oot

Flew DY LGW-EZE return in April, and found it an excellent flight. Really surprised by how good it was, particularly given my expectations. Paid £750 return per person, vs £1,200pp rtn on BA
Brand new 787, decent legspace, good recline, and free (!) inflight movie selection. Seamless check-in, left on time, smooth flight, easy arrival. in terms of flight comfort, easily on a par with my SQ flights. Also super friendly and smiley staff that seemed genuinely cheerful to be flying

Caveats:
- They charge a lot for food onboard. Not a problem as we were expecting this so stocked up at M&S with some prosciutto, pitta breads, salads, fruit and snack bars. For all of about £15 we had more than enough food for two people on a 13 hour flight.
- No water offered. Bought several bottles at WHSmith and had no problems. I did ask for water at one stage and got a funny story about only giving you one little cup at a time, and they won't refill bottles (but won't stop you pouring your cup into your bottle and then giving you another cup)
- No blankets. Again, not a problem as we expected this and had down jackets (going to Patagonia) to wrap up in
- Check-in luggage and seat choice charges. We found a deal on Lastminute.com that included luggage and seat selection at a much discounted rate to the website, so that worked well for us. Otherwise it would have added some £100 to our fare

all in all, massively pleased with Norwegian and would happily fly them long haul again

phil94028

Here is a summary of 5 trips on Norwegian USA West Coast trips in case it helps anyone deciding. The bottom line on them is that when it works it is ok but even the smallest problem and things go downhill fast and there are no staff to fix anything.

My first two flights with them were great. OAK-LGW and OSL-OAK.

Next flight, OAK-LGW took an almost 4hr delay for an engine problem. NAS do not have mechanics at OAK so finding the contract guy to look at it takes a while.

Subsequent flight was again OAK-LGW. They texted a day before to say no headsets, bring your own. Odd but not a big deal. Morning of the flight they texted to say they had downgraded me to economy with no seat assigned. Offered a 75% base fare refund (EU261 rule), a different day or a full refund. I called them, an hour on hold to get to an agent who did not know much, probably a contractor. I requested LAX-LGW that same evening which did have Premium seats and is easy to get to on my own from OAK. Agent refused so I requested a full refund and took United instead. Clueless behavior by NAS as all they did was give money away and annoy a customer. This is a theme with them. Actual NAS employees with authority to do anything in any kind of IROPS do not exist. Best to have your own plan B! United would have fixed this with a one minute phone call. Downgrades happen but you have to handle the customer carefully.

Next flight was LGW-OAK. This was on the newer 787-9 which now has 56 "densified" Premium seats that run all the way back to door 2. Clearly NAS wants the better yield on these. These are still a good deal but with the reduced seat pitch it is really hard to get out of a window or center seat if the row in front is reclined. This has generated a problem for NAS as they now have three versions of the 787 with wildly different numbers of Premium seats. Lots of downgrade potential. There is a good reason Southwest have the unified fleet. This flight got out OK. Usual stupid hand carry weighing even for Premium. They do not priority tag Premium bags. Lounge is very nice and the cabin crew on the flight were great. On arrival at OAK it took 1 hr 40 minutes to get the bags off! A huge fail for anyone wanting to attract business travelers. No NAS staff to talk to, invisible contractors again.

Bottom line is some caution is needed flying NAS in Premium if you are expecting things to work consistently. Even the densified Premium is ok for the price but less so than it was in the old config. I would still probably fly them but very cautiously after 3 bad flights in a row. Hopefully their ambitious expansion has leveled out and they will take some time to organize a more grown up operation. If they do not, I do not think they will survive against the big carriers especially with the expanded Premium expectation. Obviously IAG/BA waiting to pounce on any weakness and absorb them.

It looks like they will now allow 10Kg plus 5 Kg, two bag carry on. An improvement but another huge friction point vs someone like United who will let you do what you want. The rules make sense in the back but in Premium you get free bags anyway. I suspect the reason here is that all the checking staff are contractors so educating them for different rules for Premium would be too hard.

Nancy Colson

You make a good point. I was so concerned about getting stuck on a wet lease aircraft, I didn't even think about the possibility of a downgrade on a Norwegian aircraft. I can see now how easily it can happen now. I had such high hopes for them. I was hoping to use Premium from JFK-LGW. I love the late morning flight. They are too much of a mess now to be willing to take the risk.

klanfa

Flew them in economy the other day, and the flight itself was just fine. Delay on departure due to the interviews for USA-bound flights, though only a short delay on arrival thanks to friendly winds.
Decent legroom, and solid IFE.
I would advise against booking a meal - it was pretty bad even for TATL economy standards, not worth the extra money. I didn't mind too much since i had it included through the OTA anyways, but I would have been disappointed if I paid $30 for that.

phil94028

I was incorrect on their carry on policy. Even more crazy than I thought. If you buy flex premium or flex economy you get the 10+5. Even discount premium you just get 10Kg. A very silly way to run an airline. Just no idea how they expect to get business travelers in premium with this kind of carry on limit, if they cannot get hold bags off the plane reliably.

