Precision Air

Nairobi to Kilimanjaro. Flight departed NBO on time and arrived at JRO ahead of schedule. The flight was short about 40 minutes but the crew managed to serve a drink (alcohol included) and a snack of peanuts. Not much but definitely sufficient. The plane was a reasonably new ATR 72-500 that was boarded from the back stairs. It rained heavily at NBO so everybody was given a poncho! Overall no complaints.

I flew three times with them and they were all horrible experiences. The latest flight between Dar es Salaam and Nairobi was delayed 7.5 hours. I missed my connecting flights which were prepaid and non refundable and I missed prepaid accommodation as well. Ground staff were either rude or lying to us.

2 flights. Arusha to Zanzibar and Zanzibar to Dar es Salaam. Tidy little planes. Both flights early. In fact Zanzibar to Dar es Salaam was so early we got to Dar es Salaam 15 mins before we were even suppose to have left Zanzibar. All luggage arrived safely and plenty of soft drink on Arusha to Zanzibar flight.

Although my ticket had been paid for they had given my seat away to someone else and claimed I "wasn't on the system". Although there were 2 very helpful and kind staff members (one manager and one flight attendant) the rest were extremely rude. We were stuck in Nairobi for 9 hours with no explanation as to why and when we asked a member of staff we were laughed at and ignored. On a trip from Zanzibar to Nairobi they also laughed at my frustration when my seat had been double booked considering I had a connecting flight that evening to Heathrow I didn't think it was much of a laughing matter. I was the only one out of a group of friends whose luggage wasn't lost on the Nairobi to Mwanza flight. Just terrible avoid at all costs.

Nairobi to Zanzibar. All in all a good flight. No delays and we even got our luggage when we arrived. During the flight we got soft drinks beer small sandwiches and biscuits. I have absolutely nothing to complain about.

If you are flying from Nairobi to Zanzibar or Dar Es Salaam to Zanzibar beware of this airline. It stops off at Zanzibar between the two national capitals but has a terrible reputation for both delayed flights and mishandled luggage. We were delayed by two hours both ways on our July 2012 holiday with the airline apparently not having time to offload luggage in Zanzibar en route to Dar. They simply sent it back the next day! Our hotel told us this happened regularly.

3 one way flights NBO-DAR and DAR-Mwanza-DAR. All on clean Boeing 737. Very impressed by flight attendants on time departures and refreshments onboard. Asked how many beers wanted and even free Amarula on ice! Snack food basic - but same as Kenya Airways. Will book again with confidence.

Nairobi-Zanzibar return. Flights were fine modern atr72 with entertainment relatively comfortable for a 1.5 hr flight efficient staff and offered large choice of (cold) drinks a cake and some nuts on the return. However timings are anything but precise. Outbound they announced a delay of 45 mins and ended up over an hour late - they apologised but no real explanation. On the return the doors closed 20 mins before departure time making me wonder who had been left behind.

Arusha to Dar es Salaam with Precision Air in January 2010. Not only did they overbook the 1300 flight so we and the other people who held tickets for that flight were forced to wait until the 1500 flight (which eventually left Arusha at 1630) they also failed to put our luggage onto the later flight so that we had to wait until 2300 in Dar airport for the luggage to arrive from Arusha. At no point did any of the staff show any concern or remorse for the over booking delay or the missing luggage. I would be very hesitant to ever fly with Precision Air again.

Kilimanjaro-Mwanza-Kilimanjaro. Pretty expensive - about $350 for a round trip flight of 400miles. Making a reservation with Precision from the US convoluted - would only accept payment a direct money order transfer - at a cost of $30. It also required about 10 emails - including one to confirm from my bank that Precision had actually received the money - shouldn't Precision know they've received the money? Having whined the emails were very cordial and chatty and polite. Fortunately the ground staff flight staff and equipment put a better face on Precision. Ground staff and cabin staff neutrally helpful. Planes obviously aging but seemed to be well cared for a bit grubby but everything worked. Flights on time and about as noisy and bumpy as one might expect with the type of aircraft flying thru Africa. No baggage hassles - though kept a close eye on my stuff.