Craig Whitmore

I have been very disappointed to how they actually invite people to board.

In the past they do the normal invite to customers (Gold/Elite , Alliance members etc) to board first , they process these people and then after that they invite everyone else (front/back or whatever depending on the plane and gate)

Lately (2 latest flight) they do the invitation and some people start to move towards the gate to board (who should be) and then they suddenly start inviting everyone else so by the time I get to the gate line there are 30+ people who have rushed to get on who have no status.

Anyone else found this as well?

Kiwi Flyer

Its been that way for ages on domestic flights.

sbiddle

It's been that way for ages on domestic.

When probably 50% of the plane are priority pax I don't know whether fixing it would make things any better.

Nickolash27

Don't worry, they won't get to the destination before you.

dadig

For domestic it really doesn't matter. TT has got a lot better ex AU and AKL. Wellington is still a shambles with no priority lane. I don't see why this is hard given QF do it in an orderly fashion

codyc1515

This has been an issue for a long time. While I agree it largely wouldn't make a different owing to the large numbers of status customers the point remains that NZ offers it as a benefit (and even sells it). I wonder if it would be possible to get a refund on Koru, for instance, owing to the fact that priority boarding is advertising but never actually given.

curioustill

When you pay some money to select your seats, some seats are advertised as having 'priority boarding' for no good reason. An example is if you book an exit row.

ClanJ

A really good point above if you pay for service then it is not unreasonable to expect time to use it

gratn

Credit where due, I flew Auckland to Sydney last Sunday. By the time I got to the gate it was the usual boarding zoo. I looked for a priority lane and a staffer saw me and opened one immediately. Good service Air NZ.

dadig

My last ex AKL to SYD NZ now board J passengers first which is nice given that I tend to travel J even TT. Must have been recent as I've been on TT to try all items the menus (December menu is great btw)

trooper

I generally only fly SYD-AKL and AKL-LAX/SFO and return... cant say ive noticed any problems with boarding on those...

Were these domestic?

dadig

Not exactly. Just poor crowd control. There are groups of people who are neither priority boarding or not travelling J resulting in other pax having to navigate around during boarding. It is worse TT ex WLG due to smaller boarding areas.

NZbutterfly

Part of the NZ computer system was being upgraded last Monday so boarding was slow and went BP and Elite, PE and Gold + I think Koru (or could have been with economy) and then economy. It was different. There can be crowd surges but they seem to make another announcement for non status etc to hang ten. At least if I get there in time from the lounge to hear it.

I was flying QF with my dad once and went to the loo, they had called boarding while I was away and returned to find dad in the priority line. Not the most attentive these days! Have to admit though if I'm flying with partner or family of course they're coming in the same line. We're not splitting up for check in or boarding!

As a side note NZ staff said the upgrade was done from Australia and they were aiming for wee hours of the morning - which of course ended up being PEAK departure time for NZ flights!! I made an assumption NZ kept operations within NZ.

Craig Whitmore

I've never had this "problem" on international flights and only on the domestic flights.

Yes one of the Benefits is "Priority boarding: Once boarding commences, you may board at your leisure on Air New Zealand and most Star Alliance flights." and most of the time I don't get it.

SeaProf

My experience is that on international flights from the USA boarding has been done by cabin, first and foremost. On domestic flights within NZ, I have repeatedly chuckled when they announce boarding for elites, *G, etc and within 5 seconds of said announcement, before any elite has realistically had a chance to move forward, they begin boarding all rows. For me it's not too big of a deal, given there will be space for my bag (if this were in the USA, then it would be a much larger deal as there might not be any space left).