There’s a positive update regarding a story involving LOT Polish Airlines in Beijing…
In this post:
LOT reimburses customer for Beijing denied boarding
A few days ago I wrote about how an OMAAT reader was denied boarding on a LOT flight from Beijing to Warsaw while traveling on an Air Canada Aeroplan business class award ticket. If you haven’t read the post yet, I’d recommend checking it out.
Long story short, it seems that a LOT employee (or contractor) in Beijing unilaterally decided that partner award tickets are fraudulent, and canceled them on the spot at the airport, leaving several travelers stranded. Among those people was an OMAAT reader, who then purchased a last minute business class ticket on Korean Air to get back to the United States.
The reader had tried to reach out to LOT for months, but didn’t get any sort of resolution. Fortunately within 48 hours of the post referenced above, LOT has reached out to me, confirming that the airline will be reimbursing the passenger for the ticket he had to purchase. Here’s the statement that LOT issued to me:
First of all, we would like to sincerely apologize for the situation that occurred, which was a misunderstanding and should not have happened. Our team members has already contacted the passenger and informed him that we have made a decision to fully refund the Korean Air ticket.
I reached out to the reader to ask him about what LOT told him, so here’s the email he received from the airline:
From the outset please accept our apologies for the delay in addressing your query.
We sincerely regret the circumstances surrounding your complaint. At LOT Polish Airlines we are always disappointed if a customer of ours should be in anyway disappointed.
Rest assured that at LOT and associated companies each employee is expected to display impeccable manners and maximum consideration of passengers, as well as strictly adhere to the existing regulations and procedures. Please accept our apologies if the staff’s conduct was in any way inappropriate.
Taking into consideration all the circumstances related to your travel, the carrier decided to reimburse the newly purchased ticket and upgrade in the total amount of CNY 40044 reduced by the already refunded sum from your original ticket.
Please complete the form attached below with necessary bank account details.
We hope that we will have the opportunity to welcome you on board of our flights again in the future under more favorable circumstances.
Okay, frankly this email feels a bit canned — “please accept our apologies if the staff’s conduct was in any way inappropriate.” Yeah, this shouldn’t be a “sorry if you’re offended” apology, this should be a “sorry we royally screwed up” apology. Most importantly, though, the airline is making the reader whole.
The reader’s only concern is exactly how much he’ll be reimbursed, since LOT states that the company will reimburse him for the cost of his ticket reduced by the “refunded sum” from his original ticket. Since that was an award, I’m curious how exactly that works.
I’m happy LOT did the right thing, but…
I’m pleased that I was able to give this story a little exposure, so that this reader was contacted within 48 hours, with a promise to be made whole. At the same time, isn’t it sad that prior to this he has spent months trying to reach out to LOT without a resolution?
It’s pretty wild that you can enter into a contract for a ticket, an airline then unilaterally cancels your ticket and leaves you stranded, and then any attempt to reach out to the airline is a dead end. Your only option is to try to take them to court, or I guess in this case, reach out to someone who might be able to help.
Of course this isn’t limited to LOT, as many airlines would act this way. And in fairness to airlines, the industry is complex, and they deal with a lot of feedback from customers, which can be overwhelming. But still, for something this extreme, airlines need to do better.
Bottom line
LOT Polish Airlines is doing the right thing, and reimbursing an OMAAT reader who was baselessly denied boarding at Beijing Airport. I’m happy to see the airline reached out to the customer so quickly, it’s just unfortunate that this only happened after this situation was publicly exposed, after months of the person trying to reach out directly to the airline.
What do you make of this LOT situation?
Thanks for the encouraging result of this story. Why I called it 'encouraging'? Because I had the exactly same experience with LOT on my flight from PEK-WAW-YYZ in May.
I bought Avianca Lifemiles with my own credit card and redeemed this business class ticket for myself. I even called the LOT call center before I leave and the one on the phone confirmed everything is OK. But they just denied to give me boarding pass...
Thanks for the encouraging result of this story. Why I called it 'encouraging'? Because I had the exactly same experience with LOT on my flight from PEK-WAW-YYZ in May.
I bought Avianca Lifemiles with my own credit card and redeemed this business class ticket for myself. I even called the LOT call center before I leave and the one on the phone confirmed everything is OK. But they just denied to give me boarding pass at the counter. I have to come back to Canada so I bought another ticket with Cathay Pacific PEK-HKG-YYZ, which costs CAD 6,000 and the hotel in Hong Kong is another CAD 250, plus 2 more days on the way.
I really don't know how/why this happened and I still remember how shock it was when I heard they denied to let me go. I never give up to try to contact LOT for this issue and I hope the story will have the same ending...
