A sad, sorry, useless airline
Written: Nov 19 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: none
Cons: if it looks bad from the ground, I dread to think what it's like in the air
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| singaporeboy's Full Review: Air China |
Before I fly with any airline, I check around to see what the general opinion of it is, and I check their website to see if they have information on what I can expect. From what my Chinese friends and colleagues have told me about Air China's level of service, from their earnest insistence that I never patronize this company, from what I've read on Epinions and from what I see on their English website, I've come to this preliminary conclusion:
This is a sad, sad company which should have stopped flying years ago.
To begin with, I'll relate an anecdote from a colleague of mine who flew from Shanghai to Beijing in Economy class. A surly stewardess came around and asked him, in Mandarin, what he'd like to drink. "Orange juice", was his reply in English, to which the stewardess said, "don't have, drink Coke," and walked off without giving him anything.
Such elegant, refined levels of service seem to stop sadly short of the wonderful hospitality enjoyed on many fine domestic U.S. shuttle flights.
I wasn't about to base my opinion of an airline entirely on one anecdote, so I discussed the airline with a colleague of mine. He is also an expatriate in Singapore, from Beijing, and flies between Singapore and Beijing several times a year, always on Air China. He claims it's because they're cheap, although they're usually no cheaper than China Airlines for international flights or other mainland airlines for flights into China. He's had similar experiences on every one of his flights, and when I asked if he was ever given superior service, he couldn't recall any incidents.
Lovely. On to their website, at http://www.airchina.com.cn/english/index.htm. They don't seem to take it very seriously, as several of the links don't work at all, and many of the pages aren't available in English. On the pages which do work, there are several annoying, cutesy airplane graphics, which look like they were stolen from other websites. There's very little actual information available on anything, in English or Chinese. The online reservations system has been coming soon for over six months, and I haven't been able to find so much as a mention of what services are available on the plane itself.
If a company cannot even create a working website, how do they expect me to trust them with my life?
Air China even has a frequent flyer program, the Companion Club. Like every other aspect of this company, it's more of a sick joke than anything. With severely restricted opportunities to earn points, two year expiry of points earned and virtually no awards or benefits, unless you fly them very regularly you're better off not bothering, and even then you'll probably get little use out of it.
To top it all off, I don't even think this airline represents China well. Their logo is meant to be a phoenix-stylized version of the letters VIP, but comes off looking more like a rooster. I find this amusing since, in Mandarin, airplane and flying chicken sound the same. China Airlines, on the other hand, features a plum flower blossom with a name-chop beside it, and tiers of service representing China's first imperial dynasty, thousands of years ago. When a flag carrier of a country as big as mainland China can't even sport a logo or corporate image reflective of that country's culture, I question their ability to reflect any aspect of that culture. Their name in Chinese is also relatively meaningless, but it's hard to fault them for that, as every single airline in mainland China has an equally meaningless name.
Side note: Air China is the flag carrier of the People's Republic of China, and China Airlines is the flag carrier of the Republic of China. Aside from both being Chinese, the two airlines have nothing to do with each other.
Well, after all that, I still haven't flown with Air China, and wild horses probably couldn't drag me into a seat on one of their planes. While I admit it is a little unusual for someone to write an opinion of an airline with which they haven't flown, Air China has given me many reasons to avoid them at any cost. For an airline to be able to do that...that deserves special mention.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
singaporeboy
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Location: Illinois
Reviews written: 96
Trusted by: 18 members
About Me:
Just someone who's lucky enough to have lived in several corners of the planet
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