Questions and Answers

Family of 3 is looking to book 3 First Class roundtrip tickets to Europe through FRA on Lufthansa metal for next summer. I’ve mostly booked business class, but it feels like availability usually opens up around January for business class in the summer. Any suggestions when to start looking for First class availability? I know it opens up more a week or 2 out but with family going it would be better if booked as far out to make plans.

Well LH doesnt release F space to partners until it’s within 14 days of departure so there’s not much you can do unless you have a way to obtain miles with LH’s own Miles&More. Members are able to book F awards that are available well ahead of time.

If you have specific travel dates, I would book J if you can find space then pay any fees to upgrade to F if/when it becomes available.

Is there a typical fee to upgrade? I’m confident I can at worst get business and if I just need to pay a fee to upgrade 14 days out that would be fine.

If you use miles from Singapore’s KrisFlyer to book the tickets, they charge $75 per ticket to upgrade, plus the difference in miles. United charges $125 and the difference in miles, per ticket. Lifemiles (whose call center is horrible from what I hear) charges $150 to make changes to a ticket or $200 to cancel and redeposit.

thanks

I’d recommend lifemiles. 63,000 for business or 87,000 on Lufthansa and negligible fees. Call center much improved. I cancelled a redemption last week and also have used the screenshot method. Points at 1.375 -1.5c makes this soncheap.

Btw I just flew Swiss biz from Ord to Bilbao and back on lh first. As great as lh is I wouldn’t put a huge premium on it over Swiss biz. Just personal preference and I know everyone loves lh first. But Swiss often opens 5 seats and I loved the cabin. Food good enough. Zurich nice airport. One of my favorite business class flights tbh.