Vueling Airlines

LPA-BCN Feb 2013. Vueling operate most of the former Iberia domestic routes from Barcelona including Balearics and Canary Islands the fleet is all Airbus320's from Barcelona's (newer) Terminal 1 which is pleasant and well designed. The seat pitch on board is minimal and very cramped I would say even more so than Ryanair or EasyJet. Their 'Excellence' premium fare with seating in Row 1 is a complete waste of time and money because the leg room is even more restricted owing to the bulk-head at the front so you cannot stretch your legs anywhere. Cabin staff are usually young and well presented all are Catalan/Spanish and speak English but the poor legroom makes even a short flight uncomfortable (and I am average height) so I cannot recommend this airline.

I travelled economy BCN - Malaga - BCN with extra legroom as I knew the pitch was very narrow. Boarding was slow both ways and very disorganised on the way back. I had paid for extra legroom but it was taken away from me on the way back as they changed the aircraft. However the airline did refund the extra I paid for both ways. When you pay extra legroom you get what would be considered a normal pitch on other short- haul flights. Normal seats on Vueling have an extremely narrow pitch. I must say it was my worst trip on a plane in a while. The only positive point is that the cabin crew were friendly.

I flew from GRX to BCN on the night of 1 Mar 2013. It wasn't a full flight hence boarding was a breeze. Cabin crew were friendly and the aircraft was really clean and I felt that the legroom was not as limited as other Asian carriers operating A320 that I've been on. Flight departed on time and arrived ahead of schedule. Based on my experience flying on budget carriers in Asia Vueling certainly exceeded my expectation!

NCE-BCN BCN-SVQ SVQ-NCE via BCN. While in Barcelona I receive an email telling me that my flight from Sevilla to Nice has changed but with no information on the nature of the change. In BCN on my way to SVQ I asked the Vueling information desk and they couldn't access my return flight information. In Sevilla I called again until I was told the flight I had booked had been cancelled. I had to stay an extra night in Sevilla at my expense so I could fly back one day later as scheduled. I paid 12 € per leg for carrying my luggage in the hold however I noticed several passengers with large and heavy bags in the cabin. This makes you wonder about the policy. Like many low-cost airlines Vueling has leather seats and I don't like the feeling of sliding down on them. Although I would not recommend flying with Vueling they are very competitive in terms of fare and often the only choice on certain routes.

Rome - Nantes. Flight cancelled and the only option given to us at the desk was to fly later on to Paris with a coach journey on to Nantes. Supposed to arrive at 7pm and ended up arriving at nearly 4 in the morning the next day. We were travelling with our 2 year old. Staff unhelpful. No refreshments no help at all. Pretty annoyed to see in the EU legislation that they are obliged to offer us a similar flight at a later date - at the desk they told us if we didn't accept the coach journey it'd be at our own cost.

LHR-BIO. Maybe I've done BIO with Easyjet too often but it all seemed to go very smoothly. 1/2 full plane helped so could spread out. Flight on time service was fine. 9.50 Euros for baguette beer and Pringles would be excessive on the ground but OK as budget airline costs go. Check-in took 5 minutes boarding was quick.

Barcelona to Ibiza return. Fine for a short flight. Clean plane and comfortable seats although leg room limited - managed to book an exit row seat on return which helped. Boarding chaotic and passengers carried more than the 10kg hand luggage which wasn't controlled and led to storage issues. Both flights arrived early. A good budget airline experience overall.

Flying Vueling is more or less a disaster. I flew them 8 times in the last 3 weeks (mostly ZRH-BCN-LPA) and no flight was on time. I always purchase the tickets online and did not receive a confirmation 3 times in the last few weeks so I had to go to the ticket counter at the airport. Yesterday (BCN-LPA) we had a delay of 79 minutes without any explanation as to why with no apology. Service is often quite unfriendly very shocking indeed that cabin crew are often unable to speak English fluently. Vueling flies with AB A320 - not very comfortable but at least quite new.

The one negative experience was that they changed boarding gates and we did not realised it until we saw no activity at the gate very close to boarding time. But that could also be because we were in a foreign country and could not hear or understand the announcements properly. Recently I travelled a lot and the one thing I really appreciated was the pilot who indicated landmarks something that did not happen on any of the other flights I undertook. Barcelona to Brussels 11.11.2012. The food and beverages were very average but in par with other airlines.

BCN to CPH. Online check-in did not work but no speakable line at El Prat and seats allocated as desired. Called early to the aircraft so we left on time. Arrival 20 minutes early into CPH. Not bad for a budget airline.