FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - EWR Polaris lounge -- Reviews, Experiences, Q&A, ..
Old Apr 23, 2020, 7:38 am
  #343  
nola1
 
Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: New Orleans
Posts: 20
Very poor experience at the United Polaris Lounge EWR and at the Gate

​​​​​Very poor experience at the United Polaris Lounge EWR (Newark Airport) pre-COVID and at the Gate

Arrived around 2050 hrs on 26 Dec. Lounge did not seem that busy.
However, they were no longer serving a sit down dinner and maybe 3-4 folks left in this area.
Buffet was of poor quality with warm dry salmon and room temperature turkey.
Would be nice to let folks know food service hours in advance and to have proper buffet items when full service is not available. One solution, perhaps to make this very clear on the UA, Star Alliance, etc. websites that mention various lounges. If I would have known limited service hours and how poor the buffet was, I would have eaten at city of origin.

Bar tender lady was nice.
Half of the employees were too busy doing social media on their cell phones to work.
This was in the middle of the lounge.
The other half appeared to be doing their job.
Where I sat to eat the buffet food was mostly empty. Despite this, the person cleaning the tables cleared the dirty dishes from the other tables onto my table and left them there before loading the dirty dishes cart which was 1/2 blocking where I was sitting. Unsupervised and clueless.
Compared to my prior experience at the United Polaris Lounge in Chicago (ORD), this was very poor indeed.
Lounges at Turkish Airlines and Lufthansa are usually far superior. Yes, we do have a choice in airlines, and sometimes Lounges.

The signage for the gate was almost non-existent as the only entry to the gate was not clearly noted with a long walk from the opposite direction. The entry restrictions were due to Security (no issue about that). Almost missed my Duty Free pick up at gate – never have seen a DF person trying to hide so well.

The flight out of EWR was pleasant. The crew staff that worked Polaris were great.

Goals of this 4 month belated posting:

When things improve post COVID, to improve the poor EWR Lounge experience and to hire supervisors and employees to do a proper job.

Improve signage directions for gates when means of entry will be limited.

From NOLA with love
nola1 is offline