Many Indians shared similar experiences and raised allegations of racism
A Reddit user has accused German airlines Lufthansa of racial discrimination, alleging that crew members on his recent flight were ''rude and disrespectful'' to passengers. In a lengthy Reddit post, the Indian-origin user who lives in New York, mentioned several instances of the Lufthansa staff members discriminating against Indians and insulting them.
''Ground service agents at Frankfurt were not helpful, specifically Lufthansa employees. One such example: I asked an airline representative where I could fill my water bottle in Frankfurt, and he replied by saying "Do I look like the information desk to you, don't ask me,'' he wrote in the post.
The user further said that the staff's behaviour was particularly disparaging towards the elderly and those who could not speak English. He mentioned an incident wherein an elderly woman, who was not fluent in English, was pointing to the tea on the beverage cart and saying ''Yes.'' Instead of being understanding and handing her the beverage, a crew member almost yelled at her and asked her to “open your mouth and use your words.” They also lectured customers about how they "need to wait their turn" when they asked for napkins.
Here's the full post:
Avoid Travelling Lufthansa
byu/sazn2 inindia
''This same crew member went on a rant near me, talking to a customer about why they're ordering food if they're not going to eat it. This was comical, considering that Lufthansa had messed up the catering for the flights, and had made all the vegetarian dishes into vegan ones, which were almost inedible (I honestly do not know what happened or how. It was very confusing,'' he further wrote.
He mentioned another incident from the same flight, saying how a woman who ordered vegetarian food was served a chicken meal. ''When she opened it, realized it was chicken, and asked a crew member to replace it, he said they couldn't replace it since she opened it, and went on to say "you don't you to a restaurant, eat the food and ask for it to be taken back,'' the post read.
Bengaluru-based techie Shantanu Goel shared a screenshot of the Reddit post on X, where it has gone viral. ''All this behavior, including downright rude and idiotic staff is unfortunately not an aberration but quite common on Lufthansa, which is why I never fly it,'' Mr Goel wrote.
Many Indians shared similar experiences and raised allegations of racism against Lufthansa.
Here's the post:
The post also caught the attention of Paytm founder and CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma who quote-tweeted the post and wrote, '''Can't wait for Air India and Indigo to go places -- many of us would rather not fly European airlines.''
Reacting to the post, one user wrote, ''I had almost the same experience when I flew Luftansa once! Never touched them again.''
Another commented, ''Time to do a ‘Maldives' on Lufthansa.'' A third said, ''Lufthansa and Air France are notorious for how they treat Indian patrons. Emirates, Air India, Etihad, and Singapore airlines are much better for Seniors in particular.''
A third said, ''The Lufthansa team attitude is extremely poor..it's just not a good airline to fly with.''