TRIP REPORT: Lufthansa’s business class from Belgrade

TRIP REPORT


I flew on Lufthansa last Saturday between Belgrade and Frankfurt on board their Airbus A320neo aircraft. I was booked in business class for this journey. I arrived at the airport at 5.00 AM as the flight was at 07.00. There are dedicated check-in desks for the Lufthansa Group since there is also an early morning Austrian flight to Vienna. The check-in process was quick, and I should commend the check-in agent since I had a bit of a complicated booking and long itinerary on different airlines, but she managed to handle everything without too much of an issue and check my luggage to the final destination.



I went through the dedicated fast track lane for business class passengers at passport control only to be told off by one of the police officers in the booth that I cut the line. I told him there was no one in line and he was showing me the other people that were waiting in the regular line for passport control. I showed him my boarding pass and said I was a business class passenger and he responded, “What does that have to do with me”. I explained to him that there is a dedicated business class lane and that his booth is the one who checks the documents for it, showing him where the lane is marked with a sign, but he just looked at me blankly as if this was the first time, he had ever heard of it. Might I add this lane has existed at Belgrade Airport for at least 5 years already. He eventually angrily stamped my passport. This is nothing new since the police officers at Belgrade Airport are extremely rude, unfriendly and unprofessional. Last year, for example, I had a flight departing at 00.50 and they didn’t want to let anyone pass until midnight (there was four of them chatting in one booth). After I told one of the officers that Belgrade Airport must be the only one in the world where immigration has set working hours, he said why did I want to go through anyway. Crazy.



I went through to the business club lounge at the airport, but it didn’t open until 6AM. I don’t understand why they don’t open it at 5 considering there is an Austrian Airlines flight departing before 6, as well as the Lufthansa flight at 7. I saw at least 5 passengers try to enter the lounge, but it was locked. At 6.10 a guy appeared and told the people waiting in front of the lounge that it will take him 5 minutes until he is able to open (even though the official working hours are from 6). He went inside and unlocked the doors 15 minutes later. There wasn’t much point going into the lounge anymore as it was time to board. The airport placed Lufthansa’s and Air Serbia’s Frankfurt flights, which depart 10 minutes apart, side by side, meaning they share the same gate space, which I don’t think is such a smart idea.




I look forward to VINCI overhauling the airport, but it must also invest a lot in staff training. Unfortunately, a lot of the staff is very rude (and I’m not referring to the police officers as that is not VINCI’s responsibility), half of the staff were not wearing masks, at the security check lots of the staff were chatting loudly how they can’t wait to get off work, I saw one staff member arguing with a passenger, the lounge agent who was late to work and didn’t even seem to care or apologise to people waiting for him to start work… and this seems to be getting worse each and every time.

As soon as I passed security, boarding started for the flight. The crew greeted every passenger by giving them a disinfectant wipe. There were 11 passengers in business class. The rows have a blocked middle seat, and I was lucky as there was no one sitting in my row. The aircraft was just one year old.

We pushed back 5 minutes before departure and took off right on time. After departure, the crew served breakfast. Lufthansa has really gone downhill in the last 6 months with their catering. Their meals are now inspired by traditional German cuisine, which is fine, but we got a rather unappetising sausage with pickled vegetables. It’s nice that they are drawing upon their heritage, but they could consider that most people don’t feel like eating sausages or pickled vegetables at 7am. The desert was nice though. Drinks were served by the time everyone finished their meal. After the trays were cleared, the staff offered an apple and a chocolate.









For comparisons sake, this is the meal on the exact same flight in August 2021, before they introduced cost cutting measures.


This is the buy on board menu that is now offered to economy class passengers.



We landed 10 minutes ahead of schedule and I was very fortunate that besides getting an airbridge gate we were actually allowed to use the airbridge as we arrived at the non-Schengen part of the airport. Very often, if the plane parks at the Schengen area of the airport, the air bridge can’t be used. Since my connecting flight was also in the non-Schengen area, it worked out well for me.

