Qantas Airways

OOL-SYD QF865 Jan 14 2014. Check in was seamless and very speedy with very good staff. Qantas Club at Coolangatta Gold Coast is not as good as Sydney but was still quite good. Boarding started 30 mins before flight and was like check in very speedy. Cabin Crew very courteous and attentive. IFE was old drop down screens with QEntertainment but the News and Double Episode of Modern Family was quite enjoyable. Also the 12 radio stations were entertaining during take off and landing. Food was a dinner of penne with cream of pumpkin sauce and chicken which was good and it came with a small chocolate and water. Soft drink or wine were also offered. However no beer. Qantas T3 in Sydney was good and arriving from Gate 8 seems to be my lucky charm. As usual my luggage was the very first bag onto the carousel. Taxi line was short and was in a Taxi in less than 5 minutes.

BNE-MEL-BNE in mixture of economy out and business back. As is often noted in these columns if you get a good Qantas cabin crew they are the world's best. The FAs in business were superb and extremely professional. Lunch service and wines excellent. Only downside on this trip was that the business lounge in Brisbane (used for business class and platinum members) was closed so one had to endure a bunch of yobs and their beer and noise in the normal Qantas Lounge. Impossible to work in the normal Qantas Lounge that day so better to sit and work outside in the boarding area. Shame Qantas don't have a dress policy for their lounges at least just to exclude the dirty singlets and flip-flops mob. However I am again pleased to recommend Qantas to others.

Last year we flew on the A380-800 from LAX-SYD on Qantas economy. The seats were comfortable and the foot rest was a bonus. On this sector dinner and breakfast was served. For an inflight meal I couldn't fault it. IFE was extremely good for a 15 hour flight and not to mention the skycam feature. On the IFE people you were able to message each other from different seats. Qantas crew was caring and attentive and kept walking around the cabin asking for refreshments and so on. A snack bar at the back of the aircraft offered soft drinks and snacks if anyone was picky. Overall it was a smooth flight and thoroughly enjoyed.

I fly regularly (4 times a month) from Perth to several regional destinations in WA. I always fly with Qantas on these sectors and have to say they have their good and bad points. The good points are planes always on time (never had a flight delay longer than 5 mins) food is quite good and IFE on the 737-800 quite good for domestic travel. The bad points; seats in economy are possibly the most cramped and un-comfortable of any airline I have ever flown with even the newer 737-800 aircraft have a very tired and old look and feel inside some of FA's seem to just go through the motions and boarding at Perth Airport is just a cattle stampede but that is not all down to Qantas. On a side note the few times I have upgraded to Business Class it has been a wonderful flying experience and one of the best regional domestic business class offerings. Far better than what the Americans call 'First Class' on their domestic routes. Overall a pass mark for Qantas just.

19th Dec PER-DXB DXB-LGW QF8423 and QF8011. Return 7th Jan LGW-DXB QF8010 and 11th January DXB-PER QF8424. Had the misfortune to travel on return economy flight to the UK via Dubai on a Qantas ticketed flight the carrier being Emirates. This was my worst air travel decision and flight experience ever in 40 years. The customer focus of cabin staff from the point of boarding to alighting on the two legs outward bound legs of the journey were appalling and I cannot think of anything positive to say. The return journey was only marginally better and the cramped condition of economy seating cleanliness of the plane poor standard of food and inattentive crew made the long haul flight for the most part unbearable. I would usually rate Qantas as an adequate carrier no more no less but it's ticketing partner Emirates will do nothing to improve the perception of Qantas' reputation. If you are looking for a long haul Qantas flight that tickets through Emirates Airline seriously consider using an alternative airline.

Jan 14: SYD-MEL-SYD. It has been 5 years since I flew domestically although I still fly internationally a lot. The planes were very clean and comfortable. FA's were excellent although perhaps lacking a lot of the spark they used to have. Flights were both on time and very efficient. What shocked me was the food offering. Since when did flying Qantas become a no frills airline in terms of food. Served in cardboard boxes the food was uninspired. Breakfast was a hard cold cake/bread type of "thing" along with yoghurt and granola. The coffee was dreadful. Dinner was a cold chicken and potato salad. What shocked me was that you used to get a proper breakfast and dinner hot and quite tasty for airline food. The food was delivered so quickly and taken away so quickly it was like being in a cheap cafeteria. While Sydney Airport is immaculate and very well presented Melbourne Airport was dirty and looking very worn. Sydney Airport was renovated for the Olympics and is well maintained and updated. Melbourne looks like it did 10 years ago and like it hadn't been touched in 10 years especially in terms of maintenance. I wanted to try out QF to see if I should use it again internationally but frankly I get much better quality in terms of food comfort entertainment service and price by flying Cathay to Paris regularly.