FINALLY found a similar post to what happened to me in Chicago!
After I checked in and they gave me my boarding pass, on my ticket in the seat section it was written "SBY". I was like okay sure, they will probably assign me a seat at the gate. I get to the gate and they print me a new ticket. 5 minutes later they call me again and tell me "Sir your seat...
FINALLY found a similar post to what happened to me in Chicago!
After I checked in and they gave me my boarding pass, on my ticket in the seat section it was written "SBY". I was like okay sure, they will probably assign me a seat at the gate. I get to the gate and they print me a new ticket. 5 minutes later they call me again and tell me "Sir your seat is "unserviceable" meaning that you will not have a food tray or a TV screen." I asked if I could be switched to a different seat but they said no the flight was full and I also had the option to cancel my flight or get on the plane. Then another lady came up to me and told me when you get to Warsaw fill out a claim form and they will reimburse you part of your ticket. Fast forward, I got on the plane and it was wrapped with stickers "unserviceable". Even the TV screen that displayed the safety features right in front of me wasn't working. A 9h flight that was so disturbing on every level. Then i file a claim stating what happened with pictures and everything and this is what they replied :
"In response to your letter of complaint, we were sorry to hear of the inconvenience that you experienced during the recent journey with our airlines. We are always disappointed if a customer of ours should be in any way dissatisfied with their travel.
It is disappointing if your time onboard our aircraft was less comfortable than anticipated.
Kindly be advised that whilst regularly checked by our ground engineers back at base, the problems you described can occur and, unfortunately, our cabin crew are limited in their ability to rectify technical problems. The best they can do is to report such problems for attention to the ground personnel at the destination airport and, if seats are available, offer to relocate the passenger
We would like to thank you for taking your time to write and make us aware of your experience. We place the highest value upon customer feedback as it enables us to evaluate our business from the customer’s viewpoint.
Please be also informed that your comments have been forwarded to the responsible departments. By calling this to our attention, you have been very helpful.
Despite your disappointment on this occasion, we do hope that the impression left by this situation will not be permanent and your future travels will be entirely to your satisfaction.
Yours sincerely,
Ilona Świerczyńska
Specialist
Passenger Claims Section "
Honestly paying that much money for an airline like that, never again. A terrible airline that is part of the star alliance, what a joke.
they should refund the additional costs / damage caused by their action. I would assume an additional and more expensive flight, hotel, taxi, ... was needed after canceling a ticket.
This happened to me in Paris on EVA airlines using Avianca. TBH corporations seriously don't care anymore. There are usually 3 major options for any given service/product and they know it. Groceries/cell phones/airlines... They are all owned by the same financial institutions (Blackrock and StateStreet mostly). There is no competition and without competition capitalism does not work. All of these companies should be declared monopolies and broken up. What are we as a general population...
This happened to me in Paris on EVA airlines using Avianca. TBH corporations seriously don't care anymore. There are usually 3 major options for any given service/product and they know it. Groceries/cell phones/airlines... They are all owned by the same financial institutions (Blackrock and StateStreet mostly). There is no competition and without competition capitalism does not work. All of these companies should be declared monopolies and broken up. What are we as a general population going to do about this? This is the real reason Paris is burning.
Just beware when purchasing tickets with LOT. As a frequent traveller, LOT offers cheap tickets but really not because you have to pay more for extra cost for bagages, meals, seats, etc., like from my past experienced with them last month.
And when I did an upgrade, they lock the option on the website and only has to it with their CS which adds another top up price from the cost I have to...
Just beware when purchasing tickets with LOT. As a frequent traveller, LOT offers cheap tickets but really not because you have to pay more for extra cost for bagages, meals, seats, etc., like from my past experienced with them last month.
And when I did an upgrade, they lock the option on the website and only has to it with their CS which adds another top up price from the cost I have to pay. I was sooo disappointed with this airline, and never again. It's a very,very cunning and dishonest bussiness management here.
Seems like I should come to you from now on when I’m having trouble with getting any sort of response from an airline.. I had mold on my food in Avianca Business Class last week which gave me food poisoning and I had multiple broken seats in LH F over the last few months, would love to at least hear back from the airlines for that kind of thing
In what way did LOT "do the right thing"? They only took action after a publication shamed them. They did the right thing for their PR.
Not entirely clear how much this passenger will be reinbursed, and how the original Aeroplan miles figure in the deal.
well, poland , no wonder, they got their nick name since WWI
Unacceptable slander comment!
Nazi or communist..?
LOT's behavior is shameful. They need to do much better.
