Posting this on behalf of a friend because the situation is unreal.
He was flying ARN to MUC to MCT to COK. First leg operated by Lufthansa, ticketed via Oman Air through a travel agency. At check in, Lufthansa let his wife and 9 year old daughter board but denied him due to some ticket visibility or cross mark issue in their system. No clear explanation.
His family flew without him. He was stranded in Stockholm and had to buy a brand new ticket on another airline the next day. To make it worse, his return ticket was automatically canceled as a no show.
Lufthansa says it’s Oman Air’s fault. Oman Air says the ticket was confirmed. The travel agency is also shrugging. This booking has been cursed from the start. Return leg disappeared months ago. Child ticket vanished last week. Now this.
We did manage to get Lufthansa to add a note in the PNR confirming he was at the airport on time, so it’s clearly not a voluntary no show.
Main questions we’re trying to figure out:
Is Lufthansa on the hook under EU261 since this was departing Sweden and they were the operating carrier?
Can he claim denied boarding compensation plus reimbursement for the new ticket?
How do you get a return leg reinstated when the outbound miss was involuntary?
And at what point does the travel agency become liable given the repeated ticketing issues?
If anyone has dealt with something similar or has EU261 experience with mixed carrier itineraries, any advice would help a lot.
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