Juneyao Air

Shanghai Hongqiao to Sanya and back (party of two). Check-in in Shanghai smooth and professional no issues assigning 2 aisle seats in the same row to us. must quite efficient we showed up at the gate in Shanghai 5 minutes after the indicated "boarding time" only to find ourselves greeted by a PA announcement that we should report to our gate immediately for the boarding of the flight. We were the last passengers to board after which the flight proceeded to sit at the gate for the next 30 minutes. In-flight on the positive side: brand new A320 aircraft. Seats reasonably pitched every seat had a plush pillow and flight attendants distributed free blankets before takeoff. Food during the flight was standard pork/chicken with noodles - but quite edible. In-flight negatives: my request for English newspapers was met with a rather curt no. The seat- belt sign was on throughout the entire flight for no rhyme or reason when I queried the flight attendant he either did not understand my question or couldn't explain why the sign was always on. During cruise one of the flight attendants also rather rudely asked me to turn off my smartphone which was already in flight mode. Sanya to Hongqiao: flight delayed 40 minutes with absolutely no information provided to passengers by ground staff. Ground staff spoke very little English. After boarding we sat at the gate for an additional hour waiting for ATC clearance. I unfortunately cannot comment much on the in-flight experience on the return leg as I slept for the vast majority of the flight. Overall Juneyao seems to be about on-par with China Eastern and Air China for domestic flights.

Shanghai Pudong to Xiamen (return). We choose Juneyao purely on price being the cheapest. Check-in at Shanghai was swift albeit delayed a little. Juneyao uses new(ish) Airbus planes and the aircraft had good decor and very friendly cabin crew. Food was slightly better than most domestic Chinese airlines. All in all a very good experience with helpful and attentive cabin crew. On the return our departure was delayed due to congestion in Shanghai thus we boarded over an hour later than planned. The cabin crew again impressed very attentive. Food was a snack box on this leg as it was late evening - but this was a fairly decent standard.

Shanghai to Changsha. The Check in staff was helpful. I was very late for check in and I called them before hand trying my luck and hoping against hope that they would keep the counter open for me. They asked for my passport number and asked me to come to a particular counter asap (all in Chinese they spoke no English). When I reached the counter my boarding card was ready and was asked to rush for boarding. Onboard given a drink. Reading material was bilingual. Flight was on time. Cabin crew OK limited to no English. Safety demonstration was manual. No entertainment except for reading.

Shanghai Pudong - Xiamen. Flight delayed firstly 'due to weather' [it was a very clear day for Shanghai] and then later 'due to late arrival of aircraft'. Overall delay 3 hours with no rescheduling until all of a sudden let's board the plane. Thought it was very poor that the airline didn't even offer to us a drink. Staff seemed in hurry once we got into the air literately had to catch my snack box as it was thrown to me. Staff handed out a raffle ticket and a suggestions card [both bilingual] to most other passengers though I didn't get one maybe because I'm a foreigner. Seat didn't recline at all though better width than the other time I've flown with them. Probably won't fly again unless it is a very cheap flight.

Ha'erbin - Shanghai Pudong. No aerobridge so waiting in a cold bus with its doors open. Get to the plane and telling everyone to get out of the bus and wait on tarmac to file up the stairs onto the plane. Seats very close together. Seat belt sign on for most of the flight even though it was only minor turbulence. So I could not recline my seat.

Hongqiao to Qingdao professional and friendly service. Aircraft new staff friendly and speak good English. The only problem I experienced is finding the check-in desk at the Hongqiao airport. Their ticket prices are slightly lower then other domestic airlines.

Great food and service inflight but both my flight Qingdao to Shanghai and Shanghai to Harbin were delayed an hour or more. The first was assigned to late arrival of the aircraft and the wait was in the terminal. Note that check-in desks are not destination specific for Juneyao at Shanghai Pudong. This means that one cannot arrive after the expected rush (but before check-in closes) and expect a very short or no line since there will likely be a line of people checking in for other destinations at every counter.

PuDong to Xiamen. Wasn't expecting much based on the inexpensive ticket price from an airline I'd never heard of but was impressed with new plane and upbeat cabin crew. Dinner was a typical tin-foiled beef/chicken with noodles. Drink service was plentiful for such a short flight. Much like Southwest and jetBlue in the US. I love that they fly to both Shanghai airports and have cheap flights even in the afternoon. Overall I'd rate them as an above- average 3 star airline.

Shanghai-Harbin-Shanghai. On the Harbin-Shanghai segment midair the undercover air marshall rudely demanded that I turned off my PDA phone which was already set in "no connection'. Juneyao should better train their air marshal on manners and be sufficiently knowledgeable about PDA type phones. I am an international frequent traveller and found Juneyao's air marshal manners offensive. Travellers intending to fly Juneyao should make note about using their PDA type phones. Apart from that the air hostess service was good airplane interior was clean.

TSN-SHA. I have no idea why it's called Juneyao Airlines in English because this is nothing like its Chinese name. Check-in smooth new A320 was spotless inside. Every seat taken. The crew were friendly and helpful free newspapers - I was the only person on the flight with a foreign surname and they'd made a point of ordering in an English-language newspaper for me which was a nice touch. The food was interesting - a tangerine and a dry bread roll (no butter or anything) - but it was inoffensive. Passenger discipline an issue as it is on most domestic Chinese airlines : one stupid woman stood up to get her luggage out the bins when we were still about 100 metres in the air. The crew shouted at her to sit down but she ignored them : she fell over when we hit the ground which was funny.