The only reason for this resolution was as a result of your post. Many readers submit similar issues with hotels or airlines but receive no reply from you. Very disappointing that you would choose favorites or your political biases. I wonder what your filter criteria is.
So Lucky shouldn't help anyone/report anything, just to satisfy your question.
Since you're making an accusation based on nothing at all.
"Many readers submit similar issues with hotels or airlines but receive no reply from you."
Either you've hacked Ben's email account and are reading his mail, or you are making this up. Details please.
Just one detail:
The client should also claim 600€ for denied boarding as per EU261.
This is not EU261. It is just in case of overbooking/delay/cancellation.
I was denied boarding because of “not having PCR test” in covid, eventhough it was not needed at that time (and it showed up I was right), but no EU261 compensation (checked with the companies who deal with this).
Btw it was with Ryanair and I had to buy a new ticket, as the refused to give me a new one, actually...
This is not EU261. It is just in case of overbooking/delay/cancellation.
I was denied boarding because of “not having PCR test” in covid, eventhough it was not needed at that time (and it showed up I was right), but no EU261 compensation (checked with the companies who deal with this).
Btw it was with Ryanair and I had to buy a new ticket, as the refused to give me a new one, actually they refused to provide me a confirmation I was denied boarding and there is no way to force them doing it)Total scam this airline
LOT customer service when anything should go wrong is really not great. They don't honor compensation rules, and will make you fight tooth and nail to get reimbursed for their mistakes.
My wife and I had 2 paid biz tickets WAW-LAX last year. It wouldn't assign me seats during online check-in. Check-in agent said there were some unserviceable seats on the plane and gave us boarding passes tagged 'standby'. Every 30 minutes I would go to the boarding gate, show my passes, and they would say 'not yet'. Turns out the contract agents (at their hub!) thought we were non-rev employees. Long story short: we were...
My wife and I had 2 paid biz tickets WAW-LAX last year. It wouldn't assign me seats during online check-in. Check-in agent said there were some unserviceable seats on the plane and gave us boarding passes tagged 'standby'. Every 30 minutes I would go to the boarding gate, show my passes, and they would say 'not yet'. Turns out the contract agents (at their hub!) thought we were non-rev employees. Long story short: we were denied boarding and made it home on BA and VX 24 hours late. Our luggage got there 23 days later. Never ever again am I booking J with them.
LOT is now my last option.
Had only good experience until last July they cancelled a flight after boarding.
LOT told that they can't arrange hotels - please arrange yourself and we will compensate. Got a new flight arriving 50 hours later than original. Getting a penny out from LOT was really difficult. Gave up and accepted their offer to pay c. 65% of the cost (no compensation) in May 2023. Do not fly!
Don't get me wrong I'm glad at least they're doing this, but there are several problems:
1. LOT didn't feel sorry they did something bad. They got caught by the story going public. It took the story being featured in a blog as big as OMAAT before they decided to look into it. We should be getting more transparency into what happened and what steps have been done to prevent something like this from happening...
Don't get me wrong I'm glad at least they're doing this, but there are several problems:
1. LOT didn't feel sorry they did something bad. They got caught by the story going public. It took the story being featured in a blog as big as OMAAT before they decided to look into it. We should be getting more transparency into what happened and what steps have been done to prevent something like this from happening again. What the employee in Beijing did is really bad, and it's not just the monetary value that's lost, but also the distress of being stranded at the airport.
2. The passenger in question is refunded in CNY. Is this the right thing to do? He might have paid CNY, but the CNY/USD or CNY/CAD for that matter might have changed in the last few months. In fact, a simple google search showed that it's been weakening. Again, is LOT doing the "bare minimum apology" here?
3. And more than the stress of being stranded at the airport, the stress of having to complain about this for months and trying to get a resolution, that itself should be compensated. Anyone who's dealt with insurance and/or complain center knows how frustrating it is and how imbalanced the power can be. Large companies can just ignore your complains, no matter how justified they are.
This whole thing reeks of LOT completely not caring about customer experience. I've only flown it once and it was okay, better than average but nothing special. But reading about this will for sure make me not want to book any award ticket with them ever.
hi Nyold. I think you're spot on for a few points here. I also thought about these, in particular, #2. That being said, if I do get reimbursed by LOT timely and in full, I'll eat the fx rate difference.
In terms of corporate culture, unfortunately, this is more common in modern times. That being said, on what happened that day, I believe it is the act of a few individuals and do not believe...
hi Nyold. I think you're spot on for a few points here. I also thought about these, in particular, #2. That being said, if I do get reimbursed by LOT timely and in full, I'll eat the fx rate difference.
