed. That aside, what if I was having an emergency? Wouldn’t you say 20 minutes is far too long of a period to ignore the FA call light?
If you were having a life threatening critical emergency one or more of your fellow passengers would have acted to help you and alerted the crew.
As a medic, I once had to deal with a cardiac arrest on a long haul flight and it took me and almost all the cabin crew to even move the man concerned in what was a confined space and the remainder of the crew to calm passengers in the immediate area. I would say every member of the cabin crew was involved in one way or another and it took at least twenty minutes work before I had to declare the man dead. Can you imagine what that did for me and the crew?
I repeat, you do now know what else happened and while in the main I respect your writing, in this piece you come across as an entitled brat.
A bit harsh JH.
Also, what did you do with the dead person?
I thought that’s what reviewers were supposed to do….be overly ‘picky’. And let the reader determine if you went to far or not. I think you made the right decision.
I just read a review of Lufthansa do terrible food 747/800.
You are a little pretentious for my taste. I would hate to see how you react if you had to live like most Americans.
You are a little pretentious for my taste. I would hate to see how you react if you had to live like the rest of us.
JF: you were so upset you had to post twice!@??
Demand your money back!
Matthew, you have to remember that many of your readers (like myself) are people who will only get to travel in F class if the ticket is paid for, by a well padded corporate expense account. There is no way in Hell that my employer would ever pay for my Y class ticket to be upgraded, even to J class and even if it were an emergency to get me from A to /b. So the few times that I’ve ever travelled in F class have been paid for from my own wallet and even then, the number of times I’ve done, I can count on one hand. So if I’ve splurged and forked over the excessive amount of currency, I want a First class experience. I’m still gonna be an regular person who would never don airs and graces or act like a spoilt diva. In fact, I consider myself fortunate every time I travel in J class. And when I do, I purchase a box of Cadbury Roses to give to the cabin crew when I board the aircraft, as a way of acknowledging the good work they do in looking after people and also to say that, despite me traveling in J class, I don’t expect them to treat me in any other way than just a normal guy, lucky enough to be traveling in a little more comfort.
But if I’m travelling F class on my own dime, I’m still gonna be that regular guy. But it is going to annoy me if I have to contend with poor service when I’ve paid the highest fare of all passengers on that flight. And for you, as somebody whose job it is to review the service that an airline delivers, you need to highlight every facet of that service, warts and all. That give any potential passenger of that airline, an idea of what they may be able to expect if they fly. Especially if they plan on using their own dime to cover the cost of the ticket.
So no, you’ve done what needed to be done and said what needed to be said. Waiting 20 min for service in F class is unacceptable, as is waiting waiting to have your dishes removed. And it doesn’t matter how nice the cabin crew are for the rest of the flight! They are paid extra to maintain a higher level of service in that cabin and by not providing that service, it reflects badly on the image of that airline, Not to mention the fact that the airline also spends money on training them to a higher level to provide that service, To not point out the inconsistencies would mean that you , Matthew, are not doing your job…
Cadbury-that’s high end chocolate right?
Well done sir!
Lufthansa was alway stiff and try to cheap out in any class. I fly often between Poland and Germany. The use offer you a tiny sandwich. Now the only thing you get is a small bottle of water so you probobly not faint. Ok for me since I get Amex Lounge Acess. I looked into the A 380 first class cabin bathroom, I expected a shower there as other airline have but found only a big bench there. The flight attendant said it would be to much work to clean it during flight 🙁 Also there nonsens prices, 1 way economy flight FRA to LAX cost over $2000 when I can book with Condor $400. Lufthansa is just badly managed 🙁
Between Poland and Germany?
That’s a short haul jump.
I’m surprised you got more
than a cookie…..
A well written and reasonable review. What you are highlighting is the specific differences between Biz and First. This is why there are 2 crew for just 14 passengers in first, and why the cabin is so much more expensive than business class. This was a crew hand-off between shifts mistake. Possibly they were short handed in biz and the purser made a poor judgement call and had them helping out elsewhere leaving an unsupported First cabin.
You can’t embarrass FA’s that are not there…..
Would love to hear what each one of you does for a living who fly first class or afford one. Self funded or corporate/biz funded etc?
hello
Lufthansa staf in delhi is not alowd retun fligt 6nov21 after in cheak they hav cropation next day and next day go alowd we are lose money we make onwy ticket. And no show pay also