No alcohol before take off
 

Hello to everybody: recently a FA refuses to serve me alcohol until the Doors closing at Madrid airport.Anyone knows Qatar Airways policy about this subject?Is it related to the departure airport?
Thank you

Quite often local rules are used

I suspect it is a tax and duty thing and they are not prepared to take the risk of serving it before the doors close.

If they don't have duty paid booze on board, the bottles cannot be opened till the doors are closed for pushback.

It is just cost saving to avoid buying duty on local booz, as required if served before doors close.
Some airlines pay, others don't.

It isn;t just the duty, but the space required to maintain a separate bar. More and more carriers are resorting to this because it is cutting into space which is needed for other service items.

You just made me think of something: the OP didn't say he/she was in J - we all just assumed he was! Just a thought... :)

I was in J....to be honest I'd prefer a new travel festival next january with big discounts rather than a champagne glass 😜

There seem to be a bit of mixing here. Usually QR will open a bottle of each champagne once they get a request on any out station, but not want to serve other alchohol untill after takeoff.

Some out stations may be even more restrictive, generally JRO I experience to be more restrictive, other than that I can't recall any other from my travels.

-A

I assume the flight took off and landed safely? The issue of having champas in J-class before take-off is really a moot point, as are the reasons. OTOH, if the "requestor" really needed it - to deal with DTs perhaps - then there are other issues that FT contributors, and QR, should IMHO not deal with....

Another option is to find an airline that serves the requested libation(s) before take off. ;)

Waiting until after take-off is possibly the safest thing to do. After all, the FAs prime responsibility is to ensure our safety during any flight. That is what announcements during flights say....