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Prelude:
My client calls and asks me to meet in San Francisco the next day. With 15 hours before the meeting, I jump online to check flights. Pricing: UA & AA = $880 RT (How in the world did that happen??? Pricing is usually around $256 RT for full Y!) VX = $320 RT in F. Well, you can guess what I did…
I had heard that VX’s booking engine was not too great and found that out after my purchase when I went to select seats. I could only select the outbound portion; not the return. I decided not to worry about it and just deal with it later [on the day of departure for my return, the computer eventually assigned me a seat (aisle, thank God) after two separate calls to CS – who, BTW work from home just like JetBlue].
Terminals:
LAX: Terminal 6
Of the six check-in kiosks, only one was working – which was in front of the F line. Not bad, except people had made two lines and didn’t care what class they were traveling. Add to that the counters really had no clue what was going on. When I finally printed out my boarding pass, I had to re-queue in a longer line as nobody cared about people traveling in F.
I don’t mean to be a snob, but if I’m paying 4x the price of a Y ticket and you have an F line designated, I would like to fast-track and get to security.
Continental’s President’s Club is on this concourse, so my $2,300 Lifetime NW WorldClub Membership gets some use. This is too cool!
SFO: International Terminal A
Monsterous signs around the counter. Super excited ticket counter staff (guess that makes sense since it’s the HQ)! I got there 45 minutes before the flight a bit worried that my one bag (which VX limits you to [additionals incurring a charge]) wouldn’t make it, but the agents laughed and told not to sweat it…they check bags up to 10 minutes before the flight and personally run the last ones down. VERY COOL!
International WorldClub right after security. No, you cannot use the Clubhouse, but “…a lounge is in the works…” I have no idea what that last statement means.
Boarding:
LAX: Delayed 20 minutes due to late inbound aircraft, but went smoothly.
SFO: Delayed 20 minutes due to late inbound aircraft, but went smoothly. And the gate staff was more perky than the ticket counter!
OH, I noticed that the second row is much better than the first as the bulkhead reduces your legroom. Check it out (props to SQFG):
Onboard Preflight:
LAX: Heineken is served by a 35-ish ex-masseuse who is in excellent shape and wearing a pushup bra (now this last point may not have been that big of a deal until I noticed that ALL the FA’s were wearing them as well…hmmm…’nuff said…). XXXX, the Captain and the Number X one hired, comes to greet each and every person shaking their hand and thanking them. He tells me he’s super excited about his job now. There are no unions on VX and after Delta gave him the boot after pay cut after pay cut, he’s stoked to get up each morning and fly. Very nice to hear!
SFO: Heineken is served by a 39-ish tall woman, who later could not read the preflight information card to the passengers without stumbling a million times. Yes, she was wearing the pushup also…
The Flight:
LAX => SFO: The cabin is bathed in a purplish light. I’m told later that the windows are also coated with an anti-reflective film to enhance the ambiance.
We pull away from the gate and end up sitting there for a while… After about 15 minutes, XXXX, the Captain, comes out and announces that we have incurred a half hour delay due to a computer malfunction in the automatic pilot – it has to be reset. I ask if we can get beers and am politely told that they cannot serve us. When the plane is ready to go, we’ve now lost our position in queue. We end up taking off an hour late. No worries, though…
SFO => LAX: Inbound aircraft is late and we end up departing a half hour late, but the attitude of the crew more than makes up for it.
The Seat:
LAX => SFO: The first two buttons are missing on my seat controls. I try to pull off the last one to see if they are just loose, but no dice. Have no idea how they came off. But my IFE is working and I’m having a blast watching the Corean movie, “200 Pounds Beauty” during our major delay. If you haven’t seen it, check it out. Hilarious. Another interesting point: the crew let us watch the IFE with the screens pulled out from the time we sat down to the time we disembarked. Very AF of them.
This seat rocks. Reclines EXTREMELY far back and definitely beats all domestic U.S. carriers. The massage feature doesn’t do much of anything, but it’s nice to know they are trying…
We are served a cute little trio of dishes: baby mozzarella with teardrop tomatoes in an olive oil and balsamic dressing, melon ball wrapped with prosciutto, and my favorite – a mini cream puff.
My apologies, my camera was above and I was too lazy to grab it.
SFO => LAX: HUGE AL is anxious to finish up “200 Pounds Beauty,” but my IFE doesn’t work. The cabin crew ends up busting their butts to get it working and finally have it on during the last 15 minutes of the flight. I do appreciate the effort. Sometimes it isn’t what goes wrong, but how people deal with it. The service was outstanding.
This time with the trio, we were served baby mozzarella with teardrop tomatoes in an olive oil and balsamic dressing, melon ball wrapped with prosciutto, and a chocolate mousse with candied orange rinds:
I’m totally digging the seatback. Perfect pockets for everything…including the Blackberry (which I totally hate).
The Arrival: Actually, I have nothing to report here…went off without a hitch. Bags came off no prob.
Summary: Though there were a few (OK, quite a few) hiccups, the service and enthusiasm more than made up for it. As VX has mentioned, they intend to give the U.S. carriers a run for their money. I’m confident that if this start is any indication, they’re doing just that. I’m sold.
Oh, their FFP is kinda weird in that it is the first one to peg the miles to the dollar (5 points per $1 spent). Now they say after 4900 points you can redeem them for ANY unsold seat. However, when I called to inquire what “ANY” meant and whether it applied to F seats, the agents weren’t sure. Guess we’ll have to see about that one.
Net-net: try them out. They have quickly become my domestic carrier of choice.