SCL-SYD and SYD-HKG in business. Flight from Santiago to Sydney did not get off to a flying start due to a ridiculous check in system that took 20 minutes at the counter and another 10 minutes waiting in a line for a point to point journey. Unacceptable for business class. Flight was on-time and the Boeing 747 was complete with comfortable fully flat beds which while in a conventional forward layout were incredibly spacious and converted into a full length bed. IFE was AVOD had a good number of options which while not as extensive as some ultra tech savvy carriers like Emirates was wonderfully edited with excellent selections. The food was wonderful with a clear emphasis on fresh food that included a number of options prepared onboard. I loved the flexibility of choosing from an extensive menu at any time instead of the conventional set options at set times. The crew service was mostly exceptionally warm and attentive save for one crew member who seemed totally out of place. SYD-HKG was on an A380 and once again the check in time was far too long although the agent herself was efficient and friendly. Boarding staff greeted me in Hindi. A380 had the same seats and was immaculate. The small lounge area was a nice touch. The catering on this leg was excellent beating the high standards of the previous legs and I can safely say that it was one of the best inflight meals I have had. Crew were friendly attentive relaxed and very efficient. I was overall pleasantly surprised. There are some issues however particularly check in and certain crew and ground members that are marring the work of other staff who are going above and beyond and an airline that is trying to compete with the best in the business and seems to be pretty much up there particularly in terms of product quality. Overall better then BA Swiss Emirates and Qatar. I rate them at par with CX and perhaps just shy of sq. Hopefully their ongoing financial crisis will not let standards slip.

SIN-MEL (booked as EK8036). A surprisingly unfull flight on 29th December during the peak season with many passengers switching seats after takeoff. So I luckily had two window seats to myself. Attendants simply could not be bothered greeting passengers as they walked into the cabins (with one crossing her arms at the back of the cabin although she did turn out to be quite friendly). However service was friendly and attentive with smart use of torches to avoid disturbing passenger's sleep during the night flight. The medium size dinner and small size breakfast did leave me wanting for a little more food - although the crew happily gave me a banana on request. Inflight entertainment options were solid although screen was very small. Baggage was instantly available on the belt at MEL. Overall a satisfying flight although it lacks the sparkle of its competitor on this route Singapore Airlines which perhaps explains the high proportion of empty seats on this flight.

DUB-MEL / MEL-HBA / HBA-SYD / SYD-HKG. Superb as always. Comfortable seats plenty and tasty food very good cabin crew on all legs. Highly recommended.

Flew from New Delhi to Singapore to Melbourne to Sydney and then from Brisbane to Cairns. Delhi-Singapore leg was covered by Jet Airways and was a disaster - cramped seats ok food indifferent staff. Just before boarding our baby pram was taken from us saying it will be given to us in Singapore. The pram was not given to us in Singapore as we exited the aircraft. To collect the pram we had to cross immigration and collect it from the baggage carousel. Singapore onwards was covered by Qantas and was a dream. Ironically I had the best inflight Indian food on any airline and this was on the Qantas flight between Singapore and Melbourne. Seats were spacious in economy class throughout - to Melbourne and even within Australia. The cabin crew were always helpful - always enquiring if our 2 children (7 yrs and 14 months) were comfortable and if they could do something for us. All calls were promptly attended. If the flight had empty seats we were allotted seats with empty seats next to us to provide additional room due to kids. Inflight entertainment was excellent with latest movie releases and media content to address all age groups. On the return leg from Cairns to Delhi our Qantas flight out of Cairns was delayed and consequently we would have missed our international connecting flight out of Brisbane. When we reached Cairns airport in the morning the Qantas staff had already worked out 3 flight options for us. Based on our preference we were put on a Cathay Pacific flight. Brilliant work by Qantas staff across flight sectors.