Turkish Airlines

Our family of five adults recently traveled from Los Angeles (LAX) to IST to DAR and back. The new lounge in IST is gorgeous! The LAX-IST legs were excellent: comfortable seats attentive staff good food. The IST-DAR legs were only fair: seat controls didn't work staff was less than attentive food was mediocre. But the biggest problem we had was with the online reservation system. Even though I had printouts of the electronic tickets the system kept saying we had not booked and did not allow me to check in. Worse than that the ground personnel had a lot of trouble checking us in. By using the electronic ticket numbers (and not the confirmation code which said our reservations didn't exist) the agent could see our reservation but not check us in or print out boarding passes. Very frustrating! Finally they figured out a work-around and we were able to board.

I flew Turkish Airlines for the first time recently and was very impressed. I just flew shorter flights between Athens and Istanbul and Izmir and Istanbul but found the cabin crew to be professional and gracious and even on a one hour regional flight still received a meal of a whole grain roll with cheese green lettuce and tomato with some yoghurt as well. After flying United with its deathly pale iceberg lettuce and overcooked food on a long flight it was really refreshing! Maybe I was on the newer planes but they were so clean and with individual screens even on shorter flights. Great experience.

Travelled from ISB to IST and return in January 2013. I would never fly TK again to Turkey. I would rather take the middle eastern carriers. The flight lasted 6 hours and there was no IFE. The cabin crew were not too friendly either and they just kept to themselves. Food however was good. Overall a really bad experience. Will not travel with them again unless they improve their service on this route.

TLV to IAH - totally different experience than the outbound trip two weeks earlier. TLV to IST took off 45 minutes late. A group of us (16 people) with a 1 hour IST connection to the IST-IAH flight were assured we will make our flight (as we were earlier told by the agent after buying the ticket). Upon landing in IST we were gathered and made to run across the terminal to our IST-IAH fanlight only to find out someone probably forgot to ask for this flight to be held for us (despite what we were told). The flight was already in the air. Lots of confusion and lack of initiative led to a 3 hours fiasco before we were rescheduled for the next day's flight. We were taken to a hotel (Radisson). Kosher food was not available and food that was provided was poor at best. Next day flight IST to IAH took off 3 hours late while we were sitting in the cabin with no food or drinks (see previous posts - same experience). Food on the return leg was not as good as on the outbound leg. Bottom line - not sure all the above was worth the troubles. I will have to think long and hard before flying with THY again.

IAH to TLV - great flights on time. Layover in IST too long in this small airport but bearable. They served the signature Turkish Rahat Lokum (Turkish Delight) at IAH to all passengers in the lobby and gate areas. Free alcohol in economy during the flights and very nice crew - talking to customers with respect.

Dalaman to LHR no problems with the 5 am flight until IST passport control. 1 and 2 had at least 500 people queuing but because I was economy class got barred from business class fast track check so had to push in or miss the 7.55 to LHR. Got to plane with 5 mins to spare got seated and had 3 seats to myself. Just before take off captain announces a big delay and everyone had to get off. He said LHR was fog bound so a 2 hrs delay so back to departure lounge where 3 members of staff proceeded to shout out passenger names to the 200+ passengers so we could retrieve our boarding passes. This was chaos and very unprofessional. 2.5 hr wait then back on the plane where another 150 passengers appeared from nowhere to fill all seats then another 1 hour wait on the tarmac with no explanations before take off - total 3.5 hours delay with no food or drinks. It looks to me that I and the original passengers were held up for 3.5 hours waiting for the plane to fill up.

LOS-IST-TLV. One word: Terrible. B737-900 LOS-IST. No air conditioning at LOS airport and drinks are not allowed into gate. By the time you board most passengers are very thirsty. Requests for water were shrugged off with the response "later". How can you refuse water to thirsty passengers. After take off painfully slow dinner service and a small plastic cup with water served. Of course it's not enough. Again FA would not supply more water. I even went to the galley pointed at a full bottle of water and asked for some. Again I was told to return to my seat water will come later. I approached the inflight manager to complain and situation improved. Poor English by pilots and FA's couldn't understand any announcements. No soap in toilets with nothing to dry wet hands on. Smiles from the crew were out of the question. Food was ordinary can't understand where all the fuss about their food in Economy class comes from. Maybe from flights outside Africa. Flight to TLV slightly better crew all in all cant judge all flights they operate but for me it was the last time on TK.

We flew Paris to Kayseri on 30th September. Totally full flight from Paris to Istanbul. However good service and an uneventful flight. Had to move quickly to get to the domestic terminal for the flight to Kayseri. Luggage fortunately had been checked through. This flight not full and was uneventful. Quick service of a light meal as flight time just over an hour. All in all good flights.

YYZ-IST-YYZ. Turkish is inconsistent. Business class should be perfect from start to finish. Flight to IST was almost that. Return flight had rough edges. Turkish communication between lounge and gate had us waiting in the sweatbox gate long before we needed to be there. No separate boarding for Bus Class in fact we went through security after we had already cleared it-Twice! On board staff demand that blinds must be closed on a day flight. Food good wines not so great. Entertainment mediocre. Poor selection of music.

LAX to Istanbul. No problem except leg room which is rather uncomfortable if you are somewhat tall (5' 8" and my husband is 6'0") and it was very warm on the plane. Coming back what really bothered me was that going to the restroom early on in the flight the trash was full and the pump soap was empty. Someone had thrown bars of soap onto the counter. A 13 hour flight with guessing 300 people. Not very sanitary. Staff were polite and courteous. Good entertainment choices. Food average but I'm not the best judge for that. I'm not sure I would like to fly this airline again given a choice.