Prior to landing, the crew read out of the gates for passengers continuing with Lufthansa and I always find it interesting to hear where people are continuing their journeys to. This time it was Barcelona, Tel Aviv, Bilbao and Dublin.


Overall, the flight was good but it’s a shame Lufthansa has really ruined their catering. I’ve flown with them several times since these new meals were introduced and I don’t know which one tasted worse. From what I’ve been reading online, most people have the same opinion. Otherwise, the flight was good, and I was happy that everything went smoothly with the schedule, giving me time to catch my onwards connection.


Share your travel experience by submitting a trip report to exyu@exyuaviation.com


Comments

  1. Anonymous09:23

    Thanks for the trip report.

    The business class lounge is getting old to be honest. Same food every time I go in there. The staff doesn't really care much either and it something I would address to Vinci who runs this place.

    As for the immigration... Truth be told, it's not just BEG.
    US customs are notorious for closing their doors before all the fligths are departed in the evening. We used to frequently get crew notifications that if we don't go through customs by say 10pm, we would be cut off and the fligth would be in jeopardy of departing at all.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous09:26

    Unfortunately but this is indeed frequently seen behavior at Belgrade airport, but also other Ex-yu airports. People forget to understand their job is serving passengers.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous09:35

      Well the job of the police officers is to protect people, not to pamper them. I agree about the rest.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous13:45

      How did the person writing the report indicate they expected to be pampered by the police? The officer didn't even know the lane he was serving was for business class passengers.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous17:52

      Airport is in the thick of construction but that can't be an excuse for low levels or even lack of service by the customer facing airport staff.

      Airport will give birth to the new C section (pun intended) in a couple of months and we are all eagerly waiting for airport to finally improve service levels in line with the quality of the new addition.

      Delete
  3. Anonymous09:37

    Thanks for the report. Not one single word or photo of airport or airline service gives any business class feeling to me. This is plain economy all over the place.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:17

      Lufthansa has really gone down hill over the years. However one thing that has not gone down are their fares.

      Delete
  4. Anonymous10:14

    Belgrade Airport is generally in mess, and I am not talking about ongoing works, but in organisational way. I can agree with you that our police department at airport is not the best, but for Italians and Greeks, they are superb.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:36

      I had nothing but terrible experience in FRA.

      First of all from min 10 counters they usually open not more than 2 on T2 having mixed passengers from non Schengen countries. It takes ages to get to passport control while 2 police officers sit behind automatic entrance control (reserved for adult EU passengers) doing absolutely nothing, but chatting. They regularly ignore the crowd waiting on 2 open counters and even reject to stamp passports if someone dares to approach them.

      Frankfurt airport is regularly marked with "keep distance" signs, but when it comes to passport control nobody actually cares how many people are standing in queue sometimes for very long period of time.

      Delete
    2. In Hamburg police is really professional and kind. Last time I have arrived from BNX and only for this flight they opened 4 cabins with 8 police officers. Passport control was really fast. But security check at Hamburg is so bad. Staff is from security company, mostly from Turkey and middle East. They stopped me twice because I put in a luggage aroma diffuser, solar light, and dehumidifier bags were so suspicious. They said all electronic equipment should be taken from luggage. I haven't seen something like this before. They look like they started to work 2 days ago

      Delete
  5. Anonymous10:18

    Hit mi je činija sa jagodom,kriškom pomorandže i tri bobice grozda. Gadi mi se današnji elitizam.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:36

      И мени брате, тотално нереално.

      Delete
    2. Prepelica13:06

      While I agree with you both to certain extent, I heard many people saying the same, but whenever they had a change to experience "today's elitism" they never hesitated. My question to both of you would be - If you would get a free upgrade from economy to business on your flight, or f.e. chance to upgrade for some small fee, would you decline cause your disgusted with todays elitism and stay with your principles or happily move to the front of the plane. I don't know two of you but I am pretty sure you wouldn't hesitate moving to business class or switching from 3 star hotel to 5 star. And for people like that, in Serbian we say: "Fuj, kiselo grozdje."

