ijgordon

A Mint ticket will not provide priority security screening in T4. Precheck should be nearly as fast as Clear, if you have that.

zip10001

Hi,

I recall reading about 3h before flight - policy for Amex lounges.
How strictly is the rule enforced at JFK CL?
flight is at 5pm but I have a 2pm zoom call and would love to join from the lounge. So I would need to enter a few minutes before 2pm.
Any advice?

cmd320

I mean, if you're within five minutes or so of the correct time they should let you. I can't imagine them making you stand in the lobby for five minutes until your exact time begins unless it's overcapacity or something.

dsquared37

I have been asked to stand aside for 7 min until my entry window was open in SFO a year or two ago. And this was with staff who knew me.

happyvoid

I notice T5 for Jetblue is not busy at all. is T4 usually busier than T5?

cmd320

The last few times I’ve flown through T4 (including pre and post Corona) I’ve been the precheck in a matter of less than 5 minutes. It would have been faster if not for the stupid automated bins they use at T4.

imnotalawyer

Not sure if it was on reddit or on here but I know I have read anecdotes of exactly that sort of thing occurring, where they will strictly enforce the policy down to the minute regardless of current capacity.

cmd320

I guess it depends on the location then. I've had CLT and MIA admit me even if it were a few minutes difference, always less than ten.

jamesteroh

Went for the first time yesterday. A lot nicer than the Skyclub sans no Skydeck. Speakeasy was really nice and good food selection. Plenty of seating.

Access to this club alone is a very nice benefit for Delta Reserve members who use JFK a lot.

dsquared37

Here right now. Not crowded but not empty like my October visit. Speakeasy now has a handle on the door.... not so incognito.

Bartenders are great, sociable and make solid drinks. Too bad one of the staff was handed garbage by a departing guest and sliced her finger on the broken glass within while disposing of it. Guest never mentioned there was glass contained within.

cmd320

Here now. It’s still pretty quiet but busier than late last year for sure. Bartender says it usually starts to get a little busier around 1-2pm for the afternoon. Not a lot of departures from JFK around midday.

dj1970

Confirned that we could indeed access Centurion Lounge in Terminal 4 even though we will depart from a different Terminal.

In our case, we just used our Global Entry cards and inserted them to the ID reader at the security check gate..very simple process. boarding pass not used.

Very happy that we could do this as we have encountered some airports that did not allow cross terminal access.

Due to social distancing requirement (alternate seating tables blocked), there were not many spare seats at the time we got there.

There were good choices of food and alcoholic drinks.

RedSun

Here is my trip to Centurion lounge at JFK last week. We fly JetBlue at terminal 5. Agents at pre-TSA did not check terminal info.

I signed into the lounge via AmEx app on hotel shuttle. It has a 30-min limit. The lounge was not crowded at just past 8AM.









Plenty empty seats.

Food was very good. I think better than the food at PHL.






The French toast may be over-cooked.

Limited alcoholic drinks were available in the morning.

Be prepared to allow extra time to get to other terminals. JFK is huge. The skytalk is very long from T-4 to T-5. AirTrain is recommended, not walking outside.

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Stopped by the Centurion on Monday afternoon and it was the busiest I've seen it so far — but still plenty of seating nonetheless.

The food is the same very odd menu I posted earlier and this time I did actually try some and wasn't impressed:


Clockwise from top left: spring vegetables, chickpea stew (with pumpkin, tomato, potato), grilled chicken with potato puree (i.e. mashed potatoes) and mushroom

Vegetables were overcooked and hard while the chickpea stew was barely above room temperature and not that tasty. The grilled chicken was fine but salty and it's really hard to mess up potatoes. Overall this is the weakest menu of the 3 the lounge has had since it opened and although we were hoping this was a stopgap looks like it might stick around for a while. (And yes would take the PHL food over this — although I've only been to PHL pre-covid, and it was pretty blah then)

Also was flying out on JetBlue — no issues getting through TSA in T4 (although the contract staff guarding the PreCheck lane doesn't really know where to look for the PreCheck symbol on the mobile BP and tried sending me to regular security, so just had to point it out to them), and decided to walk to T5 vs taking the Airtrain — I timed myself and it only took ~10 minutes from exiting the lounge to getting to T5, plus some good plane spotting along the T4 A gates as well — which I think will be my preferred route vs trying to wait for the train in future

truncated

Back in the Centurion (although it’s my first time here at breakfast) and they’ve switched the menus again:






From left: Braised greens, chorizo hash, tomato galette
All very mediocre and I’m a little annoyed I never got to try the previous breakfast menu


Edit: Got more food, pancakes and parfait are decent but I do like sweet things

Also flipped the sign around and there’s a new lunch/dinner menu too, which looks better than the previous rotation:


Flight’s at 10.30 though so won’t get to try this iteration, but the gnocchi two menus ago was good so I’m hopeful this is too.

Some other observations — JFK is the busiest I’ve seen it (7.20am on a Saturday, and my DL flight arrived in T2(!) which has apparently reopened) but the lower level of the lounge is closed, ostensibly for cleaning. There’s still enough seating upstairs for now but it’s getting crowded. Also my next flight departs 10.30 and I showed up at 7.23, but the lounge agent didn’t ask for my incoming boarding pass / check if I was connecting and just let me in, so I guess I got lucky lol