Questions and Answers

One aspect of codesharing that really gets my goat is the posting on airport flight info screens of absolutely every single codeshare flight number for a certain flight. It necessitates waiting for the flight numbers to scroll through to the actual carrier’s flight number as shown on the boarding pass so that you can find the gate or belt info. This is especially true where an airline is not part of an alliance and instead gravitates towards endless codeshare agreements. Take, for example, Bangkok Airways, flying its domestic trunk routes in Thailand. With a boarding pass in hand you look at the screen to verify the gate or belt number and you can’t see, say, flight PG132 on the screen, rather you see endless codeshare flight numbers and have to wait for perhaps 2-3 minutes until PG132 actually shows.

My question is this: when boarding passes are issued, are the codeshare flight numbers actually printed or will it default to the actual carrier’s flight number? So, if I fly from FRA to BKK with Lufthansa and then on to Phuket with Thai Airways, will Lufthansa in FRA issue me with a boarding pass for, say, LH9788 or TG200??