A’s Travel Musings

I took a quick hop from Bangkok to Singapore on SQ in economy earlier this month and was reminded why SQ consistently ranks the best airline in the world. Seats have a reasonable pitch between rows, every seat has a foot rest and every chair is equipped with an adjustable lumbar support that works on an air bladder system. On the flight down all the seats were also equipped with an additional air bladder under the seat front where your thighs rest. This raised the cushion there for additional thigh support. I hadn’t seen that before and didn’t find it a notable benefit. It also wasn’t a seat feature on the return flight.

On the 2 hour flight each way a good full meal was served, offering both a Western and an Asian option. Quality was high for airline food and inline with the entire high quality service offering. Entertainment was top notch. If you started immediately upon take off (the system actually seems to start running as you taxi out of the gate) you could just complete a short movie on the video on demand (VOD) system. You just had to choose the right movie, which means you need to start reading the list of offering immediately when you board since there are more than 30 offerings in at least 5 languages plus subtitles in many additional languages.

The hallmark of SQ is the cabin crew. Controversially they continue to enforce cabin crew physical (height and weight) standards and age limits (30 for non-supervisory positions), though they have moved away from their “Singapore Girl” ad campaign of several years ago. That aside, the cabin crew are excellent. They are extremely attentive, genuinely caring and very nice. They are also discreet in making sure that things run smoothly without disturbing passengers.

I’ve known some SQ flight attendants and while they don’t like everything about their job, even outside of work they are all extremely nice people and very service oriented. Admittedly there are no unions allowed here, pay is low and one might argue that SQ is taking advantage of its employees, but I don’t think that is the case. There remain many more applicants for each open position and SQ flight attendant is a highly regarded occupation in Singapore. Clearly the SQ HR department is doing a great job in selecting the right staff and the training department is polishing their skills to perfection.

Singapore Air is usually the most expensive carrier on any given route, but there’s a reason for that and in my opinion they deserve the price premium. If you can afford to pay a little more you won’t be disappointed.

I can’t remember the last time I was through Montreal-Trudeau which I transited through last week. It’s a nice airport with reasonably good seating, lighting and comforts. Food outlets and shopping could be improved, but overall it was very nice. I really liked the well-marked charging stations scatted throughout the waiting area. There were both overhead signs and each station had a small lighted pole to mark it. These are simple and very effective tools that make travelers much happier. Unfortunately like most North American airports, Wi-Fi is only available for a fee.

I also found it strange that although I was transiting while coming from the US and going to the UK I still had to pass through immigration. It seems that the layout of the airport makes it difficult for them to segregate people who are in transit internationally from those in transit domestically so they just have everyone pass through immigration. Luckily there is a separate transit immigration counter which was staffed by a very nice officer when I was there. I did find it interesting that the officer was wearing a bullet proof vest and she said that it was a required part of their uniform. Showing that she had a sense of humor, she also said that it did help to keep her warm though.

I recently flew Thai Airways International from London to Bangkok round-trip in economy. It was the cheapest non-stop on the route, which has many carriers especially if you consider one-stop options. This run is a milk-run for TG. They fly it at nearly full capacity all year round catering mainly to British vacationers going to Southeast Asia, which means that they serve highly price conscious travelers.

The service uses older 747s. Seats are older with a tight pitch (distance between rows of seats), but have an excellent recline angle which many new. Entertainment is limited to main cabin screens only (no in-seat video and thus no video on demand – VOD) and even though it is a 12 hour flight each way only one movie and a couple of TV programs are shown on the overnight flights. The daytime flights add an additional movie, but that still means there is a lot of time without any video to occupy you.

Meals offer both a Western and Thai option and not surprisingly the Thai option is very good for airline food. Service levels are typically Thai, meaning that staff is very pleasant and accommodating.

Thai’s product hasn’t changed in many years. It remains a solid offering, but they aren’t keeping up with newer service developments. That may also mean lower levels of debt on their books since they haven’t invested much for upgrades and that may allow them to withstand what appears to be a serious global travel downturn. Of course older planes burn more fuel, so they’ll need oil prices to remain lower for a while too.

Yesterday I flew out of Heathrow (LHR)’s terminal 3 which is where most of the Star Alliance carriers are based. I was surprised to find that at the security check point you are no longer required to remove your laptop from your carry on bag. They are saying that their new scanners can handle electronics in the bag, so removal is no longer necessary. This saves a bit of hassle and improves the flow at the checkpoint.

They could further improve the flow if they would just turn the shoe scanning station’s orientation 90 degrees. Currently the walking flow through the shoe station is perpendicular to the main traffic flow and that causes all kinds of issues. It would really be best if they would just put the shoe scanners next to the bag scanners, so after you put your bag on the belt you could then place you shoes on their belt, walk though the metal detector, put on your shoes and then grab your bags. It’s a struggle for many people to remove and put on their shoes while holding their bags, so this would be much easier overall. This all assumes that throughput is something that they really care about though.

I’ve only flown Air Canada (AC) on 2 trips, with the previous one 3 years ago and then this current trip. I flew them from Boston (BOS) to Montreal (YUL) to Heathrow (LHR) and liked their product. Planes are basic, but comfortable and staff live up to the Canadian reputation of being like Americans only friendlier. Other than a slight mechanical delay leaving YUL which we made up for with tail winds, everything went off smoothly just as it should.

I was also pleased that Air Canada was the first major airline to drop its checked bag fee. Others haven’t followed yet, in part because Air Canada has few overlapping routes with them, but we can all hope.

AC also has a unique ticket pricing option. If you book on their website, you can get a price reduction off even deeply discounted fares if you decline to earn frequent flyer miles. To get this reduction you have to be a member of the AC Aeroplan program and specifically opt not to get Aeroplan miles. Sign up is free and in fact the only reason I even have an Aeroplan account is for just this reason. Interestingly when you use their online check in system you can still enter your frequent traveler number for a partner airline’s program. I’m not sure yet if I’ll get the miles though.

So overall Air Canada is a winner and they often offer lower fares between the US East Coast and Europe if you are willing to add the extra time to transit through our northern neighbor. Just remember to sign up for that Aeroplan account ahead of purchase.