Bogwoppit

You can look on https://flightaware.com to see the planes that flew your route recently. That will give you a clue as to how often it happens.

Nancy Colson

Twice since 12/31 on DY 7015 doesn't seem like great odds. I realize the dreadful weather on the east coast was a factor this week and appreciate that Norwegian made the effort to get people where they needed to be even if it meant leasing a plane. Does anyone know if the leased aircraft have a Premium cabin? How do they handle it?

McCann0528

I'm not sure if you already made this flight but this happened to us back in November on a flight from Paris to JFK, in which we paid about 3 times the economy fare for the premium cabin.

There were enough "premium" seats in the HiFly cabin to accommodate all of the guests that had booked premium on the Dreamliner, but the HiFly equipment was pretty terrible. The space in premium was advertised on Norwegian's site as 55" and it was actually about 35". No leg rests, just a tiny foot rest under the seat in front (like you would get in BA economy), and the seats only slouch down, they don't recline. It was impossible to sleep. The plane was old, my seat back pocket was tattered so nothing would stay in it the entire flight. I had some reservations about crossing the Atlantic in this particular plane (but I'm a bit of nervous flier to start so that doesn't help). The IFE is a joke, it had about 8 total movies on it - all old. Then there was some additional programming in Portuguese (subtitled in English). I ended up watching Titanic because I knew it would pass a lot of time! We did discover about halfway through the flight that there was a USB port buried under the armrest so make sure you look for that. Despite the website advertisement, there are no power ports in this premium cabin so make sure you bring USB onboard if you do get swapped out to HiFly.

I completely understand that with some carriers, 35" IS what you get in premium economy. For instance, we had a premium flight with Thomas Cook where this was the case, but in that case, we paid a lot less additional $$ over the economy price for the slightly more spacious seats. If Norwegian is going to advertise 55" and leg rests on the all new Dreamliner (AKA - SLEEP OVER THE OCEAN!) they should be prepared to do something for the premium passengers who paid the much higher fare and didn't get what they paid for.

The worst part of the whole thing is that we asked Norwegian for some kind of compensation for a downgrade and they refused, stating that their only obligation is to carry passengers from point A to point B. It took over 2 weeks and multiple requests to get even this reply from them. Despite the fact that we paid 3 times the economy price to get what amounted to about 4 additional inches (20" less than what we paid for in their 55" advertisement) they stated this wasn't a downgrade and they weren't going to give us anything. It was really difficult to get any response from them at all. Being based in NY, we fly domestically with JetBlue quite a bit and their customer service in handling irregular ops/issues is phenomenal. We anxiously await their decision on whether or not they will start service to the UK and Europe soon!

In short, be warned that if you pay for premium on Norwegian, there's a decent chance you WON'T get what you paid for.

Bogwoppit

Seat pitch on Norwegian dreamliner is 46", not 55". But regardless, it would bite to be switched from the dreamliner to a crappy HIFLY plane. I would not be happy either.

Palal

Not sure what you're implying, but the age of the plane has nothing to do with safety.

McCann0528

Actually, at the time, the Norwegian website had 55" listed as seat pitch for the Premium Cabin. I have a screenshot of this, which I sent to them, but again it didn't matter as they stated their only obligation is to transport customers from Point A to Point B and denied any request for compensation. They have since modified the website to reflect the correct pitch at 46" (though the HiFly planes have about 35" for Premium).

McCann0528

That's a fair point, but I guess for me seeing that the inside of the plane wasn't maintained well or updated made me question the overall condition of the plane.

Fud

Norwegian used HiFly to bring us back from New York to Gatwick on 25 March, Premium class. Compared to the Dreamliner flight out, the HiFly plane was a disgrace to Norwegian. There were no headphones so no entertainment and the toilets on the left side were out of order. While queuing for the only two working toilets, I was told that they had been out of order a week previously. Disgusting, embarrassing and inexcusable. Norwegian should be ashamed of themselves.

nightkhan

Just saw this about their use of HiFly planes:

Norwegian Airlines leaves passengers stranded in Gatwick Airport for 24 HOURS | Daily Mail Online

SlimpyJones

Good grief, I have never seen such a long article to talk about a delay of a flight.

sammyg901

That particular flight - DI7013/4 has had a very bad few days as the Hi-fly A330 seems to be very broken at Gatwick. It's been operated by Norwegian here and there with very long delay (as the crew have needed rest in NYC each time before coming back)

Today it's being operated by a rare aircraft - Hi fly A340-500 - complete with lie flat seats and a bar! Nice upgrade for those up the front ! Shame about the long delay. So this rotation looks like the one to avoid

Concerto

HiFly must be avoided at all costs, it is utterly dreadful as an airline and I’m not sure I would feel safe with them. Back in the day, just a year ago, when airberlin was overstretching itself, I ended up on HiFly and I vowed to avoid them thereafter. It was awful and the crews were dreadful.

Concerning the DI code, that was used by Deutsche BA some years ago, wasn't it? Or am I misreading it as D1 (figure one)? I thought Norwegian used the DS and D8 codes.

This whole thing is a shame, because in some circles Norwegian has earned a pretty good reputation for TATL flights. Apparently the service and seat comfort is not so bad as sometimes made out.

henry999

Indeed -- and what is striking is that there's not a single word about the 600€ compensation due to each passenger. Of course, Norwegian are not going to mention it and I suspect many of the pax would not even be aware of EC261.

Concerto

It's probably vaguely off topic at this stage, but I thought it was interesting to point out that HiFly is soon going to take delivery of its first A380 aircraft, previously used by Singapore Airlines.

https://news.airwise.com/story/hi-fl...et-by-mid-year

ckd38

I would definitely avoid this Hi-Fly JFK-LGW service. Just by taking a peek at the past 2 weeks of flights, it's been filled with cancellations, diversions, and 12 hour+ delays. https://flightaware.com/live/flight/NRS7014