For travelling up and down New Zealand, it’s been good to have the choice of two and often three airlines – Air New Zealand, Qantas, and most recently Pacific Blue. The choice means that when I need to get a flight for myself or my children between, say, Wellington and Auckland, a good price can be got even if the flight is the next day.
You just go online, check out who has the best deal around the time you want, book, and fly. Given the complexities of the modern family, I need to make such bookings quite frequently, often several times a month.
This past few weeks I’ve gone farther than domestically, and been domestically to Australia, twice. First to Brisbane and back, then to Sydney and back. The Brisbane trip was on Pacific Blue and the Sydney one was on Air New Zealand. The fares both trips were almost the same. What made a big difference was the in-flight experience and Air New Zealand wins that by a long way, I must report.
The latter surprised me, as I’d have thought Pacific Blue as an upstart new-entrant would have tried to make the actual flight experience better than its long-established competitors.
Our Brisbane flight was out of Auckland on Christmas Day for family reasons and Pacific Blue had the best online fare so we got that, and also it seemed the best price coming back from Brisbane to Auckland on New Year’s Day to pick up my car, which we’d driven there up from Wellington for family Christmas time and which needed returning to Wellington.
However it transpired that what seemed a very cheap Pacific Blue flight back did not include more than A $150 in fuel surcharges and taxes which were not shown in the advertised price and which I only found after paying for the tickets (online). Additionally on this airline, you have to pay extra for anything you eat, drink or watch (they will hire you a video screen for $20 to watch a film). This would be fine if their fares were genuinely cheaper than their competitors but in reality they are not, as Pacific Blue does not tell you up-front the taxes and surcharges on the leg from Australia to New Zealand, only for trips from New Zealand to Australia.
Let’s cut this story short. I got back to Auckland from Brisbane, drove the car back to Wellington, went back to work last Monday, but for very important personal reasons needed then to go to Sydney on Friday. Pacific Blue does not yet appear to fly between Wellington and Sydney (it has eight flights a week to Brisbane from Welly) but Air New Zealand and Qantas do. Air New Zealand was offering return flights at short notice for the same price as the Pacific Blue Brisbane flights we’d booked with more than a month’s notice and there were no hidden surcharges. What was claimed was what you paid. Both ways.
My 6am flight over on Friday morning offered a full breakfast with choices, a full hot, cold and bar drinks service (it was bizarre to see a woman in the seat in front fill up on rums and Coke at that hour) and a multi-channel entertainment system in the seatback. At no extra charge. Ditto the flight back from Sydney last night. A choice of two evening meals, wines, coffee, whatever, and the seatback entertainment on the multi-channel remote control.
Pacific Blue promotes itself as cheaper than its competitors specifically by saying it charges you more if you want to eat, drink or take luggage on its planes. If you choose not to do any of that you can get a fairly cheap base fare. That’s a great idea if it really is cheaper, and it seems to be on Pacific Blue’s domestic flights.
I’m at this moment seeking flights for my daughter between Wellington and Auckland and return for Thursday this week and Pacific Blue has the cheapest (about $69 without luggage) so I’ll probably book that for her.
But on trans-Tasman flights, and maybe beyond, Air New Zealand’s fares appear to be very competitive, they include the surcharges and taxes that don’t seem to be on Pacific Blue’s website, you don’t have to pay more for the drinks or food (which was massively better than Pacific Blue’s expensive sandwiches) and should you so be disposed, you can spend your entire Air New Zealand flight watching for free a vast selection of movies and television shows or competing for a free flight by playing an odd UK computer-game version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. Someone actually won it on our Sydney – Welly flight home last night.
Being someone who loves flying and is almost obsessive in my interest in planes and how they fly, the best thing about this seatback screen was how you can switch it to “flight mode” which gives you a constant real-time display of where the plane is, its height and speed, the time left to your destination and so on. On descent to Sydney and Wellington, this display also had a GPS satellite map image of the plane’s path above the sea, land and suburbs below, so realistic you could look out the window and see below what the screen was showing, from the screen’s details knowing exactly where you were. Amazing!
11 Comments
January 12, 2009 at 6:15 pm
Agree, Air NZ is by far the best airline flying out of and in NZ at the moment. Qantas the airline you didn’t fly with, is struggling in NZ, is flights often delayed or cancelled.
Air NZ’s entertainment system that works from the moment you get in the plane to the moment you get off is also as far as I can see an industry first and a major plus. Recovers about an hour of otherwise dead time.
January 12, 2009 at 7:50 pm
(it was bizarre to see a woman in the seat in front fill up on rums and Coke at that hour
>> Indeed. Generally I wait until midday before indulging…unless the alochol offered is particularly good then all bets are off.
January 12, 2009 at 9:02 pm
I fly a lot, its a very pleasant surprise how good Air NZ actually is at the moment.
Even Australians I know prefer it over Qantas right now- and thats saying something.
Rob Fyfe is doing a damn good job.
January 12, 2009 at 9:54 pm
We’ve had good service from Air NZ though not always the cheap last minute prices, especially when flying to and from anywhere but a main centre.
January 13, 2009 at 7:47 am
Unfortunately, in the last 8 months Air NZ ground staff have twice managed to leave my luggage off the plane when I’ve flown from Wellington to Auckland or Christchurch to connect to a long haul flight. This meant I got to my destination 12-24 hours later only to find my luggage wasn’t with me.
First time was in May, when I had a 5 hour connection gap at Auckland before boarding a flight to Chile (and then on to Mexico). The luggage made it from Wgtn to Akl, but not on the flight to Santiago.
Second time was in November, when – in spite of checking in 50 minutes in advance – the handlers at Wellington didn’t even get my suitcase on to the flight to Christchurch, so I had no luggage in Jakarta for 72 hours.
And as homepaddock says, they’re not cheap when you’re flying to and from anywhere but a main centre. Wellington to Queenstown is always horrifically expensive compared to Auckland or Trans-Tasman flights.
I should add though, that the in-flight service from Qantas on the way back from Jakarta in November was pretty dreadful.
I’ve yet to fly on an airline that can come close to Singapore Airlines for on board customer service, although even that company is a little complacent in how it treats its frequent flyer customers.
January 13, 2009 at 9:07 am
My father recently sent me a grumpy email, complaining that booking through the AirNZ .com.au website is often much cheaper than booking through the .co.nz one as they have local specials not publicised here.
Worth a try
January 13, 2009 at 9:56 am
I got put off Air NZ after some really lousy service and hidden costs a few years back. Might give them another go. But nobody, and I mean nobody puts Air Koryo’s service in a corner!
January 13, 2009 at 1:22 pm
Your comments re Pacific Blue, I thought the Commerce Commission had taken Air NZ to task re this issue and Qantas as well. How come Pacific Blue have not been treated similarly to a bout of Diplock charm?
January 13, 2009 at 1:31 pm
Pacific Blue were also taken to task by the CC, that’s why they disclose the surcharge NZ-> Oz and not when Oz -> NZ. Shows the mettle of the company though.
January 13, 2009 at 2:35 pm
AdamSmith1922, Jane Diplock’s head of the Securities Commission. I think you’re referring to the lovely Paula Rebstock?
January 15, 2009 at 10:33 am
Air New Zealand are a mile better than most of their competitors on the trans-Tasman. They are still slightly behind Emirates, in my opinion however – their focus on service is relentless, and their planes tend to be very new and thus better fitted. If there’s no significant price difference, it’s Air NZ or Emirates every time.