Asia - Any Advice on GMG or Biman Bangladesh from Intrepid Travellers?

I am using frequent flyer mileage in October to get to BKK which will serve as my launching point to Bangladesh. I plan to fly into Dhaka, spend about two days there, then fly to Cox's Bazaar for 2-3 days.
Does anybody have any experience w/
1. GMG Airlines' international operation between BKK/DAC? (Service, reliability, fare, safety, etc.)
2. Biman's domestic service between DAC and Cox's Bazaar?
What is the best way to book in advance?
I am not getting much response from emailing the airlines.
Thanks in advance for any help at all.

Hello,

I am from Toronto, Canada but just moved to Bangladesh a few months ago and have had some traveling experiences with both airlines. My suggestion to you, right away, is DON'T... hehe :-)

In all seriousness, both providers are quite shoddy, at best. Bangladesh Biman in the government-owned national flag carrier that is one of the worst in the air. GMG is a new(er) private airline that operates domestically and also internationally to KTM and BKK, CCU and some other destinations.

The DAC-BKK-DAC sector uses an MD-82, which is better than what they use for domestic flights (Dash 8's). The service on board isn't the greatest, safety isn't the best either and its not very reliable either; however, it does seem to beat Biman.

For BKK-DAC, I would most definitely choose TG (daily). If not TG, then I guess GMG would be my next choice, followed by BG if no other options existed. I do not have the fares at the moment, but if you are looking, send me a PM and I can have someone from my office obtain them for you.

Biman's domestic service is pathetic. Flights are often delayed up to 12 hours or just outright canceled without prior notice. Sometimes they amalgamate flights without informing passengers, sometimes they decide to switch aircraft and other times, they just change schedules without informing Ops at the airport (ie: ground staff aren't available, no tarmac clearance, etc).

I am not surprised that you did not receive a reply from the airlines, especially Biman. It is very poorly managed and inefficiently run.

Cox's Bazaar is an amazing experience (from what I have heard) and it should hopefully make it worth all the hassle you may experience getting there. Don't mean to make things sound complicated, but just letting you know the real situation here at the moment.

By the way, the caretaker government made some drastic changes and recently (two months ago) canceled some unprofitable routes in their domestic network, but, afaik, the Cox's Bazaar route is untouched.

Anyways, hope that helps.. If you need any more assistance, don't hesitate to ask. I'm sure I can assist more than the airlines, which is pretty sad, actually.. LOL :-)

-t.

And, oh ya, I think the DAC - CXB RT fare is $95 plus taxes. I believe taxes are around $4 USD.

-t.

Avarice13...PM forthcoming. Thank you for the information and offer to assist!!!!
Planning is half the fun for me and this trip has been a challenge to arrange!

Avarice13...PM forthcoming. Thank you for the information and offer to assist!!!!
Planning is half the fun for me and this trip has been a challenge to arrange!

BUMP...any recent experiences with GMG? I have the "pleasure" of being booked on them DAC-KTM in a few weeks....

GMG are more reliable than Biman but thats really not saying much. GMG planes tend to be newer and more comfortable as well.

Cox's bazaar is ok. The town itself is really, really foul but the beach is ok. The best thing to do is take a boat out to a smallish offshore island (I forget the name but it's the one you can see from the beach). There a Myanmarise community out there who have a interesting temple and the island is nice to walk around.

The deluxe bus to Cox's takes about 10 hours and is about as comfortable as Bangladeshi buses get. The best hotel in town is called the Seagull and is about US$50 a night. I didn't stay there but the restaurant was pretty good (for Bangladesh).

on the KTM-DAC-KTM sector, on-air there doesn't seem much difference between the two airlines. Though, customer service seems to exists for GMG, whereas for BG it seems like it doesn't. GMG gives more food, but looked like catered from a chinese restaurants that are plenty in Dhaka :p.

The joke that goes in KTM is 'with GMG you can expect to fly the same day, with BG may be same week'. :D.

What seems to happen with BG, is if their smaller planes go tech, which is quite frequent, they wait for one of their bigger planes to be available (A310, DC10), and so sometimes just make people wait for a day or two and put all of them in one plane. :D. Once i thought i had a long delay of 26 hours, only to realize at the airport that there were people waiting for 2+ days. :rolleyes:

For anyone else considering GMG....

I called reservations 48 hours before my DAC-KTM to reconfirm. "Yes, yes, we have your reservation confirmed." Show up at airport 2 hours before flight: "We no longer fly that route." "As of when?" "About 5 weeks ago."

Was offered Biman, which I briefly considered (ignoring safety concerns) but when I found out the standby list was over 50 people....I reluctantly gave up on going to KTM :td:

Finding an affordable last-minute ticket out of DAC was far more interesting. Of course, GMG is refusing to refund the tickets....