by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 27, 2016 | Featured, Lounges, Lufthansa, Passenger Experience |
Lufthansa has rolled out a new pilot program that will test the the ability of using smartphones and their bluetooth technology as a ‘key’ to gain entry into LH Lounges.
The trial began on October 27 specifically at the BUSINESS CLASS LOUNGE located near gate A26 in Frankfurt. Passengers who have downloaded the Easy Access app from their respective App Stores will now have the ability to simply tap their phone to a tablet next to the Lounge Entrance and have the doors automatically open.
No longer will passengers have to stay in line outside the lounge while passengers fumble to find their boarding passes or frequent flyer cards. Nor will they have to wait in that line while the Lounge Attendant explains time and time again to passengers in the line as to why their economy class ticket on Aeroflot doesn’t give them the ability to enter the Lounge.
Remember, the trial ONLY COVERS the Business Class Lounge near Gate A26 in Frankfurt. Nowhere else at this point. If the trials go well, I suspect this will be expanded to cover other lounges in the network.
In order for the process to work, you’ll have to install both the Lufthansa app as well as the Easy Access app. The 2 will coordinate their data and using the bluetooth function on your phone, allow you to communicate with the Tablet at the ‘A26 Lounge’. You can find both Apps in your App Store by searching for Lufthansa and Easy Access.
I’m not sure why they are going to all the trouble of a separate app and requiring bluetooth technology in order for everything to work. I would think it would have been a lot easier to use an existing Electronic Boarding Pass that contains the ‘QR Bar Code Square’ that is scanned when boarding a flight. It seems that it would be easier to have that kind of a scanner at Lounge Door and allow passengers simply to use their Electronic Boarding Pass as the key to the lounge. After all, it’s what the lounge attendants are currently using when checking in guests. But as they say in my neighbor, it’s not my circus and it’s not my monkey so I don’t have any insights to the decisions!
At the end of the day, it’s still a far better way to bypass the sometimes long lines when trying to get into a Lounge.
To learn more about this new initiative, please visit www.LH.com/easyaccess.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 27, 2016 | 737, Featured, Fleet Update, Frankfurt, Lufthansa |
This Saturday, October 29, Lufthansa will be broadcasting via Facebook the retirement ceremonies surrounding the last 737 in the fleet.
Her last day of work is scheduled to be on October 29th with a few roundtrip flights from Frankfurt. As of now, she is scheduled to fly to Geneva, Stuttgart and Nuremberg. The final landing of the 737 is scheduled to take place at 7:40p when she returns from Nuremberg (LH153) and the simulcast will capture the moment. Tickets are still available for these final flights.
To tune into the broadcast, please use this link (you will be redirected to Facebook). You can also track events on Twitter or Facebook using the hashtag of #ThankYou737.
One of the retired workhorses of the LH Fleet…..
There’s a lot attention being paid to this final 737 due to the fact that Lufthansa was the launch customer for the aircraft nearly 50 years ago and is responsible for the aircraft’s existence.
Lufthansa approached Boeing in the 1960s looking to replace a propeller driven regional fleet with jets so that they can better serve their European destinations. Boeing and Lufthansa announced February 19, 1965 that LH would be the launch customer, and almost exactly 3 years later on February 10, 1968, the first 737 joined the fleet. In all, 155 737 aircraft had been part of the LH fleet at one time or another over the last 48 years.
Had it not been for LH, there’s no guarantee that the 737 would have ever been developed and become one of history’s best selling and most popular aircraft.
Related:
Lufthansa gives birth to the 737
Lufthansa’s 737 retirement schedule
by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 23, 2016 | Air Berlin, Corporate, Featured, Lufthansa |
Reuters has reported that talks may have taken place between Lufthansa and Alitalia about the prospects of Lufthansa taking a substantial stake in Italy’s national carrier. The main topic of the conversation may have been regarding Etihad looking to give Air Berlin to Lufthansa in return for a stake in Alitalia.
Etihad currently owns a 49% stake in Air Berlin and a 29% stake in Alitalia and both investments are slowly becoming disasters for Etihad. So much so that Etihad signed off on the Air Berlin deal to let Lufthansa lease 40 aircraft and take over a substantial part of Air Berlin’s routes while Air Berlin tries to fix its woes.
According to the article, Alitalia management denied that any talks have happened but what are they supposed to say? Yes? We did and Lufthansa is going buy a large piece of us and we’re going to throw in Air Berlin as a door prize? How many times have discussions been denied only to become fact a short time later.
It’s an interesting 3-way deal that may be brewing between Rome, Frankfurt and Abu Dhabi. Etihad sees 2 major losses on the horizon with Air Berlin and Alitalia, and sees a way out of almost both problems by giving away Air Berlin to Lufthansa in turn for Lufthansa taking a stake in Alitalia.
My gut suggests that a complete take over of Air Berlin by Lufthansa would simply solidify their Eurowings unit as one of Europe’s largest Low Cost Carriers (LCC) without Lufthansa having to grow the brand organically from within. Considering Air Berlin’s dire financial straits, LH could steal the airline for a song.
But of course, these conversations never happened 😉