In terms of corporate culture, unfortunately, this is more common in modern times. That being said, on what happened that day, I believe it is the act of a few individuals and do not believe this reflects largely their company or society as a whole. Nowhere is perfect and I was just unlucky to have to interact with some "bad apples". But luckily, I'm fortunate to have help in the US from people like Ben at OMAAT and you all sharing ideas and pulling for me. For this, I thank Ben and all of you here.
The reader shouldn't accept a refund of their new ticket as full settlement of the incident. EU261 would apply in this case, as it's a journey to the EU operated by an EU carrier. This requires that the passenger be paid €600 (in the case of a long-haul flight) for denied boarding - which this clearly was.
It's not a journey to the EU, since passenger's destination was in the US. There's a recent court ruling stating that the overal journey shall be taken into account when determining the applicability of the compensation law, not individual sectors.
EU261 applies to EU carries regardless of origin and destination.
hi FL360. With everything I had to go through, I'll be mostly satisfied if I do get reimbursed by LOT timely and in full.
As Ben mentioned, I replied to LOT's response trying to confirm the exact dollar amount but haven't heard back. I’m cautiously optimistic that they’re not going to play any tricks there (e.g., pay a much lesser amount or taking months to send the payment).
If they play it right, they may...
hi FL360. With everything I had to go through, I'll be mostly satisfied if I do get reimbursed by LOT timely and in full.
As Ben mentioned, I replied to LOT's response trying to confirm the exact dollar amount but haven't heard back. I’m cautiously optimistic that they’re not going to play any tricks there (e.g., pay a much lesser amount or taking months to send the payment).
If they play it right, they may get recognized for a great recovery on an awful situation. So let's see if they are smart enough to realize this opportunity.
Ignorance and unilateral authority from frontline workers can be astounding. Last summer when we were waiting for construction on our home to finish, we spent a ton of time at various Hyatt properties in the area. I used WOH points transferred from Chase UR for the majority of these. After one week at a Hyatt Place, I noticed the folio had $800 or so worth of charges. Went to the front desk to politely clarify...
Ignorance and unilateral authority from frontline workers can be astounding. Last summer when we were waiting for construction on our home to finish, we spent a ton of time at various Hyatt properties in the area. I used WOH points transferred from Chase UR for the majority of these. After one week at a Hyatt Place, I noticed the folio had $800 or so worth of charges. Went to the front desk to politely clarify that this was an award stay using points. The desk employee had no idea what I was talking about; when she called the manager over, she said "he's saying he got an award for a week at our hotel or something." Tried to explain to the manager, who insisted I have to call Hyatt to work it out. Called Hyatt and they insisted I had to work it out with the front desk. In the end I just emailed customer service after the charges had settled on my credit card, which were then promptly reversed. But wow. I'm a pretty patient person but I was beside myself.
Wow, our faimly will be flying LOT next month on business awards booked through Lifemiles, I hope this wouldn't happen to us.
I'd say at this point, the airline least likely to do this is LOT
This just confirms that it was the handling company going rogue (as LOT customer services confirmed repeatedly that the ticket is showing as valid in their systems).
The question remains why they didn't catch this problem earlier.
hi Samo, this is what I believe too.
I would want to add the detail that the station manager wasn't the one making decisions. He kept telling me his boss is the ultimate decision maker. He repeatedly said he can't make the decision and can't go over his boss; he'll get in trouble. He hand me his phone to speak with his boss and I had the "pleasure" of speaking to her. She (I...
hi Samo, this is what I believe too.
I would want to add the detail that the station manager wasn't the one making decisions. He kept telling me his boss is the ultimate decision maker. He repeatedly said he can't make the decision and can't go over his boss; he'll get in trouble. He hand me his phone to speak with his boss and I had the "pleasure" of speaking to her. She (I don't know her by name, just a phone number) was the one claiming that credit card transfers to airlines and then booking with miles is "illegal" and the one threatened to call the police. She knows I'm a foreigner and likely don't want to get in trouble with the local police. At the end, it is likely the decision of a lone individual and the rest are just "puppets". She is the one who should at least be trained on proper customer service or at worst be dismissed from her role.
As to why they didn't catch this problem earlier, I'm speculating here, could be that the customer service issue was not sufficiently escalated to someone higher up in Poland.
The problem is a lot of Chinese are doing everything to circumvent the rules. You see people selling hotel points and airline miles to companies and these companies literally bought up every room/ seat that was available.
Some companies are trying to combat the issue by not letting suspicious guests to check in.
