#78 out of 94 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings.
353 reviews
Hey there,
in May this year (2023) I spend some time in Milan with a very good friend of mine. It was my first time in Milan and while my expectations were quite moderate (as I was often told it's not one of Italys most scenic cities) I was pleasantly suprised.
Of course one shouldn't expect a huge old town complex like in Florence or Venice, but Milan is still far from ugly and has it's very own beauty. :)
After three short days in Milan and a lovely day trip to Turin it was time to head back to Berlin. To get a little bit of change I choose Austrian for this flight, hooping for a hot meal on my first leg from MXP to VIE.
We arrived with the Malpensa Express from Milano and since my friend was flying hbo and I had baggage to check in we shortly split up and she already headed for security.
As it is quite common within Europ all LH Group "Premium" Airlines were charing a check-in area. Today Check-In Area 6 of Malpensa Airport T1 was designated for LH Group, with Economy Bag drop counters in the front and 3 or 4 dedicated Business and First Class check-in counters behind.
As you might have spotted behind the big group of students checking in at the economy counters, the Business Class counters were pretty deserted soI had my bag checked in and an old fashion printed boardingpass in no time.
From the CheckIn Area 6 its a very short walk to security.
At Malpensa Airport aswell as at Linate Airport (the other one of Milans main airports) Fast Track is called "Via Milano" and was resonably fast.
A few minuts later I was leaving security and guided into the duty free area, were I met with my friend again.
At Malpensa Airport gates are announced only about an hour before departure and people are gathered in a central area. I do not realy like this system, as you do not find any quiet spots in those central areas. As my friend was on another flight and did not have lounge access, this was also not an option.
So we went to the area of Gate A01 to A10, were there was plenty of seating, no crowds and even some nice apron views.
We arrived at the aerea roughly an hour before boarding and I frequently checked the screens for new Gate information.
And did some plane spotting well more like watching.
At around 1pm my plane arrived from Vienna and the gate was also announced.
We were quite lucky as an hour before departure our annoucend gates were A06 and A10, which where in the area we were already in. We said goodby and I made my (very short) way to gate A10, were boarding was soon to begin.
Within LH Group boarding within Europe is done in five Groups. Before May 2023 Group 1 were all Star Alliance Gold Members (including those of LH Miles&More) and Group 2 consisted of all other Passengers in Business Class, but both Groups were always called at the same time, so the differenciation was slightly unnessesary.
Group 3 to 5 are all other Economy passengers from window seat to middle seat to aisle seat.
In addition families with small children and people with reduced mobility can bord before, although thats very weakly inforced.
At the End of April 2023 LH annouced that they were going to change Priority boarding. Group one should now be exclusivly for HON-Circle-Member (M&M's super top tier level) and called seperatly from Group 2.
But apparently this Memo had not arrived at MXP yet or there were simply no HON Members on my flight, because the gate agent called Group 1 and 2 at the same time.
As it is common within europe, seating in austrian business class is the same as in economy, but the seat next to you is blocked so you do have some more space and privacy. On the Embrear Austrian offers standard 2+2 seatings, so in Business you'll always have your own row to yourself.
The Cabin is devided by a "curtain", which gets moved according to demand. On this flight we had 3 rows of Business Class.
The flight was fully booked, but an Embrear has only around 120 Seats so boarding is still relativly fast. So we pushed back on time and taxied to the runway.
It was a cloudy but very clear day, so I had some nice views of the Lombardia Region, but flying eastwards the clouds became bigger until the weather was quite nasty over Austria.
Usually Austrian offers nice hot meals in Business Class on flights with a scheduld flight time over 80 Minuts. So with a scheduld flight time of 85 minutes I was looking forward to get a nice lunch. However on this flight only a cold snack was offered. I don't know if thats normal on the MXP Route or if something went wrong with the catering process.
I opted for a Gin&Tonic together with a glas of water. Later in the flight coffee and tea were also proactivly offered by the FA.
About an hour after take-off we were descenting into VIE. The weather was exceptionally bad and the visibility quite low.
We arrived at a remote position in VIE so we had to be bussed to the terminal.
At the very crowded terminal, I directly proceded to the Austrian Lounges, were I waited for my connecting flight to Berlin, which will soon follow this report :).
Thanks for reading! :)
Overall an okaish travell experience, although I was a little bit disapointed that no hot meal was offered (I know that seams like a very unreal problem on an eightyfive minutes flight for north amarican travellers ;) ).
7 Comments
Not sure if this is a cost-cutting exercise because the ERJ-195s have ovens so are capable of serving hot meals. As A321Lufthansa cited, it should be a hot meal and I've even had hot meals on shorter segments (VIE-VCE).
thanks a lot for the update! So it is cost cutting in the end, sad to notice that.
LH group actually does better than most with a blocked seat in J on the E-Jets or similar regional jet configurations with a 2-2 layout. Most other European carriers like BA, AF, KL, IB, don't block the adjacent seat in regional aircraft so you end up having exactly the same seat as Economy with someone sitting right next to you. So at least for the blocked seats OS and LH are better than average...for the rest, not so much.
Hah, as a Franco-American who splits my time between Europe and the US I see both sides. My american side thinks a fresh meal (even cold) is amazing on a 1h flight. My European side sees the lack of hot meal as disappointing since the meal is essentially the biggest differentiator between Business class and Economy class. Definitely looks like some cost-cutting on the catering side!
Thanks for sharing!
Yes you're right. A lot of European Carriers only offer a block middle seat in Business, which is non-existing on their regional aircrafts. In fact I only can think of Air Baltic and LOT(?) that always keep the seat next to you free apart from LH Group.
Indeed, but to be fair, most other european airlines would also serve a cold meal, on flights of that lenght.
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