Northern Canuck

$667 is not a return fare. Penguin and I were comparing one way fares. (SFO-YYZ about $960 and YSB-BGI $667). That being said the current return fare Premium is $1611 and economy $674.

superangrypenguin

Close. I was comparing SAN-YYZ as its Rouged. SFO YYZ is ML

Northern Canuck

Sorry, yes that should have been SAN-YYZ @ $960 not SFO. In any case we were comparing one way not return fares.

AA_EXP09

Seriously? You would prefer rogue over UA (mainline) F?

superangrypenguin

I looked over my post again, just so we're clear, I would rank it this way:

ACr PR (J) > UA F > AC Y > ACr Y

UA F is nothing more than drinks and a bigger seat.

Hell, canadiancow ranked ACr PR service > LH F.

One of my best flights I'll never forget. September 12th, 2014 on ACr PR from TPA to YYZ. Had all 3 seats (at the time) to myself and had one of the best experiences onboard (interactions with the crew) in my life. Pleasant, hilarious crew, highly attentive, and to be fair, I liked the iPad IFE (first time in my life holding an iPad too)

BlondeBomber

For front cabin, yes. Very route dependent though--for long transcons/Hawaii/international, UA is fine but for some of the regional front cabins, e.g. E175 etc., then UA is inferior to Rouge for sure.

Wpgjetse

I would all day long. I did both in the last 3 weeks and Rouge J was better than UA F.

canadiancow

Honestly, AC Pr vs. UA domestic F, it would be price and schedule for me.

I have SFO-CUN-SFO booked, but now I need to be in YYZ shortly thereafter, and I'm looking at changing to CUN-ORD-YYZ. There's a CUN-YYZ non-stop on ACr, but it's twice the cost for J, so I'm going with UA.

Looking at SAP's SAN-YYZ, every US airline has a one-stop option under $600. AC's non-stop is closer to $800. Is that worth the premium? That's up to you to decide. But product/service in domestic J on flights of that length is pretty standard across the board.

bcrdukes

Thank you!

Looking forward to a trip on this route on PY!

flyquiet

(Longer trip report-y post. Skip if uninterested.)

This was my first ACr 763 J flight. MCO-YYZ this afternoon. I take back all the things I said about ACr J being pretty good. This was like a Glee Club putting on a show on Broadway, except without the glee. They were trying hard, as far as I could tell, but there were not enough of them to take into account where they were on the learning curve.

Lateness was a problem out of the control of the crew (as far as I could tell). The scheduled departure was 12:25. Delayed to 12:40 on the display board at airport. This was apparently due to the incoming delay. They arrived about 12:25 and took a long time to unload all those children and a few portered individuals.

However, we were not taxiing toward the runway about one hour after scheduled departure.

Aside from the late incoming, a LOT of the delay was due to gate checking bags as small as a macbook in a thin bag. I understand that confiscating carry-ons speeds up the biomechanics of getting passengers into their seat, but NOT if nobody can enter the aircraft until all the bags have been schlepped two at a time down the jet way by just two individuals.
We were on board and they were still schlepping them from the jetway, down the stairs, to the cargo door. I was seated in view of those stairs and I didn't see any use of the "bag slide".
There were no menus on the seats (although there were used blankets, approximately folded and put into plastic bags as though clean).

This is probably predominantly ground personnel causing the delay, but perhaps the cabin crew could have expedited passengers loading and unloading (on the incoming).

We got pre-departure juice/water offered but no meal orders taken that I could see. Once we were in the air, it seemed that one single FA took meal orders, proceeding front to back, as far as I could tell. He may have taken SE first, but if so, that was very discreet.

Taking orders took a LONG time, because ... no menus. FA had to give the options orally to each and every person in the 763 J section - what is that, 30 seats? A lot more seats than the usual 12-16.

When they came around for my choice, I said I am deaf and have food allergies so need to see the menu in writing. The FA was all "oh yeah", like he'd seen the Passenger Assistance flag on the manifest but it went in one eye, out the other. He proceeded to write the two options on the reverse of his order sheet. There was not even ONE copy of the menu to show me. Perhaps they double catered the aircraft but the southbound people ate all the beef or something.