At the LGW base they have both configs of 787-9 with very different capacity in premium (and a lot less legroom in the densified config) so major downgrades will happen if they swap aircraft. The wet lease AC do seem to go on that short JFK-LGW run, to control costs. Flightaware will show you what happened in the past.

I would say they are still worth the effort but in my case I would make sure that I had FF miles to buy a last minute ,mileage ticket to/from the west coast on United. From the East Coast to LGW it is a pretty short flight, so I would survive the downgrade. This is not an airline run like United or Southwest! Not directly engaged with the customers and the airline just seems to hide when there are any kind of IROPS etc. This is a bad model.

Like you, I had high hopes for them but they are just trying to do too much at once.

Hope they make it. Watching their results meeting with the analysts, I think it is going to be a very ugly winter for them ahead, especially with the fuel cost bump. They are not planning a safe business strategy. As with Laker and Virgin Atlantic you have to be very sure of what you are doing for TATL if you want to survive. The latter went to Delta and I think this fleet will be IAG soon.

Mary Louise

ANC RED-EYE

I'm thinking about flying Norwegian for the first time FLL - BCN in Oct. I had a few questions:

-if I choose LowFare and do not pay for a seat, will I be able to check in online or in app and choose a seat at checkin?
-if I can't choose in app/online, can I choose on a kiosk at FLL? (And what time would the Kiosk be available - I most likely will arrive in FLL about 12 hours before the flight).
-if I cannot choose via app/online/kiosk is it customary for the agents to oblige specific seat requests? Or is it along the lines of some of the US basic economy products where they assign your seat and you have to pay to change it even if other seats are open?

Note that I most likely will be on a one way itinerary. Though I likely will also return on Norwegian, I can't get this to price out all on a single itinerary.

While I know seating can be a crapshoot, I am just debating if it is worth paying extra to get an assigned seat in advance; if it is highly likely that I will get either an aisle or a window by not paying for advanced seat assignment, then I may just take the chance, and I think understanding the above will help me to at least have an idea how much control I may (or may not) have in the matter.

Thanks for any insight!

asdca

While I don't know about that specific route, my experience (JFK-LGW-JFK and EWR-ORY), you can't check-in online at all, whether or not you have an advance seat assignment. Both times I flew without a paid assignment, I was there for check-in right at the three hour in advance mark and got my preference for seating from an agent. At JFK, the kiosks weren't available for anyone. Not sure why.

deegeeair17

I've been flying CPF-FLL & LGW-FLL for 3 years now. Great service for the most part. I just don't like the arrival setup in FLL. Upon arrival you're shuttled from terminal 3 to 4 by bus as terminal 4 has still not been completed. FLL a mess.

aster

Has anyone flown on the LGW - SIN route? How would you compare it to other carriers on the same route in terms of comfort, etc.?

lokijuh

I recently posted a review on Australian Frequent Flyer for the SIN-LGW flight in premium. I can't comment LGW-SIN, as it is different timing, but I thought the SIN-LGW day flight (9am departure, 4pm arrival) was good - in fact as I didn't want or need to sleep it was a great flight. Can't comment on the life up the back in the 787 economy cabin, but if you get the meals inclusive package I'd say it would still be below SQ in terms of service and comfort (compared to 9 across 777 or A380) , it's probably not too different to any long haul 787 with 3-3-3, I can't see why QF's PER-LHR service, as an example, would be that much better. Main negative was limited selection on IFE.

lordlucan

From Jan LGW SIN is cancelled.

Ivana Krstulovic

Hey guyz. Do you know where i can search for coupon codes for this fly carrier?
It asks me some "campaign code" ... Or if there is a link of all fly carries coupons and codes. I didn't see any

4sallypat

So our family booked a last minute budget spring trip to Europe in 2 weeks.
4 Low Fare tickets LAX-MAD and CDG-LAX flying a 787 Dreamliner.
Strange that the air tickets are so low so close to departure and the seats that have been "taken" are very low - makes me worry that they might cancel the flight ?
Never used Norwegian to Europe - we usually fly BA or Delta.

So my questions using a LCC for long haul:
1. If we bought 4 tickets on one receipt, will the agent at the counter assign us seats together ? Can we ask for together seats assuming they are available ?
2. The NAS website shows personal and carry on can not exceed 10kg. The email I received says Max 10 kg, Max 55 x 40 x 23 cm - do they actually measure it or weight it or both ?
3. Is the food worth it to pay ? I think $45 is a bit excessive for economy meal.... We were planning on filling up at the airport lounge (KAL) before the flight. Really wished the Centurion lounge was ready then.....

nologic

Seems that Norwegian has discontinued pre-departure lounge access for non-Premium Flex pax (such as discount Premium and Premium Upgrade passengers) and in-flight cocktails/hard liquor drinks are no longer complimentary in Premium class, just beer and wine/sparkling wine.

https://www.norwegian.com/us/travel-info/on-board/premium-cabin/