      Delete
    3. Anonymous13:22

      Prihvato bih bez problema i ponovio,Gadi mi se današnji elitizam.

      Delete
    4. Anonymous13:35

      It's half of a strawberry!

      Delete
  6. Anonymous12:30

    Those are good premium loads.

    ReplyDelete
  7. What a great review. I think you should go for a side job as a consultant—I'm sure you could sort things out pretty rapido!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Anonymous17:09

    Great review. Goes to show what's the J cabin standard for intra-European flights. LH, KL, JU, BT, W6, FR -> difference in J cabin is getting insignificant regardless of airline's overall business model.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous20:20

    Thanks for the report! I guess the connecting flight was worth of business class ticket, because this one surely wasn't :)

    I had the exact same experience with the business class line and the police at the passport control. That was some years ago, and while this line wasn't exactly new back then, I just imagined the person manning the desk was new at the airport. But this happening in 2022 - that's just an attitude problem of whoever runs the border police at BEG.

    I would also disagree with the comment that it is a bad idea they put two FRA flights in the same gate. Mixups happen more than you imagine - and it's way easier to correct them if pax don't have to re-clear security and run across the airport. I had a FCO-BEG flight one, AZ and JU were departing at the more or less the same time, however the gates were VERY far apart. Not really pleasant for at least 10 pax who arrived at the wrong gate.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I take that flight about once a month and have never seen the inside of that lounge. I end up just going to the Air Serbia lounge.

    On check-in, there's about a 50/50 chance that priority desks will be unmanned. It's lots of fun during covid times when you have to use a desk.

    Surprisingly, I haven't had any problems with passport control or security.

    All in all, BEG is one of the better airport experiences in my opinion. It sure beats FRA...

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous01:48

    Most of newly employed airport staff came from ruling SNS party with zero knowledge or ability but huge sense of entitlement...Vinci is simply forced by Serbian government to hire them. Very difficult to train them and run the airport successfully...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous07:24

      Lol no they are not from SNS. Stop writing bullshit.
      BEG has ads for all positions all over the media. Their problem is that they don't pay well so high quality people don't apply

      Delete
  12. Anonymous08:23

    I am flying out of Belgrade regulary, often on the morning flight to Zurich (JU). Yes, the airport is dead in the morning, the lounges are crap. But even more terrible are the overpriced restaurants in the main area. Very unfriendly, unmotivated staff of Dufry, lousy offer of bread and sandwiches, understaffed. This is not the serbian hospitality I am used from downtown.
    But what angries me most at BEG is, that none of the gate agents is actually able to perform a proper prio boarding for Biz or status clients. This works everywhere else, but not in BEG - a matter of attitude!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous16:43

      Is there at least a proper business class priority boarding for New York flight?

      Delete
    2. Anonymous16:46

      There is. There is a priority lane for security and there is a special gate just for business. Because they use a double gate for JFK with two air bridges. For example gate C5 and C6, business class passengers enter through C6 while the rest go through C5.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous10:45

      I'm going to disagree on the lounge point. Air Serbia lounge is actually, in my opinion, far above your average European business class lounge. Yes, the views are lacking, but I would also take JU lounge over any LH Senator lounge as well. Pre-Covid, their food was also great. On the other hand, BEG lounge is just as good as any contractor lounge, however, they do have issues, capacity and washrooms above all others. Anyway, I wouldn't say they are crap. Far from it.

      Gate agents do what airlines instruct them to do. I never had any issues with priority boarding holding status and/or C class ticket on QR, LH, AZ, TK in Belgrade. And yes, priority boarding with JU to JFK can save you a lot of time at security!

      Delete

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