PEK Transfer
 

Been through PEK once and that was a few years ago. I know the advice I received at the time assisted a lot!
Coming through again in February and was hoping to get some tips to get from A to B painless :)
Will be arriving on AC (coming from YYZ) - have an extended layover then onto Air China going to Singapore.

Any helpful advice on where we are going when we land (do's & don't) Will we be staying in the same terminal? We are flying business so I will assume our only lounge options are Air China? How is the lounge/food/drinks here. Any sleeping/shower options in the lounge?

Thanks in advance. Appreciated.

Both AC and CA (Air China) use T3 at PEK, so no terminal change would be required.

CA lounge is fine. If you need a shower, take the elevator to first floor. Food's fine there, nothing spectacular but you will be fed.

Just make sure you don't get arrested. :D

Tell us more :D

you will be staying in the same terminal. The Air China lounge is pretty underwhelming. Priority Pass gives you access to the Air China First Class Lounge which may be marginally better. There should be a shower. I know there's a pretty good Cathay Pacific Lounge in the terminal but not sure you can go in w/ a CA ticket.

Last time I was there PEK merchants do NOT accept foreign currencies and i doubt this has changed, so make sure you have either yuans or credit card. You can find chain restaurants in the terminal like KFC or Pizzahut, and (probably) mcdonalds.

PEK also has pretty poor environmental controls. It's annoyingly warm in the summer, and pretty cold in the winter.

As this is about a transfer at PEK rather than an Air Canada specific question the thread has been relocated to the FT China destination forum for further discussion.

tcook052
Air Canada forum moderator

That's a more than weird statement.

Especially considering your location (and presumed nationality)

It is the Canadian regime that captures anyone their US puppet masters demands on crazy fishy reasons no sane gouvernment would act upon when flying via a Canadian airport (and actually stay airside at doing such)

Flying through China, especially when staying airside (and unless you're an escaped prisoner or something like that) doesn't bear any risk to any normal traveller.

So I'd suggest to bring either hard facts, if you claim so, or not to keep irritating travellers with your stories.

What's so weird about the statement? China is pissed off at Canada now. I happen to love my Huawei phone, by the way, but there's no doubt that the company violated an international agreement.

He was talking about past events. And again, there are zero reports that EVER anyone was taken hostage while doing an int-int transit in China. Not even Canadians up to this day, despite their regime's terrible behaviour which is making any sane traveller to put that country on the "do not even transit" list, alongside other countries like the US who are on the list for quite a while already. I'd like to stay in freedom when I do an int-int transfer and did nothing wrong (Besides being the CFO of a big company who is on the target list of the crazy US regime, as in this case)

Canada is acting on Lybian Ghaddafi levels like in the case Göldi.

The Canadian "regime" was simply enforcing an established law. If you honestly believe that nobody has been sent to the back room in PEK, I know of a bridge that is on the market.

So, can someone give me a coles notes version of the process when we land on AC. Where do we go through first - Just reading a few more posts and it sounds like the signs and any assistance from staff is dismall.

Go through customs first then security? I will assume then we will be able to just go to the lounge and/or will be in the same area as our gate on Air China? I have only been through here once and that was several years ago and can't recall? I just remember being told to go stand in this line and of course it was the wrong line.........yada, yada, yada.

Just read several reviews of many people transferring through here and either they didn't get their luggage and/or stuff was stolen out of their luggage and they said no luck from this point on for any customer service or actually even being able to contact someone properly about it.

For an international to international transfer, you do not pass customs and immigration if you luggage is checked-through (I assume that it will). You only need to pass security which is on the left of immigration. You can see it in this video:

Great. Thanks very much! I'm not sure why I thought we had to pass through both areas.

I could swear the last time through here we were arriving on Thai from BKK onto United and thought we went through customs and security...........not sure but we definitely went through one or two areas that was not the norm.

So simply get off the plane and stay to the left of the Immigration line which will be a security line/ Does it say anything of the sort for international transfer ?

I recall standing in a line and having our passports stamped......then I believe going down an escalator ( I think ) and going through a little security area then possibly back up again where we were on our level of departure. I remember this because we were running and thought we were late. The terminal looked barren and this guy rolls up on a little cart and says get in but then puts out his hand for $$ - I didn't know any better and gave him too much as I didn't have change......the thing went as fast as a turtle. Could have walked three times as fast! LOL. We made it but we were had :)

...also the above video is more for someone arriving and exiting the terminal rather than an international transfer.

I went onto the PEK website and it is confusing or contradicting in the instructions: Do you just line up in International Transfer > get through that then go through security > then you are good to go to your gate?