Usually, the Hungarian Malév is a very good airline. But don’t think that you get a free flight when they offer a free flight.

What happened? I received the Malév Duna Club Newsletter, where they promise to give a free flight for every air ticket sold between 7 March and 7 April to “most” Malév Destinations between 1 May to 31 August. So far, so good. I bought two flights matching all the conditions, but Malév said that (unfortunately, of course) I can not get any free air ticket, because I do not fly from Budapest.

This is not the only restriction Malév has. You can only fly from September to December, which was not been said as well, and you can not fly the same route twice - which means, if you fly from Budapest to Amsterdam in May, you must fly from Budapest to somewhere else in September, accoringd to the lady at the Malév Hotline in Budapest.

O.K. - I send a complaint to Duna Club the frequent flyer club of Malév, but received no answer. Only the Swiss subsidiary of Malév called me, because I complained there as well. It was, of course, the same “unfortunately” I heard already from the lady I talked to in Budapest - only in German.

So is this the way Malév treats customers? I send a complaint to Duna Club two days ago, but they seemed to be unable to answer me, so I sent a second complaint today to the sales manager. We will see what happens.



Previous German text -> here

Update: "we are very sorry if it escaped your attention, we are not in a position to offer you any compensation."