Tried & Tested

Lufthansa A319 Business class

11 May 2010 by AndrewGough

BACKGROUND The daily Munich-Tallinn service (LH3454) is a new one for Lufthansa, improving links between Germany and the Estonian capital. It departs Munich’s Terminal 2 at 1925 every evening and arrives at 2250 local time (+1hr), complimenting a morning flight from Lufthansa’s other hub at Frankfurt. It’s possible to pick and choose your hub with Lufthansa, thereby improving overall options for business travellers. The official flight time is two hours and 25 minutes, and it is served by an Airbus A319.

CHECK-IN I’d arrived at Munich in the morning as a transit passenger from London Heathrow (to see the LHR-MUC review, click here). As such there was no checking in to be done, and I spent the few hours between flights exploring the airside area of Munich T2, including several of its lounges.

THE LOUNGE As a business class passenger without frequent flyer privileges, I only officially had access to the normal business class lounge. There are two other higher tier lounges – Senator for those with senator level frequent flyer membership, and the First class lounge which is reserved for first class passengers (obviously) and Hon Circle members (the highest Miles and More tier achievable).

The business class lounge had recently been updated, and it showed, but Munich Airport T2 is only about four years old itself, the result of a 40 per cent cash investment by Lufthansa itself. As such everything about T2 is geared towards Lufthansa, although it doesn’t suffer from over-branding. The business class lounge has a new “biergarten”, consisting of several beer benches underneath a mock vista of the Bavarian mountains. The lounge is vast with lots of seating, and open and bright thanks to high ceilings and glass walls all around. The mood is very much one of relaxation, and while many were working on their laptops, many more were sitting and chatting over a small glass stein or two of draft beer. There is a work area with power points for laptops, plus four internet-connected terminals which were free to use. The food on offer at the time was frikadellen (meatballs) and cold potato salad, which was delicious with mustard.

I was also given a tour of the senator lounge, the smaller senator cafe and the first class lounge, but none of these were free for me to use. The senator lounge is much smaller and more intimate, but there’s more on offer with everything, including wifi, free to senator passengers. The senator cafe is aimed at anyone wishing to grab a quick cup of coffee, rather than sit around for any length of time.

The business and senator lounges are aimed at the majority of business travellers and frequent flyers, and this is reflected in the emphasis on function over form. The First class lounge is markedly different as it is far more luxurious, and has more in common with a modern hotel complete with a la carte restaurant dining. The lounge has two “bedrooms” with made-up beds and dim lighting. Colouring in the lounge is in shades of neutral brown, rather than the grey/brushed aluminium that dominates the other lounges, and there is a staffed bar with a greater range of drinks on offer. The lounge is also unique in that it has its own booking desk, where flights can be changed. There’s also a passport check desk, complete with a rather bored-looking immigration officer, presumably for inbound first class passengers so they don’t have to bother with the usual queues. The lounge also has a cigar room, baths and rain-head showers, and it’s virtually devoid of all Lufthansa branding.

BOARDING Gate 44 was called at 1845 and it takes about five minutes to walk there from the business class lounge. Once there I found myself at the back of the queue, before boarding eventually started 20 minutes later. Again, no priority boarding for business class, this is because it was bus boarding rather than an airbridge. The bus took quite a long time to get to the plane, but as I had got on it first I was the in turn the first to get off, and the first in my seat.

THE SEAT As my flight was booked for me as part of a party, I never had the opportunity to choose my own seat. However, all the business class seats were very much the same, and nearly identical to the seat on the first leg of my journey from Heathrow to Munich. Seats are six abreast (ABC-DEF), however the middle seats (B and E) are unsold and used for an extra table, which proved very useful.

To see the seatplan, click here.

My seat, 2A, was a window seat. On this particular flight, business class extended as far as row four only, the curtain separating business and economy had been moved forward in line with demand. It’s worth noting that economy passengers should try to bag a seat as far forward as possible in the hope of getting one of the business class seats. (The business and economy class seats are essentially the same apart from a one inch difference in legroom. One of the business class armrests is also adjusted to make the seat effectively wider. This is not the case in economy.)

WHICH SEAT TO CHOOSE? There isn’t a lot to separate the seats in the business class cabin, the only real factor being whether you prefer a window seat or not. I would point out though that the bulkhead in front of seats 1A and 1B doesn’t extend across as far as 1C, so there’s extra legroom to be found here. Also, sitting in 1C or 1D will mean you’re the first to disembark.

THE FLIGHT We pushed back at 1940, which already put us 15 minutes behind schedule. But it wasn’t too long before we were up in the air, and we made up about five minutes time over the duration of the flight.
Half an hour into the flight the food was served, which I was looking forward to having been pleasantly surprised on an earlier Lufthansa business class flight. This time around, the starter was a chicken tikka on a mango salsa, followed by a main of beef with carrots and mashed potatoes. A lemon tart finished off the meal. The beef was delicious if a little on the tough side.

ARRIVAL We started our descent at 2245 local time, and touched down 15 minutes later. A slight delay of ten minutes but nothing major. I was quick to disembark, being in the first few rows of the aircraft, and was soon on my way to baggage claim. When I got to the carousel it wasn’t yet running, and it must have taken at least ten minutes before we saw the first suitcase, which let down the flight a little but was presumably more a fault of the airport operator than of Lufthansa’s.

VERDICT The evening flight time makes this perfect for business travellers originating in Munich, or even when connecting from Heathrow. They can get in a day or half day’s work before leaving for the airport.

PRICE A mid-week return in June, from Lufthansa’s website, starts at €1,049.

CONTACT lufthansa.com

Andrew Gough

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