Thunderroad

My wife might fly Thomas Cook in premium economy next June, San Francisco-Manchester-Amsterdam. Even though it's far off, we need to nail down her arrangements sooner rather than later. So I'd welcome any quick advice re any of these matters:

1. How reliable is the airline, as in chances of cancellation and big delays?
2. Any experience with whether and how well it rebooks in case of cancellations? I saw one thread here at FT indicating that it rebooked someone onto LH, though did a lousy job of notifying the poster.
3. Any impressions, positive or negative, re premium economy?
4. Her onward flight MAN- AMS would be on a De Havilland Canada DHC-8-400 Dash 8Q turbo-prop. Any experience with this plane?
5. The company seems to have a reasonable option of paying $70 for being able to cancel more than 24 hours before the flight. Any experience with this?

Thanks for any advice.

ricktoronto

I avoid charter airlines like the plague. One IRROP and there is no fleet to provide another or it's 5,000 miles away and they are generally loath to pay for a ticket on a real airline to accommodate a planeload of passengers all paying peanuts. And PE is on one version of one aircraft, so if it's unavailable you fly coach or not at all. Don't know how good or unbiased Skytrax is but they rate 5/10. 3/10 for seats. Mostly in Y those judgments. 35" pitch in PE vs 31" in coach. Trustpilot rates them 73% "bad". Airline Ratings.com 4.2/10.

As for PE remember ABC = Anything (is) Better (than) Coach. So it must be better. But might be closer to coach on a scheduled airline (looks like a bit less than a US domestic J seat) . Depends on how they cram people into coach, then add 3-4 inches to that, and a hot or better meal. I suspect drinks are free anyway.

The Dash series are one of the most reliable short field airplanes in the world, but narrow with narrow seats (though LuxAir have an actual business class row of seats). Rather fly a Dash than an ATR which sound like they are falling apart every second.

If the fare is $50 then it's a lot. If the fare is $2,000 then it's a pretty small fee if you get 100% of the money back. CX for instance, charges $150 or $200 for a cancel, admittedly on a $6,000 fare.

Thunderroad

A belated thanks for this useful reply. Unfortunately, by the time you posted it I'd already bitten the bullet and purchased the ticket. (Not blaming you at all, to be clear. I just saw the price of the ticket starting to increase and decided to take the risk.) You're quite right in what you've said about the seat and the risks involved. The premium economy seat is indeed better than coach on any airline, 35" pitch with some basic in-seat IFE in a 2-3-2 set-up, though to be on the safe side I think she'll bring her own food with her. But those risks remain. And FWIW, the cancellation fee is at least 150 GBP (and maybe more), not the $70 I'd previously stated.

flatlander

Do you mean their "Premium class" (7 across on an A330) or Economy Plus? I'm going to assume "Premium Class". So, it looks about as roomy as the Premium Economy in most of the other transatlantic airlines.

Thomas Cook is a well-established airline that's had a reasonably (by airline standards) stable business for a while. So they don't have the problem of having a bigger timetable than their fleet can fly, or always hoping the new aircraft is delivered in time so they don't have to cancel the route (ahem, Norwegian, Woe I mean Wow, etc). They do work their fleet hard, as they mainly do lower margin leisure travel. In the end, I don't think they'll be much less reliable than, say, Icelandair and they're less likely to go bust in the next few months like Wow.

A Q400 is a somewhat cramped turboprop, but it's no more cramped than the average regional jet in the USA. Note that rather like regional jets in the USA, if you're the sort of traveller with a max size carryon and ancillary bags, you won't be able to get those into the cabin. Who is operating that Q400 flight? FlyBe?

BAW94

Thunderroad

Thanks for this useful, encouraging info, folks. (Yes, indeed, it is Premium in 2-3-2 on the 330.) I realize we're still running something of a risk, but it's still good to know about the positive experiences and impressions.

As for the A400, it is Flybe. My wife is masterful at packing light and this is a shortish summer trip as well, so she probably won't have problems with its baggage limits.

BAW94

Thunderroad

Thanks for letting me know about this. The connection is about 3.5 hours. And she'd just have carry-on luggage.

I'd like to ask a related question: There's another, earlier MAN-AMS flight on KLM that she could take about two hours after arriving in MAN. I'm thinking of booking that for her since it would cost very little as a combination of miles and $$ and so she could get to AMS about 1.5 earlier (which would be somewhat advantageous, since she's flying in for a mini-reunion with friends who are based in Den Haag). I'd imagine that this would not be a problem for Thomas Cook or Flybe - she simply would be a no-show for the Flybe flight. Assuming she makes the KLM connection, any reason to think no-showing for Flybe would be a problem?

Agneisse

No-showing this one time should be fine - if she misses the KLM flight for whatever reason, she will still have the Flybe flight (that she was 'supposed' to have been on) available. Indeed both Flybe and KLM appear to leave from the same terminal at MAN. The only potential issue I see is if she is forced to gate-check her bag at SFO, although this is unlikely given she is in PE.

highpeaklad

Thunderroad

Thanks very much! She's a very light and efficient packer, so I'm not concerned about that potential problem.

Good to know. Thanks!