Last Friday I escorted my colleague to NRT and he was flying NRT-PEK on CA business.
I was curious if there was any change in CA ground services after joining *A -
in fact it was even worse, basically due to rennovation of terminal 2 I guess.

CA check-in counter was only one row - row V for all pax, and it was mess as xzhu said.
Given the number of flights CA has from NRT, it is just too too small.

The row V counter was originally designed & used for ANA's First, higher elites (Diamond/Platinum) and *G check-in if my memory is correct, and I could use it with no waits when it was there - as ANA also had big counters for business class (Club ANA) pax elsewhere in other rows in those days.

So even the waiting space for the row V is small, it worked well then - but it is NEVER designed for all PAX of multiple flights IMHO.
In addition at T2 all check-in luggage is required to go through a screening machine before check-in (this process was already made unnecessary as new EDS is installed in T1), and the machine made the mess even worse.

So we saw the same hundeds of people there - and as I could not think C class PAX should also line-up, I asked the JAL staff there if there is any priority lanes and she *reluctantly* (no kidding) said C Pax can go ahead to counters - but we also faced the screening machine line before getting into the C/F counters. There was no one who could tell we could cut into the line before the machine, I needed to go back to verify if we could do it - as it was embrassing for us to do so without
guidance by airline staff. Finally we could do it after I could find staff to help it. (Without doing so, you need to wait for the hundeds people!)

Another issue was JAL GHs - I could not feel that they were trying to make
the check-in experiences more smooth.

One more issue - while CA's FFP system is *somewhat* working for *A now in China, it looked like they have not installed FFP system interfacing with *A at all at NRT, because the GHs told PAX that *A mileage number cannot be entered to systems well at NRT and need manual entry.

I hope the CA counter moves to regular lines when the rennovation completes 2008 summer -for sure it is better to move to T1 South but I guess there are already too many airlines. Hope it can move to T1 North at least.

Anyway I would not recommend to fly CA from NRT now, in especial *G and premium class pax - you know, it is painful to cut a long line even if you are told you can do so - and ground staff helping it is not very available. (Yes they are there but not so *ready*)