We're sorry you chose to rat us out, instead of tolerating our abuse. We've decided to make a special exception, just this once as a favour you shoukd be grateful for. Soon/sometime we'll return most/some of the money we illegally forced you to spend. We're deeply sorry you've chosen to react this way to these "circumstances".
Thank you to Lucky for getting things as they should, but a system that requires public channels to intervene is a failed system.
Different from the story, but I’m happy to see only ‘LOT’ and ‘LOT Polish Airlines’ being used here, and not the half-hearted ‘LOT Polish’, as pointed out in the previous article. It shows Lucky really does listen to his readers’ feedback, which is one of the reasons why this is the best in the business, bar none.
Some of you really need to get over yourselves. Most people call them LOT Polish Airlines, because that's what they use themselves in english.
Hi VLCNC,
You did not get the point. See the other post to fully understand what’s going on.
Feel free to comment here in case you have further questions.
Oh please It is LOT Polish. Or are you going to correct everyone from saying American instead of American Airlines, United…
An example that illustrates Klaus's point is nobody says just "British" for British Airways.
I can't believe the pedantry over this is continuing.
I know right, just absolutely the worst bores on this earth.
I think equally important, as LOT refunding and apologizing, is that they make sure it doesn't happen again.
Glad that LOT came to their senses of solving the issue, however as you pointed out, why should it take your post to get them into action? [It seems in the last years, the Lufthansa Group airlines Customer service has been going downhill as fast as the slippery slope. My lost luggage case is still open after months without any resolution with them!]
I thought that Poland had quite some good consumer protection, but seems...
Glad that LOT came to their senses of solving the issue, however as you pointed out, why should it take your post to get them into action? [It seems in the last years, the Lufthansa Group airlines Customer service has been going downhill as fast as the slippery slope. My lost luggage case is still open after months without any resolution with them!]
I thought that Poland had quite some good consumer protection, but seems that LOT is outside of this.
In my opinion, LOT should reimburse 100% the newly purchased ticket and provide all the impacted pax a free return ticket from anywhere in the US to Poland at least.
The so called duty manager in Beijing should be relief of his position.
Cheers!
How does this have anything to do with the Lufthansa Group? LOT uses M&M as its frequent flyer program but otherwise has no affiliation with LHG
It's pathetic that it took you posting about it to get LOT to do something.
I am currently owed 950 dollars or so under Israeli law from Turkish Airlines for a flight 2.5 months ago from Israel to America in which I was delayed arriving by a full day. Turkish has fully acknowledged that I am owed the money but continues to drag their feet. I basically have no recourse short of taking Turkish...
It's pathetic that it took you posting about it to get LOT to do something.
I am currently owed 950 dollars or so under Israeli law from Turkish Airlines for a flight 2.5 months ago from Israel to America in which I was delayed arriving by a full day. Turkish has fully acknowledged that I am owed the money but continues to drag their feet. I basically have no recourse short of taking Turkish Airlines to small claims court. Hopefully they will eventually pay up but if they don't there is not much I can functionally do.
I am in the Same Situation with the Turkish. They keep messing up my refund; it has been nearly a year of them saying that they owe me the money, but weekly following up requires me to run around with no results.
It should not be like this, but they are an airline that does not handle situations well when things go wrong (Weather Delays, System Issues, Air Traffic). Don't give up.
Yeah and if you call the customer service line, the reps can't do anything. I've tried emailing the C-suite execs as well with no luck.
They tell me I can go pickup a check at jfk (I live in NYC) but that would take about 3-4 hours of travel so that's not happening.
I've tried disputing the charge on my credit card with chase, but Turkish is such a large merchant, chase won't...
Yeah and if you call the customer service line, the reps can't do anything. I've tried emailing the C-suite execs as well with no luck.
They tell me I can go pickup a check at jfk (I live in NYC) but that would take about 3-4 hours of travel so that's not happening.
I've tried disputing the charge on my credit card with chase, but Turkish is such a large merchant, chase won't even consider my case.
I've tried to get the Israeli version of the FAA involved but they won't respond to me.
So I called Turkish today and told them that if the money isn't in my account by end of July I am going to take them to small claims court in NJ (my flight was out of EWR)
It’s because most carriers outsource to third party providers with few skills who use boilerplate responses and are trained like pavlov’s dogs.
It sounds like you’ve already wasted 3-4 hours! Just go get the check. Clearly you enjoy the drama.
@nick, unless you are paying for my Uber to and from JFK so I don't need to spend 3 hours on a NYC subway, I will pass on that. Plus I can do things while I am on the phone
Very unfair Nick or are you a Troll Bot looking to stir up trouble.