CurbedEnthusiasm

Hello! I have a JL flight (USA-Tokyo-Jakarta) coming up in business class. I read on a blog that JL stops all meal service two hours before arrival but couldn't verify that with any other source. Is that true or not?

SKT-DK

‘Read on a blog’ should be enough of a hint for you not to trust it….

work2fly

On the trans-pacific flights, the policy is that you can't place an order within 90 minutes of landing.

AlwaysAisle

It is one hour and 30 min. before the landing.

Following is this May business class menu of JL 5 (JFK-HND). The English version is the second half of the menu, look at the top of the last page. It says:

We are pleased to serve following menus at anytime after the first meal service.
Please ask your cabin attendant by 1 hour and 30 minutes before landing.

One hour and 30 mi. is the last order. FA will continue to serve meals in less than one hour and 30 min. before landing if the order was received 1 hr. and 30 min. before the landing. In business class, FA will go around the cabin asking for the last order for around 1 hr. and 30 min. before the landing. Also in business class, I have seen FAs serving drinks at the very last minutes before landing to passengers Serving drinks in paper or plastic cups, not glass cups, so that a passenger can keep a drink during the landing. FA simply asked a passenger to hold a cup with a hand during the landing.

May business class menu of JL 5 (JFK-HND)

Following is May business class menu for Tokyo-Jakarta flight. This menu does not even say 1 hr. and 30 min. before the landing. Likley HND-CGK flight does not have a scond meal, some light snack items only, so that FA/s can continue to serve those items a lot closer to the landing.

May JL business class menu HND-CGK

CPH-Flyer

Last order for items that needs preparing in the galley at 90 minutes, snacks and drinks depends on when the captain will have told them that cabin service needs to end to be seated for approach and landing. If the load is very light, last order can be closer to landing, and if significant turbulence is expected on approach they may have last order earlier. But nothing in the last two hours is just a blogger trying to get attention by overstatement.

prathetkrungthep

On ORD-NRT in J right now and interestingly enough after the first meal service a flight attendant did come around explaining their policy for dine on demand and said they would stop serving meals two hours before landing… all the menus on this flight still says 1h30 so I’m not sure if it’s just the crew trying to make sure they have enough time to prepare the meals given a relatively full load on this flight…

CurbedEnthusiasm

Interesting, so the blogger I cited wasn't dreaming this up. Seems odd for the staff to differ from the written guidance; aren't the Japanese legendary for being policy sticklers?

prathetkrungthep

I know right? Was def surprised to hear that too and played it back in my head to make sure it’s not a loss in translation. Surely 1h30 in Japanese isn’t the same as 2h by any chance?

FWIW boarding at ORD was also a cluster*; no groups whatsoever after pre-boarding just a free for all, though I think the blame there lies more with the AA ground staff than the Japanese.

CPH-Flyer

It could also be that they are expecting weather to cause them to close down earlier than normal. But see what they actually do at the end of the flight, and how weather is behaving on approach.....

prathetkrungthep

Cabin lights on shortly before A-3h and FA just came around asking for last food orders… glad I stayed awake to work then and didn’t sleep!

Looks like it’s because of turbulence, feeling it now the moment the meal arrived. It is absolutely understandable why they would want to close up the galley early, but I wish it was clearly communicated as such and not just randomly said as A-2h and then actually doing A-3h in practice.

JALPak

You do understand weather patterns changed overtime right? The can only plan and communicate based on the available forecast at the time of departure. Just tell CA to wake you up for pre-arrival meal if that’s such a big deal for you. They usually asked if you want to be waken up for last order anyway.

prathetkrungthep

Not my first time crossing the Pacific, so yes I do know that the skies are not always as friendly as we would like them to be. FWIW FA did ask if I wanted to be woken up when she informed me of the A-2h. I merely wished to add a real-time DP to OP’s question about whether meal service ends A-2h as this blogger suggests or if JAL consistently sticks to the letter of the A-1h30 policy.

dvs7310

Earlier this month comign back from Bangkok they turned on the cabin lights and essentially woke everyone up right after 2 hours before landing. It was awful because it's the midnight flight that leaves Bangkok around 12:40am, so they are waking people up trying to serve breakfast at 4:30am Bangkok time, absolutely ridiculous. Of course if you manage to sleep through the bright lights and noise, they won't physically wake you, but thise is a great example of a fairly short flight that should be dine on request only and use your reading light if you want to do so, not the full cabin lights. I don't think the full cabin feels an urgent need to eat at 4:30am nor wants to be woken up until it's actually time to put seats back up for landing.

CPH-Flyer

They do the same on the Ho Chi Minh City flights, a bit of a mix if I ask to be woken up for food, or just put on a mask and earplugs and sleep until I have to raise the seat. Depends on my mood of the night.

Plenty of people sleep until last possible moment.

Unimatrix One

On basically all the JAL J flights that I can remember, it has been like this. Menu says last order is 1.5 hrs before arrival, FAs say 2 hrs before arrival. It has been like this for years.

Actually, as I think about it, this is fairly common at a lot of Japanese businesses. At restaurants I often see staff going around the tables announcing "last order" well before the published time. At hotel pools, they start conspicuously closing things up, putting parasols away, etc. well before closing time. And at the Imperial Palace gardens, the security staff run around telling everyone it's time to leave 30+ minutes before closing time. In general there is a lot of pressure on customers, either direct or indirect pressure, to stop early so the staff can end work on time. It's one thing about Japan that annoys me.

And getting back to JL, what has really annoyed me is the tendency on many flights for FAs to make landing announcements (put your seat backs up, lower the divider in J, etc) much earlier than other airlines. I've been more than an hour away from landing and had them make us put our seat backs up and lower the dividers (which destroys the privacy). I complained to the FAs once, and they gave some lame excuse. I don't remember what it was, but I remember thinking that it made no sense.