Cofyknsult

I may very well experience this next week (1.15 hr scheduled connection after a 17+ hrs flight, Biz Class), which makes me wonder:

Are the numerous agents with name boards ("Mr Smith"... "Mr & Mrs Eiffeltower"... "Dr Xray"... "Family Lin Piao Zhen" etc...) greeting most arriving flights, often 10+ agents, waiting for VIPs, perform the paid "Al Whatever" Meet & Greet service, attend to Oneworld Elites, or are they sent to expedite the flagged tight connections of normal passengers ?

hotwingz

I think its both. From my experiences there is always some agents for VIPs etc. I was on a delayed flight to DOH twice and both times they had multiple agents with signs for the passengers' onwards destination so that they could bring all passengers to their connecting flights quickly

Barolo72

I am sure, as personal experience, that if you flight F on long haul, i.e. A380, you will be greated and escorted from gate to lounge and vice versa even if the other flight is J. I noticed that you don't get this service if upgraded at airport.
B.

NeoOfTheCRS

I love the Qatar Airways in-flight experience. Have I had bad service, in flight sure, but overall it is outstanding.

The HIA propaganda is way over-done. They spent billions of dollars on this new airport, complete with an impaled teddy bear, but they don't have enough jet bridges so you have to ride a bus? Come'on. Maybe after the rest of the GCC completely shuts the airspace to Doha, we can get a jetbridge as opposed climbing a stair ladder and sitting on buses on the baking hot tarmac. But the inflight experience is great

TBD

Sorry ... the only statement here that jumped out at me as unbecoming of QR is that the food was mediocre ....

Planes are sent to remote stands. Schedules change. Connections are made. "Managers" on the ground are clueless. It all happens ... to every airline ever.

QR has a superior J lounge. They also have some of the best food I've tasted in the sky. I hope you do consider that nonstop next time so there's another seat available for me.


side note: that thing is so weird .....

Cofyknsult

Much better than average, yes. Outstanding, no. And it has gone down tremendously in the past year, even if I take the personal credit of having successfully requested the return of the Godiva 2-chocolates box after it was replaced by a single one . Still below the 4 or even 8 box of Valrhona squares the previous years. I'll grant you though that the wines have remained very VERY good.

[/QUOTE]
QR has a superior J lounge. They also have some of the best food I've tasted in the sky. I hope you do consider that nonstop next time so there's another seat available for me.
[/QUOTE]

Thank you for your wish. It is presently granted about 25% of the time.

"Best food you have tasted in the sky"? It is either gross hype or you have not flown with QR in a long time. This applies to choice, quality and quantity, not to mention items which quickly run out.

Granted for the J lounge but there too, the food has slipped in a major way.

ALL THIS BEING SAID, QR remains a superior airline, which is exactly why I allow myself to post constructive criticism as I wish QR to remain that way.

ph-ndr

With the train finally working it's OK. My problem is that I've had more than my share of being docked at D/E gates incoming, having to clear security, and then leaving outbound on a A320 to somewhere from the bus gates located two floors below where I came in, but 3km walking in distance.

That is mostly the past now, though.

-A

TBD

Does your definition of "long time" include 6 months? I last flew QR in January.

Cofyknsult

Complete with an impaled teddy bear

OH, It looked to me that the bear had slumped after being executed in an electric chair.

msm2000uk

Let's try and keep things On-Topic - lest I have to delete posts and Close the Thread...which I don't want to do, as it's been highly informative.

Sitting on the buses, is the only place I ever feel cold when at HIA. The air-con on the buses is arctic.

The jetbridges query has been answered upthread by our Resident QR Operations Expert, so I won't comment.

M

ph-ndr

When I'm in a hurry in DOH I find arriving in and getting bussed all the way to security is a bonus. Only thing better, which has happened twice in as long as I've been through HIA, is arriving at one gate, no security and then out from the next over gate.

Now, I want to talk about proper bussing, lets pull up stories about being bussed to and from the far side of the old airfield, there's a proper trek.

-A

N1Rotate

For the eagle-eyed FTers that monitor gate utilisation at DOH during their transits, 3 gates are closed for 30 days for maintenance work at the tarmac level.

tav1989

I quite like the bus ride to the terminal or out back to the aircraft. Part form a few years ago when the bus doors refused to open aircraft side and we were suck awaiting technician to fix the problem. Thankfully the Icy AC kept us cool

mecabq

Another example is the DXB service (or was, before the embargo). QR had an impressive schedule, with a flight like every hour, which they marketed as sort of a "shuttle," with dedicated check-in and inbound immigration lines at DOH.

Yet this flight often came in at a far-away gate, even at off-peak times, and sometimes required a bus transfer. For the business O&D day-tripper, which must be a core market for many these flights, you'd think that they would reserve something like gates A1-A4 and B1-B4 for all DXB flights.

I realize that that wouldn't always be easy because the aircraft might be coming from or going to a different destination, but given the large number of flights, they could surely improve the logistics. A good example of something that management probably does not pay attention to.

It would also be a nice innovation if they had a standby-type option for these flights. The airline generally doesn't do that -- and it isn't relevant anyway except for the few destinations with high frequencies -- but coming up with something for hourly DXB flights could make the service more attractive; I might lean toward that option instead of EK if my schedule was flexible and I knew that I might be able to take advantage of it. As it is now, I think one has to go to the ticketing office at the end of the terminal and change the flight instead of being able to make the change at the check-in desk, much less being able to do a real standby at the gate.