Abandoned in Frankfurt: Lufthansa must compensate school class

A school class from the Köflach grammar school got stranded on the way from London-Heathrow via Frankfurt to Graz in Germany. Lufthansa had canceled the onward flight and then took a stubborn position with regard to compensation and the reimbursement of expenses.

The Austrian agency for passenger and passenger rights announced that Lufthansa had not taken care of alternative transport, food or accommodation in Frankfurt am Main. The hotline would not have been accessible to the teachers. The students and their teachers should have spent the night in Terminal 1. A solution was not found until the next morning: the school class was to fly to Linz and then be taken to Köflach by bus.

Lufthansa did not respond to the prompt complaint from AHS Köflach in a timely manner (within 6 weeks). The APF was finally able to arrange the payment of 6.132 euros from Lufthansa to the students and teaching staff. The 6.000 euros is made up of 24 times the payment of 250 euros payable for flights of less than 1.500 kilometers under the EU Air Passenger Rights Regulation + 132 euros for care services (meals).