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Windsor6
19th Jul 2020, 19:33
New to the forum - SLF who travels (or did) extensively for work and pleasure.
When the current, difficult period starts to ease and people begin to travel again, I wonder who are worthy of our hard-earned cash? Which airlines have handled the situation sensitively and with compassion toward their employees?
I appreciate that it depends where you are from/going to but it would be nice to support the ‘good guys’ if there are, in fact, any.

Mr Mac
20th Jul 2020, 09:11
Windsor6
I used SAS / Shamrock during the last few months due to LH being shut down on my normal route too and from Germany, and both did well but I will be moving back to LH due to time it takes using those two carriers on my route. I have just started to do long haul routes again, with a trip down to Doha with Qatar a few weeks ago, but I usually use EK in that area. I will be back to LH/EK/SIN as things reopen, though we do have a contract in Auckland, so I will have to go down there (when they let us in ), but it does not start until next year, so may get to try NZ as one route we can use from Germany is a code share with them via Hong Kong.
Kind regards
Mr Mac

Donkey497
20th Jul 2020, 11:22
Flew out & back from Canada on Transat just before the lockdown kicked in. A lot of folks are critical of AT at the best of times, but as a fairly regular user, & high mileage business flier, I can't really say I've had anywhere as many issues with AT as I've had with other carriers.

Given the lack of understanding about transmission and governmental guidance at the time, I found the cabin & flight crew were well organised and very savvy about how they went about things. Flight crew gave longer briefing than normal, explained about ventilation system on plane. Cabin crew spent time well shuffling the cabin before pushback - kept families together, tried to spread others about the cabin as much as possible putting as much space between folks as possible, asking people to wear masks if they had them or scarves, snoods, etc. if not. Flight crew asked people to stay in seats as much as possible, use call buttons well ahead of time/need if you wanted to get up & about & wait for Cabin Crew to come to seat & shepherd them to minimise hanging about at galley / toilet etc. Worked very well on a fairly busy flight.

I have NEVER seen Pearson airport soooo eeemmmmpppppppttttyyyyyyyy......... you could have held three Stanley Cup games and a half dozen football games in the check-in areas without disrupting the few passengers that were there. This side was even worse, I was anticipating that some sort of Day of the Triffids / Zombie Apocalypse had taken place by the time I wandered through Arrivals without seeing another single, solitary soul.

S.o.S.
20th Jul 2020, 12:01
Hello Windsor6 and welcome to the 'cabin' of PPRuNe. A good 'Starter for Ten'.

beachbumflyer
20th Jul 2020, 18:22
Good idea, Windsor, so we all know who are the good guys and who are the bad.

Pistonprop
21st Jul 2020, 14:01
Great idea but you can forget it. The majority who fly / will fly in the present climate are / will be the younger generation. Their loyalty lies with their wallet!

Mr Mac
21st Jul 2020, 18:12
Pistonprop
At nearly 60 years old I will take that as a compliment ,even though we have never met !! ;)
Cheers
Mr Mac,

PAXboy
21st Jul 2020, 19:39
Some of us are highly irritated to be kept at home. I am fortunate that, when we can travel easily again, I shall continue to book the carriers I deem best, most appropriate etc. As I have always done. I recall some 20 years ago, a colleague returning from a trip to his home in NZ, swearing that he would never travel with Garuda again. I did not let my smile show on the outside!

One of the keys is Maintenance. The problem is that we cannot get direct sight of how well it is being done. We have to look around for the indicators in the company that filter down. Which brings us to the inevitable that EVERY carrier is cutting costs. The most extreme in the last couple of years was Boeing and they are now paying a considerable price for the way they changed their focus away from Engineering and towards Money. Firstly the 787 had teething problems and the Max has become unique, we hope that this has taught the rest of the world a lesson.

Look at a carrier across many years and at as many facets as you can. I have paid more money to route on carriers I trust and will do so again.

Pistonprop
21st Jul 2020, 22:44
Ah but, Mr Mac, I did say "the majority" and not "all". Oh, and if I was as young as you I might think differently! ;)

Mr Mac
22nd Jul 2020, 13:02
Ah but, Mr Mac, I did say "the majority" and not "all". Oh, and if I was as young as you I might think differently! ;)
Pistonprop
Touche. However observing my fellow passengers I have to say that not many apart from the cabin crew,would see 40 or being generous 35 again. All my flying is scheduled and not usually to the sunniest places or resorts, maybe with the exception behind DXB and I do get to turn left on boarding.
cheers
Mr Mac

Pistonprop
22nd Jul 2020, 16:57
Mr Mac, I'm a left turn only too (long haul), but now only travel for leisure. Therefore, I remain grounded (my own choice). :)

Paul Lupp
22nd Jul 2020, 18:59
Never mind which airlines, which airports? We are being told at work that we ought to start using our annual leave up, as due largely no doubt to the "problem" of travel, almost nobody has taken any time off.
I thought about taking a few days in mainland Europe, but LHR seem to be taking the mickey with car parking charges at the moment. Seems that any stay from 3 days to 10 will cost in the region of £160 ! There are restrictions on available car parks, and pod parking appears to no longer be an option. This kind-of kills the idea of going away to me, I don't want to pay about 50 percent of a holiday cost again, just to park my car at the airport. Public transport may be cheaper, but a 25 minute car journey takes between 2 and 3 hours by train/coach

Nightstop
23rd Jul 2020, 05:27
Plenty of cheap parking on private driveways near LHR and elsewhere, just Google “park on my drive”.