Apparently it was chicken and couscous or pasta ravioli. No other description. I had no idea if it would be chicken and bell-pepper studded couscous but I felt pasta was risky pepper-wise because they do love to cram it into the red sauce. (As it turned out, the couscous had thin yellow julienne and it was hard to smell over the cumin, but I licked one and it seemed to be carrots. Whew. After that, aside from being cheap-o chicken thigh meat, it was reasonably tasty on the standard of a TATL Y meal.

It was not mainline standard in relation to drink orders. It was also weird that they took drink orders with meal orders, but then brought a drink cart around and poured in the aisle, so what was the point of taking the order ahead of time - they did not commit it to memory in any way - had to look it up on their chart. Also, there were no napkins offered with drink service. They had them, but I had to ask for one. Likewise no warm nuts. What the heck? The nuts make my day! As sort of a "by the by", after handing over the beverage, the FA held up a krispy kernel almond packet, like “do you want?” Like, yes I want nuts, but I wanted warm in a dish! Sheesh.

Waiting for the meal, after they handed out hot towels, they retreated to the galley with the curtains drawn. There were no drink refills. Usually on ACr J, we do see the FA offering refills.

I could not even smell food cooking until 1:40 into the flight. At that point, there was less than an hour until predicted landing time. It took so long to serve the trays that I was almost finished the entree before they came around with the rolls, and not that it is a big deal (like it is with the nuts), but the rolls were not warm. If they aren't baking them on board, I'd suggest plating with the meal on the 763 and cut one time-consuming procedure. This cabin crew were so overextended that the system has to be reviewed.

My meal tray was taken at 25minutes to landing, 2 hours into the flight. At that point, we had started descent. Many people were still eating entrees.

Fortunately NEXUS was uncomplicated, but the capper was that we had no bags until 35 mins after landing. (GTAA at their finest.) Fortunately the Priority came off first, putting me in a better mood. BUT I would recommend Rouge have a look at revising procedures and staffing on the 763. This is not to the standard even of the 319 J ACr let alone mainline.

why fly

Chuckle, this wont change the apologists, AC is amazing, that's the only thing they can hear.
Put on your suit of armor, and get ready you might as well have insulted their mother.

flyquiet

To be fair, ACr responded to the initial dumping-on of the 319 J service with adjustments, and with experience, work-hardening, and attrition of those not cut out for it, the service -- in J -- is fine. It's a business route for me, notwithstanding the holidaymakers travelling on points or hard-earned vacation funds. I don't mean to be precious, but I'm not as willing to sacrifice if I'm not saving my personal money. So I've appreciated what they've done there.
But in the same spirit, they have to know when they have missed the mark and this 763 just missed it by miles. (The piloting was A-1. Smooth.)

PlainEnthusiast

I had my first 1626 segment yesterday (319) and it was a challenging day for Rouge to say the least.

It was a full flight but there was no announcement in the boarding area with respect to complimentary gate checking of bags. Instead, at least 10-15 Y pax had to come back upstream with their bags during boarding and dump them in the galley.

The SD had her hands full with that situation and another pax who had a verbal altercation with a pax travelling with a screaming baby in J (Pr).

As a result there was no water or juice service at all for the 50+ minutes we sat at the gate after Zone 1 boarding. An FA from Y offered to assist the SD with the service but was told "don't worry about the juice". (I was impressed with the initiative taken by this other FA - she was in full uniform, not flustered at all by the boarding commotion and almost seemed like she should have been the SD).

No newspapers were offered until yet another FA from Y came forward, noticed the papers sitting in the galley, and decided to start handing them out.

After takeoff there was no hot towel service and we didn't see the beverage cart for nearly 50 minutes! I almost used the call button to request a drink but decided that the SD was having a tough day and that we'd eventually receive some service. Part of that time was taken up by the pax travelling with the baby commiserating with the SD about the gentleman who told her that the baby needed to behave. She then asked the SD if she could change the baby on top of the drink cart (which was not yet fully setup).

No peanuts were offered so I asked if they were available and she indicated that some were heated up and that she would get back to me. After the cabin beverage service was completed I was the only pax to receive a dish of peanuts.

With respect to the chicken and lentil dish, as we were getting ready to deplane an elderly pax that I had switched seats with (so she could sit with her daughter) said to me "that's the worst food I've ever had". Apparently she had a long career with AA and was speaking with some authority on the matter.

flyquiet

Jeepers!

Northern Canuck

<Pulls up a chair, grabs a bowl of popcorn, gets ready for the show> lol