This spring, Lufthansa made headlines for discriminating against Jewish passengers on a flight. There’s now an interesting conclusion to this story, as the airline and passengers have reached a settlement.
The basics of Lufthansa’s discrimination against Jews
This incident involves Lufthansa flight 401 from New York (JFK) to Frankfurt (FRA) on Wednesday, May 4, 2022. There were many Orthodox Jews on the flight connecting to Budapest, and there were reportedly some mask compliance issues on the flight, to the point that the decision was made that these passengers should be denied boarding on their connecting flight to Budapest, due to not following crew member instructions.
That’s fair enough, though the issue is how Lufthansa handled the situation. Lufthansa didn’t just deny boarding to the specific passengers who were causing problems, but rather denied boarding to all “obviously” Jewish passengers, based on how they looked, or how their names sounded.
Some of the interactions were filmed, and one Lufthansa employee could be heard confirming that everyone was being punished for the crimes of some — “everyone has to pay for a couple.”
That’s not exactly a great look for anyone, especially a German airline…
Lufthansa settles, pays $21K to each passenger impacted
In addition to Lufthansa’s CEO personally issuing an apology for what happened, Lufthansa is now providing monetary compensation for the incident. As reported by DansDeals, Lufthansa has reportedly paid $21,000 to each passenger who was impacted by this incident.
This includes a settlement of $20,000, plus $1,000 to cover expenses resulting from being denied boarding. The law firm that negotiated the settlement is reportedly taking 18% of the $20,000, leaving each passenger with a payment of $17,400.
Checks have reportedly shown up in the mail. It’s estimated that somewhere around 130 passengers were denied boarding, meaning that Lufthansa has paid roughly $2.7 million. Wow, that’s not cheap.
Bottom line
Lufthansa has come to a settlement with the passengers who were denied boarding on a flight this spring. Specifically, Lufthansa is paying each passenger $21,000, and after legal fees, each passenger will get $17,400.
It’s nice to see that this story ultimately got amplified, and at least there was some justice — Lufthansa had to pay up, and Lufthansa’s CEO even had to personally apologize.
While Lufthansa had a case for denying boarding to those who weren’t complying with mask policies, it’s outrageous that the airline just denied all Jews boarding by association. Here’s to hoping that something like this never happens again.
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