Chessboxin

Was in Sydney lounge last weekend (around 5pm). Arrived approx 90 minutes before boarding and it was absolutely packed to the point where my partner and I had to sit at the bar as it was the only spot available. Bartender was friendly which made it ok, but certainly not very relaxing listening to consecutive people ordering Baileys on ice.

sopwith7

Yea the trick with the Sydney lounge is to show up by 4:30pm and grab one of the big chairs at the far right end of the lounge. Take your shower right away if necessary, hit the buffet right at 5pm when dinner comes out, then just use the satellite drinks station near the TV room (rather than the main bar) until it's time to head downstairs for boarding. You won't really notice the crowd.

Rebound

All the lounges are packed - there was a big sign downstairs on Monday at the AKL INTL Lounge that said only 1 guest and no comp passes, I had to sit at the bar.

Noobmaster69

Hi everyone, just wondering what's the busy season and time period for the international lounge at AKL? I am just a Koru leisure traveller and want to avoid the competition.
It doesn't seem like the school holidays right now, so is it always busy no matter what time of the year it is?

nzkarit

In AKL Intl have seen people sent to Strata longue during morning and evening peaks. So late morning to mid afternoon would be the best time to visit when just east coast flights are happening.

Thai-Kiwi

Susiew237

I usually fly with gold partner but today, the rare time I am actually going to fly on my own I can’t use my voucher that I got from CC spend. I think it’s rubbish. Why give out free vouchers if I then can’t use them. To be honest though the bacon and egg McMuffin from McDs is superior to lounge food anyway but it is nice to find a possie in the lounge to relax and have multiple cuppas.

Rebound

Take that up with your credit card company

Thai-Kiwi

For what it’s worth:

https://i.stuff.co.nz/travel/news/11...reeloaders-out

sbiddle

Such a poorly though out opinion piece.

JayKiwi

Moronic piece of media writing. I take my children into the lounges once a year at most. I was in AKL international the first day of the school holidays just this week, and the presence of children in the lounge was literally undetectable.

Most Elites I know exercise guest rights with discretion. Any suggestion that Elites are regularly bringing this cavalcade of children and max guest entitlements into most of their lounge visits is just nonsense.

sbiddle

All the blaming of people bringing guests overlooks the very simple fact that massive growth in air travel has occured in recent years. The number of HVCs has grown significantly, the number of aircraft and the size of aircraft grew significantly and and yet Air NZ did very little to increase lounge sizes.

Somebody posted some analysis of the AKL International lounge on here last year about morning departures and lounge capacity. Just looking at this again now for departures this morning their are 2,895 seats available on Air NZ departures during a 90 min period from 8:25 - 9:55 this morning and 212 BP seats across those flights meaning 212 who are entitled to access regardless of status.

The simple fact is the international lounge was too small when it was built, and domestic lounges are struggling simply because nothing had been invested in upgrades during a 10 year period where passenger numbers skyrocketed.

WLGNZ

Totally agree.
Over three years ago I talked with Mr Luxon about this and he acknowledged the issue with the International lounge. Since then AirNZ have added International flights with BP seats. And have done zero to accommodate these additional passengers.
It is a conscious decision by AirNZ not to invest in customer experience.

cavemanzk

AKL has enough business class seats these days to justify an "Business Class Only" Lounge, it would be great to kick EK out then take over that space for an J lounge.

ottiehund

I experienced the AKL International lounge twice over the last couple of weeks, both times the "we are experiencing high demand..." sign was at the bottom of the escalator. Wife and I got in first time (flying PE to NAN) as a guest with my Koru while she also has silver lounge vouchers of her own as do I along with CC vouchers, second time on my own (I was flying J to SIN) so no issues with getting in, however the couple ahead of me were turned away.

For our first visit the lounge was 75% full (at a guess) and it was about 9am on a Friday morning when we got there after transferring from domestic. We found seats reasonably easily and got a coffee and a snack ok but it was busy enough it didnt offer the 'haven' the lounges used to be.

The second visit was a bit different, the place was simply the MADDEST I have experienced. I arrived from domestic a bit earlier than the previous time, about 8am and it was a Thursday morning. There were lines for food and I had to sit in the TV room to even get a single seat. I spoke with one of the food service workers and she said breakfast time was simply the craziest time of day. In fact it was so bad I gave up trying to get food initially and ordered a coffee on the app and got a water from the drinks area. After half an hour or so it started to quieten down and I got some food.

On the way home from NAN we had 2 hours in the AKL domestic lounge (about 5:30pm to 7:30 pm on a Tuesday evening) and to be honest I almost went outside for some quiet. Part of the issue was the place being packed but making it worse was the behaviour of some patrons. One lady for example sitting a row from us at the very far end of the lounge (which is where we found our seats) was on her phone on one of those video 'face-type' of calls showing her phone around and talking loudly into it (why would you even do that in a lounge environment?), while she was doing this her kid (8-10 years old at a guess) was unsupervised and running all around the lounge at will. We gave up trying to get food and a drink (1) because of the lines and (2) because of the behaviour (people cramming as much as they could get onto their plates etc). It just wasn't pleasant.

On the way home from SIN I had time in the CHC lounge which was a haven in comparison to AKL (although one of the worst lounge showers I have experienced for a long time - the facility was ok but the plumbing was either worn out or on the fritz and simply would not set or maintain a water temperature). That was late morning on a Tuesday, so I guess peak business travel had passed. The lounge staff were very friendly and helpful (esp as my SQ printed but NZ flight number boarding pass was rejected by the scanner).

None of these comments will surprise anyone I don't think - just reaffirming what has been said already.

Picking up on Cavemanzk's comment, it is a couple of years since I have used the EK lounge but recall it being very nice indeed. Having arrived from a domestic connection I was there early and it was sparsely populated initially, with excellent selection of food and drinks. Over the next couple of hours with 3 A380's all departing in quick order (I don't think that happens now?) the occupancy started to fill up and it ended up being quite busy but still a few seats around if you looked for them and none of the 'quick lets plunder the buffet' mentality and bahaviour you seem to find now in the NZ lounge. Overall, even at it's peak occupancy, my recollection is that the EK lounge experience was superior to my recent NZ experience.

In summary I guess there are more HVC's these days and more passengers with 'gifted' access. Having a lounge at capacity, while maybe not ideal from a passengers perspective, still shouldn't be all that much of an issue if it is managed well and (and this I think is the big one) if people respected the rights of other users a little more and were more respectful and mindful of their behaviour. If that happened things would be more pleasant for all, unfortunately it seems nowadays that doesn't always seem to be the case. Simply, too many users with what appears to be a sense of entitlement and an 'it's all about me' type attitude with a disregard for others.