acader

I flew AI uptil the mid 90's and got sick of their service. With the entry of AI into *A, I tried AI again, but was very disappointed. The EWR - BOM sector aircraft was old and falling apart. The seats were stained badly. The underseat housing was duck-tapped in place. I can go on with this list. **But** I must confess, their fares are so low sometimes that it is really tempting to put up with all defects. Last Nov before Thanksgiving, I got fares barely touching $3K for RT in biz. The staff onboard have been very nice though.

AJLondon

I flew a 2 hour domestic in J on a 321 today, on a lunch time flight.

- No menus
- PDB offered: either water or some tetra-pack sugar laden juice
- Food choice was Indian veg or Indian non veg. No continental options.
- No thali. Usual tray with a "main course" foil container with 70% rice in the middle, 15% mixed cauliflower peas on one side and 15% butter chicken on the other. Literally two bites of chicken!
- Salad and dessert (rice pudding - kheer) was on the same tray in shrink wrapped plastic containers
- Tea was in the normal hard plastic cups. Definitely no earthern ware.



P.S. The first officer's mother was in 2F and constantly listening to some music on her iphone without headphones. Despite two of us asking the cabin crew to suggest she uses headphones, nothing was done. Although to be fair, they did offer her headphones finally which she disdainfully refused - and after that they were too scared to even go to her.

jalabi99

I've been in India for almost two weeks now and have pretty much flown Air India exclusively, to Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, and Delhi. Economy class each time. For some reason, every time I bought a ticket (which was easy as pie to do on their website), it issued me the exact same seat. You can choose your own seat at booking; if you require as much legroom as I do, I advise you do just that. I made the mistake of just going with the automatically-issued seat and ended up squished between two bemused men as my knees were touching my nose for the whole flight. The second time that happened (BLR-MAA) one of my seatmates gently suggested that I ask the flight attendant if I could switch to a seat in the exit row; she made the change immediately and for the rest of the flight kept coming over to make sure I was comfortable. Quite nice.

Even though I am loath to give yet another airline all my personal information, because I have had such good experiences with them, I am about to sign up for AI's frequent flyer program now

678flyer

I completed a LHR-BOM-GOI / DEL-LHR trip 3 weeks ago. Apart from an unexplained 90 min delay on the BOM-GOI flight, everything went off well. Good food, excellent service.

oliver2002

Did BOM-CCU domestic J on Sunday morning, same show. Asked about it, the purser mentioned the foil minimalist menu is on domestic J, the elaborate service is on the AI 1-199 international/domestic flights. Those have upgraded catering in J and Y.

Keyser

sounds about right....flew ai 43 from maa-del last night....was offered a menu with a number of indian & continental options....no tin trays or plastic cups....everything felt new & the service was nice....

uastarflyer

Anyone do the SIN-MAA and AI346 that can comment? 3-4hrs 788 service seems reasonable. I have done Jet (okay) and SQ (decent) on same route previously.

I am looking at adding that leg to UA SFO-SIN nonstop (which commences 1 June) which leaves ~3hr layover in SIN.

oliver2002

Thali dinner:


Chai terracota service:

oliver2002

3-4 weeks later, same flight, no thali but plated:



Coffee was served is a very odd way: you got your cup, then were offered instant powder for a tiny nescafé jar, then hotwater and milk:



A fruitplate was offered as desert:

oliver2002

Sadly on BOM-CCU, a route of 120min (CCU-DEL was 80-90min) we got this:


Which tasted as tasteless as it looks, so I asked for the Indian alternative:

AJLondon

Your BOM-CCU experiences are close to what I have had recently. Two tasteless pieces of chicken in a foil container!

I am now planning to move most of my domestics btw DEL-BOM/BLR to 9W. Might still keep using AI for DEL-GOI where they have a nonstop with a J cabin.

SeeBuyFly

Well, most coffee in India is instant coffee, even if it is mixed in advance and served from a pot. I have had relatives ask me to bring them some coffee from abroad, and then be bewildered at the sight of the actual coffee I brought them.

So they presumably thought it was a classy touch to give you spoonfuls of Nescafe that you mix in the cup.

PS The food doesn't look bad, overall, for a domestic flight in business class.

oliver2002

Of course the food was good, I'm not complaining at all

The instant coffee thing was OK for me too, the presentation was just weird. We were handed a 50g jar with no spoon or anything and were supposed to shake/pour some instant powder in the cup

After having nescafe for nearly 20 years in India I know how much of a spoon I need in a cup to get the required strength, but the shake/pour method was puzzling. Especially weird since the rest of the cabin looked like they hadn't made their own cup for quite a while

palermo

that food looks awful Oliver2002. I flew Y domestic to VNS last year and it was bad. Return was J in 9W and the food was adequate

A few months later I flew from Del to CMB also in Y as I was connecting from BA to CMB after they ceased the direct flight. The plane was beyond filthy. Never seen anything like that. I passed on the food.

I am going on holidays again this year to india and flying J 9w which I booked as part of my international ticket with EY.

mat_bkk

+1 they are far from being the best but if you pay your fare by your own it worth it !