French Bee

Customer Reviews

No Skytrax Rating
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Seat Comfort 12345
Staff Service 12345
Value for Money 12345
Customer rating from 92 reviews
3/10
No Skytrax Rating
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1/10

"close for boarding passes 1hr 30 mins before departure"

(United States)

Trip Verified | To call it “bad customer service,” would be the understatement of the century. This was not to be believed. The SNCF train, which took me from mid-France to Paris, was delayed. I still ran like the devil to get to the airport in good time. Went to check in at 1:30PM, exactly 1hr & 20 mins before the scheduled 2:50PM departure. I was in utter disbelief when I was told they were not going to give me a boarding pass because they close for boarding passes 1hr 30 mins before departure. That is only a 10 minute difference! They didn’t care that there was plenty of time to get to the gate. When I asked if there was any recourse, I was told that I could go to a customer service line. When I got there, I found dozens of other people in the same situation. The recourse was to buy a new ticket. Forget basic customer service. What happened to the days when they would actually rush you through to get you on that plane? I paid extra to get on the flight the next day, and I also had to pay for a hotel that night.
Type Of TravellerSolo Leisure
Seat TypeEconomy Class
RouteParis Orly Los Angeles
Date FlownJune 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Ground Service 12345
Wifi & Connectivity 12345
Value For Money 12345
no
1/10

"Terrible experience altogether"

(United States)

Trip Verified | Terrible experience altogether. We have a small child who was sleeping in his stroller and the RUDE lady at the bag check had an extremely poor attitude. She said we had to check our stroller then and couldn’t check at the gate. Never heard of such a thing and was certainly not the case flying to Paris. She became quite nasty and was screaming at my wife. In the end, we woke our child, checked stroller and carried him through the numerous check, long lined check points. I paid for priority boarding, but that doesn’t matter because once they open the gate, everyone runs to board the plane. French Bee did not board first class, priority, etc., prior. It’s a free for all. You’d think that on an 11 hour flight you’d be offered some sort of beverage, ie., soda, juice, coffee… NOPE, you have to pay for all drinks… ALL. Same for anything to eat.. no snacks offered. It also seemed they needed to make an announcement regarding no smoking quite often… very strange. Would I ever consider flying French bee again? Absolutely not.
Type Of TravellerFamily Leisure
Seat TypeEconomy Class
RouteParis to Los Angeles
Date FlownJuly 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Ground Service 12345
Wifi & Connectivity 12345
Value For Money 12345
no
9/10

"In flight service was attentive"

(Australia)

Trip Verified | Family of 5 (2 small children + parents and grand mum) Los Angeles to paris return. Check in was easy Boarding was easy. Great service even though we were late to the Gate. In flight service was attentive, courteous and helpful. Reasonably priced and food was tasty. The aisles are slightly narrower but good leg room. Plenty of overhead storage on both flights. Plane had new entertainment equipment and felt new, great value for money. Pro tip: make booking with hot meal it’s worth being included or bring ample snacks, drinks, and meal/ cup of noodles from airport/home.
Type Of TravellerFamily Leisure
Seat TypeEconomy Class
RouteParis to Los Angeles
Date FlownJuly 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Ground Service 12345
Wifi & Connectivity 12345
Value For Money 12345
yes
3/10

"avoid your airline at all costs"

(United States)

Trip Verified | Shortly After Flight BF 730 took off, the pilot announced that there was a “mechanical issue” and therefore the plane had to return to Orly. There was no elaboration of the nature nor the impact of the issue on the flight. Once on the ground, we were instructed to claim our luggage. It then became obvious that the flight was not leaving at all when the staff began handing out vouchers for a nearby Marriott. The staff was not sure we would be on a flight the next day because they had no information about crew or aircraft availability. They went on to say there would be a bus to transfer us to the Marriott, but they had no idea when it would be available, so we took a taxi. The remaining passengers arrived at the Marriott by bus between 10:30 and 11:00pm, not having had food or water since before boarding the flight. We were treated like merchandise, not as paying customers. At 5:00am the room phone rang and we were told to be in the lobby by 6:00am for a bus to take us to the airport. When we got downstairs at 6:00, there was no bus; it finally showed up at 6:30. Frank has mobility issues and we were told that there would be plenty of help for us. That help never materialized, either at the hotel or at the airport. We checked in and were informed that flight BF 5731would leave at 10:30am. There was no help available to get Frank all the way to the aircraft; we were taken to an area one level up from the gate, but the elevator to the next floor down was out of service. Eventually the operator of the lift truck showed up and put us in his vehicle. The flight was further delayed because the catering had not been delivered. We finally boarded and the flight left around 12:30. Unlike on our outbound flight, we were seated in the seats we paid for. The flight crew was OUTSTANDING. They were efficient, friendly and very helpful, one of the best cabin staff we have experienced in many years of air travel. They deserve better management than they currently have with French Bee. The theme that comes up repeatedly in the above fiasco is the abysmal level of management communication. It is ironic if not ridiculous that, in a company which relies on precise communication to ensure passenger safety in the air, that there can be such poor communication. It is highly unlikely that we will ever book a French Bee flight. By the same token it is very likely that we will warn others to avoid your airline at all costs.
AircraftA350-900
Type Of TravellerCouple Leisure
Seat TypePremium Economy
RouteParis Orly to Los Angeles
Date FlownJune 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Ground Service 12345
Value For Money 12345
no
1/10

"Do not recommend"

(United States)

