Freightman

I am currently in Muscat and due to fly home on Monday amd thought I would give a few impressions on the new terminal in Muscat.

I am not due to fly out until Monday and I can post about the new Primeclass lounge then (although I gather they have managed to put a duty free shop inside the lounge....)

However, in terms of arrivals, the good news is that there are now jetbridges. The bad news is that (for now at least) on both mine and my parents flight, they seem to struggle with the jetbridge. It took around 15 minutes on both flights for the bridge to be attached.

In terms of arrivals, there is no more visa on arrival. E-Visas are necessary despite the 'visa collection' desks. On my flight (BA079 on time) we seemed to arrive before the rush and immigration was easy and quick (around 1 minute). On my parents flight (BA079 about an hour late) immigration took about 30 minutes due to queues.

Word of caution. BA flights seem to dump passengers at one end of immigration. The first desks you come to are marked 'Visa'. These are NOT the desks most people will want. The next set are 'GCC residents' then 'Tourist Visa' which are the ones most will want.

After immigration is hand baggage screening then baggage reclaim. Bags took (again on both my and my parents flight) around 20 minutes to come through but FIRST bags came out first then a good few minutes before just club bags came out. I did not see the final set but presumably non-priority bags came out last.

Will post some thoughts about the new lounge on Monday.

Phil the Flyer

Freightman - thank you. That’s useful information.

jday

Is this the travellers club, or are there multiple lounges in the new airport?

Freightman

My understanding is there are 2 lounges airside, the Oman Air lounge and the Primeclass lounge but I'll check tomorrow.

I forgot to add that the fial set of immigration desks is marked first/business class. BA do not give out the fast track passes and they weren't letting people in with just a boarding pass.

flatlander

BA6948

subject2load

Freightman

I thought it might work on just a boarding pass but they were actively turning people away if they didn't have a small plastic card as well.

It may I guess be something that changes as they settle in or BA will get the fast track cards.

flyuk

Visa on Arrival is still possible. I was offered one last week. The desk on the left hand side will happily sell you a VoA for around 50 USD.

There was only one working lounge airside (Flight class or £35 to enter, card payments only), and one landside (was completely empty when I was there last week, paid entry).

Generally speaking the terminal is just not ready, there are failings everywhere, including security ones. When looking for a toilet while airside, I walked through a few doors unchallenged and found myself landside, on the wrong side of security.

I was travelling QR first class and used fast track with no issues with just my boarding pass.

I am sure these inconsistencies are because it's all a bit shambolic still. Some signposting is badly wrong (the one for an ATM took me to the highway), the wi-fi is unreliable, plug sockets intermittent, seating arranged poorly and as soon as there is no natural light it gets incredible dark in some areas. The finishing is astonishingly bad, there is dust and building debris everywhere. There is no left luggage yet and the information desk knows little to nothing about anything.

Still miles better than the old one.

Oh, and they lost my luggage in transit, so if you see a black roller with loads of stickers on it... grab it for me please.

mickeyjaw

Hi, can I please chip in two questions - maybe you can find out the answer to one or both on your way home or maybe somebody else already knows:

1) Can you get access to the Primeclass lounge based on BAEC status or using Priority Pass?

2) Is it possible to connect between BA and QR (separate tickets, same day) airside without a visa?

flyuk

No. Payment or flight class.
Yes. If your luggage is checked in, you need a gap of at least two hours between flights so they can manually re label it (or in my case, fail to do so).

Freightman

So just back from Muscat and the new departures area. Interesting set up and as Flyuk said there is still a lot of work to be done before the airport is finished.

On a good note, there is a seperate Business and First check in area. Zone A for Oman Air and zone B for everybody else. It isn't branded BA but they do have the BA F and J tags. From check-in there is a dedicated fast track channel. First to a boarding pass check (hint - there are no signs there today but the left hand gate is international and the right domestic. There was 1 staff member helping people but they were a bit lost when more than one set of passengers arrived). For international departures, next stop emigration then a security check - standard fare electronics, liquids, belts etc.

Once airside the Primeclass lounge is upstairs with the stairs/lifts/escalators straight in front of you. Again as Flyuk mentioned, Oman Air lounge is not open so everyone is using the Primeclass lounge. Not sure how long before Oman Air will be open, but the BA flight goes at a reasonably quiet time and there weren't many seats left in the end. Also upstairs is the transit hotel (couldn't see if it was open).

The lounge itself is OK. In the reception area are lockers for you to self store bags. Showers are available just behind reception. Food at the time of the UK flight was breakfast which was the standard fruit, toast, pastries etc. Also in the food area is a bar but this was closed at that time of the morning. There are floor to ceiling windows in the seating area with unfortunately a view of the roof only. Plenty of staff milling around clearing tables.

Finally, getting to the gate was easy enough. BA flight left from a B gate. It isn't a good idea to leave this until the very last minute to get down there are there is another much more thorough security check after they scan your boarding pass and you go downstairs. This one was a shoes off, liquids (any duty free liquids must be sealed in the tamper bags otherwise it's not travelelling with you), all electronic devices right down to mobile phones must be removed, belts etc. Larger devices may need to be powered up (they asked me to turn on my laptop and I saw someone with an ipad have to turn it on as well)

Boarding was a little disorganised. Signs were for groups but calls were for business/first then ecomony. No further boarding pass scan though so no elegibilty checking either.

WorldLux

Sounds like someone ordered to open the terminal that hadn't been quite finished. I've visited a couple of brand new terminals (including some that hadn't been officially opened for operations) and I've never seen something like what is described above.

Freightman

Exactly that. I think the date had slipped anyway (it was supposed to open last year) and someone finally took the decision to open.

At the moment it sort of works, but you can't look too closely at the details.

Dan72

Really? The last new terminal to open that I can recall was DOH, where the QR lounges were not open for quite some time (nor the transit train). I think, contrary to what you say, it is actually quite common for such large builds to open only partially complete.