My client calls and asks me to meet in San Francisco the next day. With 15 hours before the meeting, I jump online to check flights. Pricing: UA & AA = $880 RT (How in the world did that happen??? Pricing is usually around $256 RT for full Y!) VX = $320 RT in F. Well, you can guess what I did…
I had heard that VX’s booking engine was not too great and found that out after my purchase when I went to select seats. I could only select the outbound portion; not the return. I decided not to worry about it and just deal with it later [on the day of departure for my return, the computer eventually assigned me a seat (aisle, thank God) after two separate calls to CS – who, BTW work from home just like JetBlue].
Terminals:
LAX: Terminal 6
Of the six check-in kiosks, only one was working – which was in front of the F line. Not bad, except people had made two lines and didn’t care what class they were traveling. Add to that the counters really had no clue what was going on. When I finally printed out my boarding pass, I had to re-queue in a longer line as nobody cared about people traveling in F.
I don’t mean to be a snob, but if I’m paying 4x the price of a Y ticket and you have an F line designated, I would like to fast-track and get to security.
Continental’s President’s Club is on this concourse, so my $2,300 Lifetime NW WorldClub Membership gets some use. This is too cool!
SFO: International Terminal A
Monsterous signs around the counter. Super excited ticket counter staff (guess that makes sense since it’s the HQ)! I got there 45 minutes before the flight a bit worried that my one bag (which VX limits you to [additionals incurring a charge]) wouldn’t make it, but the agents laughed and told not to sweat it…they check bags up to 10 minutes before the flight and personally run the last ones down. VERY COOL!
International WorldClub right after security. No, you cannot use the Clubhouse, but “…a lounge is in the works…” I have no idea what that last statement means.
Boarding:
LAX: Delayed 20 minutes due to late inbound aircraft, but went smoothly.
SFO: Delayed 20 minutes due to late inbound aircraft, but went smoothly. And the gate staff was more perky than the ticket counter!
OH, I noticed that the second row is much better than the first as the bulkhead reduces your legroom. Check it out (props to SQFG):
Onboard Preflight:
LAX: Heineken is served by a 35-ish ex-masseuse who is in excellent shape and wearing a pushup bra (now this last point may not have been that big of a deal until I noticed that ALL the FA’s were wearing them as well…hmmm…’nuff said…). XXXX, the Captain and the Number X one hired, comes to greet each and every person shaking their hand and thanking them. He tells me he’s super excited about his job now. There are no unions on VX and after Delta gave him the boot after pay cut after pay cut, he’s stoked to get up each morning and fly. Very nice to hear!
SFO: Heineken is served by a 39-ish tall woman, who later could not read the preflight information card to the passengers without stumbling a million times. Yes, she was wearing the pushup also…
The Flight:
LAX => SFO: The cabin is bathed in a purplish light. I’m told later that the windows are also coated with an anti-reflective film to enhance the ambiance.
We pull away from the gate and end up sitting there for a while… After about 15 minutes, XXXX, the Captain, comes out and announces that we have incurred a half hour delay due to a computer malfunction in the automatic pilot – it has to be reset. I ask if we can get beers and am politely told that they cannot serve us. When the plane is ready to go, we’ve now lost our position in queue. We end up taking off an hour late. No worries, though…
SFO => LAX: Inbound aircraft is late and we end up departing a half hour late, but the attitude of the crew more than makes up for it.
The Seat:
LAX => SFO: The first two buttons are missing on my seat controls. I try to pull off the last one to see if they are just loose, but no dice. Have no idea how they came off. But my IFE is working and I’m having a blast watching the Corean movie, “200 Pounds Beauty” during our major delay. If you haven’t seen it, check it out. Hilarious. Another interesting point: the crew let us watch the IFE with the screens pulled out from the time we sat down to the time we disembarked. Very AF of them.
This seat rocks. Reclines EXTREMELY far back and definitely beats all domestic U.S. carriers. The massage feature doesn’t do much of anything, but it’s nice to know they are trying…
We are served a cute little trio of dishes: baby mozzarella with teardrop tomatoes in an olive oil and balsamic dressing, melon ball wrapped with prosciutto, and my favorite – a mini cream puff.
My apologies, my camera was above and I was too lazy to grab it.
SFO => LAX: HUGE AL is anxious to finish up “200 Pounds Beauty,” but my IFE doesn’t work. The cabin crew ends up busting their butts to get it working and finally have it on during the last 15 minutes of the flight. I do appreciate the effort. Sometimes it isn’t what goes wrong, but how people deal with it. The service was outstanding.
This time with the trio, we were served baby mozzarella with teardrop tomatoes in an olive oil and balsamic dressing, melon ball wrapped with prosciutto, and a chocolate mousse with candied orange rinds:
I’m totally digging the seatback. Perfect pockets for everything…including the Blackberry (which I totally hate).
The Arrival: Actually, I have nothing to report here…went off without a hitch. Bags came off no prob.
Summary: Though there were a few (OK, quite a few) hiccups, the service and enthusiasm more than made up for it. As VX has mentioned, they intend to give the U.S. carriers a run for their money. I’m confident that if this start is any indication, they’re doing just that. I’m sold.
Oh, their FFP is kinda weird in that it is the first one to peg the miles to the dollar (5 points per $1 spent). Now they say after 4900 points you can redeem them for ANY unsold seat. However, when I called to inquire what “ANY” meant and whether it applied to F seats, the agents weren’t sure. Guess we’ll have to see about that one.
Net-net: try them out. They have quickly become my domestic carrier of choice.
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