Oman Air

Business class to Bangkok via Muscat. Newish airline trying hard to compete with the big names and doing very well indeed. Standard of business class seats on Oman are superior to Etihad - newer more comfortable seats more space and excellent in flight entertainment with Bose headphones. Staff very courteous check in fast and efficient food superior & drinks were flowing. The only thing that was really average was the lounge at Terminal 3 - looked old and dated. In contrast the new lounge at Muscat is great with a very attractive layout of various food. Shame the lounge was invaded by loud mobile phone speakers and other inconsiderate people.

MCT-DXB in Business Class. Easy check-in at MCT and Business Class lounge is great with a wide selection of food and drink. A separate bus to the aircraft for Business Class and the welcome was warm on almost new B737-800. A snack of sandwiches and cake served together with drinks - even managed a second round on this 45min sector. Arrival on time and cleared of the airport in 15 minutes.

LHR-BKK via MCT. SAS lounge at LHR spacious and comfortable. Onboard food wine entertainment lie-flat seat and service from cabin crew all excellent. Cabin crew quietly conspicuous throughout the flight and anticipated top-ups. Lounge at MCT excellent. Streets ahead of Emirates and Etihad.

LHR-MCT-CMB return A330-300 on all sectors. Economy full on all sectors but experience seemed calm and efficient. Food was standard economy fare and drinks service offered (it is not a dry airline). Inflight entertainment very good with seat-back screens. Oman Air offer in- flight wifi and you can use your mobile phone via Inmarsat connection. I was impressed with Oman Air's service at a competitive price.

LHR-MCT-BKK return. Having booked well in advance was annoyed to receive email informing us of schedule change (don't Oman know their schedules for the year?) with two options : cut short trip by three days or extend by one. No offer to compensate for either loss of holiday or extension expense. Online check in is a farce only one sector can be checked in and a seat selected. Ended up row 23 LHR-MCT but row 44 MCT-BKK. Same on the reverse journey row 23 BKK- MCT row 44 MCT-LHR. Of the 8 flights with Oman on this route in the past six months IFE has worked only once. Crew range from attentive to disinterested. Food has taken a nose dive in the last six months. MCT-LHR flight at least 7 rows were denied a drinks service as a 'senior' staff member resented being told she had forgotten to do it and sulked. For the first time ever had to use the call button to ask for a drink with meal and get IFE reset after a promise to rectify went undone. Have used Oman Air's OnAir product successfully once. Good wifi speed but at $29.95 its very expensive. Decided to treat ourselves to OnAir on the MCT-LHR (longest leg). Worked fine for 20 minutes then crashed and crew couldn't have cared less. Oman is great when its good and absolutely appalling when its bad. The planes are new so they say. Am going to give Oman one last try in October.

LHR-MCT-BKK-MCT-BKK. Full flat seat and overall cabin space extremely comfortable food and drinks excellent as are the cabin staff. Muscat business lounge very good.

FRA-MCT-CMB return. The seat pitch is generous inflight entrainment great food was good flight attendants friendly service good. Great value for money economy class product. The only negative complaining points were some delays on the FRA-MCT flights (due to weather and on the MCT-CMB flight (due to technical reasons) and the stop in Male on the MCT-CMB flight.

LHR-Muscat-Trivandrum return. Staff were surly and arrogant service almost non existent (we had to ask many times for our meal then provided something completely different) our one drink of wine did not materialise. Then we were told the company policy was not to serve "drunken passengers"! When I complained the chief steward showered my wife and I with gifts and an apology but the damage had been done. Add to this the pools of water in both toilets. Incidentally we are not drinkers and had not had any alcoholic drinks prior to our flight. We merely wanted some refreshment with our food.

BKK to LHR via MCT. A tale of two halves. BKK to MCT flight was excellent staff very attentive and interacted with passengers. The cabin is excellent as are seats. Lounge at Muscat is small but quiet and relaxing. Food options well presented. The 2nd flight was disappointing. Having made the mistake of ordering vegetarian food the crew were oblivious to the fact that the meal presented was third rate. No alternatives offered and we went the whole flight without any food. The cabin crew seemed to spend most of their time talking among themselves. Four staff for 16 passengers but little interaction and no customer service. This illustrates the inconsistencies in standards at Oman. At their best they are as good an any airline but at their worst they are poor. There is an urgent need to achieve greater consistency.

Me and my partner got our flight to Bangkok scheduled for April/May. They tried to reschedule our flight in February for later dates we had made arrangements for hotels/flights after few days they went back to original timetable. Of course they did not even consider taking any costs of our arrangements! Appalling customer service. And today the same story - again they want to reschedule a flight and the reason is "something to do with switching from their Winter Schedule to their Summer schedule and being a young airline they are quite inexperienced at this". They have already ruined our vacations with such irresponsible behaviour. They are not worth all the hassle even though they've got competitive price.