A slightly more civilised airline

Fiona Stevens was initially denied boarding with her violin on Eurowings but they found a way around it.

Here’s what happened:

“Dear Eurowings, At the check-in desk at Köln airport I was just told that I would not be able to take my violin on board because it is in a hard case. I know that this is the wording on your website, which is why I wrote to your customer service department last year to let them know that no violinist flies with their instrument in a soft case because no insurance company would insure their instrument if they did.

Many violin cases have a fabric cover, so check-in agents assume that these are soft cases, which they aren’t. My violin case does not have a fabric cover, which is why the check-in agent picked up on it. To be fair, she was simply doing her job. Please would you change the wording on your website, as I asked you to do last year, so that your staff have realistic guidelines and we musicians have no more check-in issues. Luckily the agent’s manager, who was called on the scene, was quite clear that a violin absolutely has to travel as hand luggage – many many thanks to him at this point! I look forward to receiving your reply soon, Regards, Fiona Stevens”

Hours later she had this reply: Dear Fiona, please send me your feedback as e-mail to facebook@eurowings.com and I will forward it to my relevant colleagues. They will get back to you as soon as possible. Best wishes, Jens

Sounds like a friendly airline, for once.