New to ANA: Leaving noe\w [dissatisfied customer]
 

I fly regularly SFO/NRT/BKK. I have been using United for years. Now that they've stopped their NRT/BKK service I've had to look around for another airline. I've used ANA twice. I have a couple of million miles so I've had my share of bad experiences. But ANA is a joke. I don't understand why anyone would fly them, and I'm certainly not going to continue.

My last flight a couple of days ago we checked in BKK for BKK/NRT/SFO. AND couldn't process my wife's ticket because she has a green card and they don't have the ability to process a green card (in BKK). So they gave me both boarding passes in BKK but my wife only to NRT. They told her she'd have to check in again in NRT.

And even though I had upgraded our Business Class tickets to First, ANA doesn't have First Class on those flights.

The plane was nearly an hour late to NRT. We were stopped at the transfer check because we're supposed to show boarding passes. We had to get permission to proceed. By the time of the late arrival, the missing boarding pass and ANA using gates that are almost in another city, we were 20 minutes late to the United gate for NRT/SFO. No chance, of course, to use the lounge. Then we had to check in and get my wife's boarding pass. Fortunately, United held the plane and we made the flight.

Then we get to SFO and even though we're in Business Class (upgraded to First) and I'm 1K our bags are nearly the last ones out. Reason, ANA arrived late so our bags didn't get included in the VIP load. That cost us another hour.

So between not being able to process a green card during check in, not giving connecting boarding passes, not having First Class, departing late, arriving even later, not allowing time for baggage to connect properly they demonstrated that they simply aren't qualified to get international business traffic.

I wouldn't take this one experience to turn you away from ANA. I'm also a 1K on UA. I fly mostly US-NRT-TPE. I only fly UA when I cannot get on a NH flight.

Baggage handling on NH is consistent. Only during rare tight connection will my bags come out late. On UA, its a toss up when my bags will come out, there seems to be no correlation of status, class of service, connection time, and check in time.

For intra Asia flights, few carriers actually have a first class. Flights in the US may have a "first" class but it's basically the same as intra Asia business class.

I can't speak of green card and connecting flight ticket issues since it never happened to me.

Versus UA, I always prefer to fly NH.

Gates that are almost in another city?

Exaggeration of the week for me.

I am sorry to hear of your less than ideal experience but this sounds like a post about misery looking for company.
I fly NH a lot out of BKK (even before the UA pullout) and they are like every other airline: lousy Y, sometimes late etc

Your issue has more to do with UA rather than NH - they pulled out and left a less than ideal arrangement in place.

I suspect the green card issue has to do with NH-to-UA connection -in the past, I have had colleagues on green cards who used to fly on the redeye NH (now gone sadly) departing BKK-to morning NH NRT-US connections with zero issues.

It's a shame you were dissatisfied with your experience on NH, but I'm surprised you say such in comparison to UA. Allow me to offer a few comments...

I'm a little surprised that they told you that (perhaps there was an issue when the details were inputted), but the transfer process at NRT is straightforward so they should have been able to take care of you.

That's correct, NH does not offer F service intra-Asia. However, if you used a GPU or other UA upgrade instrument, you would not have been able to upgrade to F on non-UA metal.

I assume you were on NH806. FlightAware shows no major delays for the past several days -- in fact, it shows early arrivals on several of those days. UA852 to SFO shows a 2 hour delay on July 11, but other than that it appears to be the usual 40-50 minute delays to allow for connections to be made.

Incidentally, the 40 gates in Satellite 4 (where the BKK flights usually arrive) and the 30 gates in Satellite 3 (from which UA flights usually depart) are not that far apart, and connected by moving walkways. I'm sure it seemed much further given your state at the time.

That is a problem with UA and baggage handling at SFO. Despite being a DIA and sometimes traveling in NH F, my checked bags have often still not come out within the first 30-40 minutes. If the flight was as late as you say, if I was you I would be grateful that the bags made the connection at all.

I'm sorry you feel that way, but I think you have set your expectations too high. These sorts of things--especially delays and baggage handling issues--will happen with any carrier. I would absolutely encourage you to try flying them a few more times to see if your mind is changed.

You sure you fly regularly SFO/NRT/BKK at all ? As it doesn't seem like you do.

Been transiting in NRT for years (20+), it doesn't necessary need a boarding pass to get thru transit security, as there are thousands of people connecting in NRT from one airline to another on a daily basis, just an itinerary is sufficient enough, they fully understand the situation, especially vice versa when most if not all the time UA is not able to print out NH boarding pass out of the US, done that hundreds of times.

Like the other poster mentioned, GPU doesn't worked on non-UA metal flights, so even if NH use a 3 class plane, you still wouldn't be upgraded to F, only on the legs where you are flying on UA metal.

*A upgrades are a different story, but I don't believe that apply to you, as you were NH C connecting to UA F, not connecting to NH F.

How long have you been a 1K with UA ? You know better 1K or UA F don't get a special priority tag ! UA F is like all C, 1K, Platinum, Gold, Silver, *G, all using the same premier access priority tag ! UA and sUA is NOT like LH has a HOH tag, NH/SQ/OZ all have a different F tag !