Trip Verified | Never got to take the flight. We had booked the flight for 29 August 2023. French Bee did a schedule change, which cancelled the flight-- then things went poorly. We had booked the tickets through AMEX. When we called AMEX to see what we could do once the flight cancelled, they called French Bee to get the flight moved to a day earlier. Somewhere in that process French Bee took over the reservation. Our plans changed late last week and I called AMEX to get the flight changed. AMEX has no access to the record now, since French Bee 'owns' it. They told me to call French Bee. I called them, after a 30 minute hold a very stressed and unhappy agent was going to process the refund, then abruptly told me since it was an agency booked ticket AMEX would have to do it and then she just hung up. That fast. I'll try AMEX one more time, then I guess I'll have to dispute the charges. French Bee isn't a company you want to work with. At least we didn't have to get on the plane and deal with the non-service attitude. Do not recommend.
Type Of TravellerCouple Leisure
Seat TypePremium Economy
RouteSan Francisco to Paris Orly
Date FlownAugust 2023
Value For Money 12345
no
1/10

"French Bee won't see me again"

(United States)

Trip Verified | Worst experience ever! First, our flight was delayed for about 1h. Then they boarded us and we took off. But after about 1h of a shaky flight, the pilot announced that there was a technical problem and that we had to return to Paris. So after about 2.5h in the air, we were back where we started, but happy to have made it back in one piece. A lot of chaos back at Orly in Paris, took another ~6 hours before they found hotels for some of us, most were told they should look for their own accommodation. About 10 unmotivated staff speaking no or poor English trying to manage some 400 agitated passengers. Worse, we had no clue what would happen with our flight to LAX, though they promised another attempt the next day. Sure enough, at 6.28am they sent out a text message and email saying there would be another flight at 10.30am. Short notice, esp given that nobody said it would be that early. Another problem, many passengers were shuttled (after ~2h wait for the shuttle) to their hotel rooms at CDG airport, which is ~1.5h away from Orly (!). It is now 10am and we just got informed that our flight would be delayed. Deja-vu! Hope we make it back in one piece, one can feel anguish, perhaps fear among the passengers. This operator seems technically unreliable and has unprofessional staff. French Bee won't see me again, to say the least.
Type Of TravellerSolo Leisure
Seat TypeEconomy Class
RouteParis to Los Angeles
Date FlownJune 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Ground Service 12345
Wifi & Connectivity 12345
Value For Money 12345
no
1/10

"one party had their ticket suspended"

(United States)

Trip Verified | It’s so bad. They tried to tell us we couldn’t fly because one party had their ticket “suspended”. What did that mean? The man at the counter wouldn’t explain. He threatened to “call the captain and not let us on”. Keep in mind we’re a family of 4, just standing there trying to figure out if our vacation was ruined. Almost on the verge of tears, my Mom was, after planning this Tahiti trip for a year. The man laughed at us and said we needed to buy another ticket. Right there and then. For $800. Seeing no other choice, we did just that. A minute later, the man gets on the phone and says “they've activated your old ticket. Maybe you’ll get a refund in 24 hours.” We got a refund a week later. This man was combative, rude, and mean.
Type Of TravellerFamily Leisure
Seat TypeEconomy Class
RouteLos Angeles to Papeete
Date FlownJune 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Ground Service 12345
Wifi & Connectivity 12345
Value For Money 12345
no
1/10

"they don't care about business"

(United States)

Trip Verified | Rude check-in staff and gate staff. Their baggage check-in software stopped working at the check in counter and they blamed on it saying we checked in late. But we had already checked in at another counter and had our physical boarding passes and bag tags. So how can they say we checked in late. And then at the check-in counter, nobody is helping us check in bags and kept pointing us from one supervisor to another. At one point, they pushed us aside and stopped speaking to us when we are clearly trying to converse with them. I wish I had the names of the staff who ignored us and left them on our own, so I could list them here. Anyways, we didn't want to miss the flight just because they aren't checking in our bags. So, we just took the bags to the gate hoping we can ask them to check in at gate. At the gate, we met with much ruder staff who told "we cannot fly today and our ticket is cancelled". They put us in a security check area and made us wait for 20 mins. Then after much verbal fighting, airport flight supervisor came in and heard us out. He finally helped us by allowing baggage drop at the gate. The French Bee staff were still looking at us like criminals and we gave feedback directly that the service is bad and they treated us rudely by lying that "we cannot fly today and ticket is cancelled" or if they really did cancel, why did they cancel without our permission when we already had our boarding pass and bag tags. To that feedback, they were still not sorry or acceptive, they just said fly Air France next time. So, clearly they don't care about business. We aren't flying with them anymore.
Type Of TravellerCouple Leisure
Seat TypeEconomy Class
RouteParis to San Francisco
Date FlownJune 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Ground Service 12345
Wifi & Connectivity 12345
Value For Money 12345
no
1/10

"Absolutely terrible airline"

(United States)

Trip Verified | Do not fly this airline. Delayed two hours and then had to return to original airport after an hour due to technical issues. Absolutely terrible airline.
Type Of TravellerCouple Leisure
Seat TypePremium Economy
RouteParis to Los Angeles
Date FlownJune 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Food & Beverages 12345
Inflight Entertainment 12345
Ground Service 12345
Wifi & Connectivity 12345
Value For Money 12345
no
1/10

"$100 for one baggage suit"

(United States)

Trip Verified | The worst company I have ever seen. Took $100 for one baggage suit, when their website write it cost $50. Also small child took a seat a lot of rows apart. Manager was very rude, and said " it's your problem. I can't do something"
Type Of TravellerFamily Leisure
Seat TypeEconomy Class
RouteSan Francisco to Paris
Date FlownJune 2023
Seat Comfort 12345
Cabin Staff Service 12345
Ground Service 12345
Value For Money 12345
no