If you are like you said been flying SFO/NRT/BKK regularly and using UA for years, you should know priority tag bags really come out randomly in all US airports ! Not to mention the amount of priority tag bags on a plane with nothing to differentiate class of service !

Late arrival from a previous flight totally unrelated for your bags that came out late, do a search on UA forum, there are plenty of threads about the priority tags are quite useless at any US airports, especially from an international flight !

You should fly TG F BKK>NRT and then NH F to SFO. NH has no F to/from BKK and even their J on that route is awful. Should have done your homework.

You and all your luggage arrived at your destination seemingly on time...oh the horror!!!

Not hard to guess OP is flying on a UA paid C ticket upgrade to F with a GPU.

But I agree OP should have done his homework, I think I am just surprised since OP claimed he is a seasoned traveler thru NRT and being UA 1K, he doesn't know much by connecting in NRT and how the priority tag works, more like coming from a brand new traveler.

So, to summarise (and please do correct me if I have missed anything):
1. There was an issue with through check-in, and your wife had to visit the transit desk at NRT.
2. NH never scheduled to operate a 3-class aircraft on BKK route, and did not in fact on the day.
3. The flight was delayed by an hour.
4. You did not have time to use the lounge.
5. UA did not let out your bag first at the carousel.

And, in response to the above, ANA is subjected to hyperbolic diatribe such as "ANA is a joke. I don't understand why anyone would fly them, and I'm certainly not going to continue" and "They demonstrated that they simply aren't qualified to get international business traffic".

It sounds like either UA has spoiled you completely with their immaculate operations (as if), or you just don't have much experience of international travel with its range of common incidents and issues. Either way, please, do as you say and keep away from ANA - it is clearly all wasted on you.

I'll respond in equal detail.

I was surprised, too. Never happened before. I have flown UA BKK/SFO at least 20 times and a similar amount SQ. Never had a problem before.

I would have been able to use *G miles to upgrade on ANA.

Yes, I was on 806. Definitely late.

Fair enough.

Not according to both UA and SFO. They take the container with the priority bags first. My bags got loaded into a regular container.

I've got well over 2 million air miles so I know that these things happen. But this is my second ANA flight and both were bad. And I never had these kinds of problems on UA. I'm considering TG. If that doesn't work out I might leave Star and try Cathay.

I'd be willing to bet I have more international miles than you do. I have had a minimum of 80-100k per year and up to 300k in a single year. Well over 2 million miles international. These things happen, but they've happened on every ANA flight I've been on (OK, only 2). The fact that the primary problem seems to me (per both ANA and UA) that ANA can't process US green cards during BKK check-in, and that led to the delays both at NRT and SFO, tells me they aren't a competent international carrier.

Do you know of another international carrier flying out of BKK to the US, connecting either to their own flight or another alliance carrier, that cannot process a green card during check in?

I think the operating assumption ought to be there is a problem with UA. I don't check bags, but my spouse does and there are frequently problems with UA... never with NH.


Both good choices. Might want to look at EVA as well. I usually do TYO<>BKK on TG....mostly in F, but the 380 has nice flat bed seats in J as well.

Yup. A printed itinerary is sufficient. And the staff at NRT transit security are incredibly polite and helpful, they bend over backwards to get you through quickly. I can't imagine what it would take to make them give a passenger a hard time.

Yeah this has nothing to do with NH. It's SFO baggage handling. The priority tags are often ignored, especially for international arrivals. The NRT arrivals are particularly problematic because there are so many morning international arrivals at SFO.

+1

Just arrived on my 3rd ANA flight this year. 1 more paid already and that will be the last. I've been in BKK for 4 days and my back is just starting to recover from the ANA business class seats.

The issues with ANA are not unique to ANA. But my complaints are probably due to the dramatic difference between Business Class on UA and ANA on the NRT/BKK/NRT leg. I haven't been in a Business Class with that poor quality of seat in 10 years on any other airline. The worst on other airlines is the lay flat at an angle seat. These things not only don't lay flat but the "Z" shape when fully reclined is simply painful. I got the FA to give me a couple more pillows to fill the seat out a bit but that only hepled a little.

Next flight SFO-BKK will be UA and TG. See if they are any better.

Agree completely with that statement.

I had over 100 international arrivals at Don Muang before they opened Suvarnabhumi and have around 100 in the new airport. I fly SFO/NRT/BKK round trip at least 3 times a year, often 4. I'm on my 3rd trip this year right now.

Several people mentioned that US airports don't necessarily honor the priority luggage tags. In fact, none of them do. But they do unload the baggage bins according to how they are loaded in the plane. So if the departure airport loads the bins properly, the priority luggage comes out first.

What UA told me is that they have an enormous problem with bags getting loaded randomly into the flight bins rather than following the priority. Again, the old flight was UA and all the same flight number so I never had a problem.

And to the poster who mocked UA service (I didn't quote your post because we are not supposed to get person here), yes, compared to ANA, UA service on the NRT/BKK route was immaculate.