FlyingDobber

On QR for the first time in a while from KUL (KUL-DOH-MAN) at the end of August and I have been "KUL'ed" too. I was hoping for QSuites as this would be my first experience in them but:

Outbound KUL- DOH now switched to the 21:20 departure on MH (A330 Business) and inbound on QR844 (DOH-KUL) has been switched to a 773 no QS.
DOH-MAN- DOH appears still to be QS but we will see.

For the money, as it is a paid ticket, I now wish I had chosen a different carrier and gone with the SQ direct flight...with a KUL- SIN stop instead of in DOH. Will see what the soft product is like but...

Toh Woo Kim

KUL-DOH went from 3 QR flights daily (1 with guaranteed Qsuites) to only 1 flight daily while other 2 are codeshare with MH

For my September flight, I been bumped from 9pm flight, to 2am and then now to 11am flight, causing me longer layover in DOH and arriving one day later at Budapest.

I redeemed 2x tickets with miles, so not much flexibility to change

ryandelmundo

How far in advance do they bump you? I still see the Qsuites available for booking on Google Flights at the end of August. Are you saying those flights are phantom and you'll be rebooked to the other ones? Can they really sell flights they aren't flying?

kt74

The summer changes are all done now, and you should only see QR metal for QR844/845

FlyingDobber

OK, Thanks I will check.
I was changed last week onto MH for the 21:20 departure so not on QR845.
DOH-KUL QR metal for QR844 and now on Q Suites! it was a 777 non QS

Confusing...

kt74

Right, now that QR has cancelled all our bookings and either shifted our flight times, or dumped us onto MH, has anyone successfully been able to book a seat? I'm not precious in general about seats, but pre-booked QR seats have been allocated seemingly randomly into the MH A330 cabin, such that couples have been split up next to strangers (they seem to have ported Qsuite seat reservations directly where possible, so 5J/6K -> 5K/6K with a stranger in 5H)

Go online on QR -> this is not operated by QR, go to MH
Go online on MH -> we don't recognise the booking ref or ticket number

Call QR -> you booked an MH flight, so you need to call MH [...ummm, you cancelled a QR flight, and rebooked me onto MH]
Call MH v1 -> it's a QR ticket and a QR operated flight, so you need to call QR [...errr, it isn't]
Call MH v2 -> I can see you booked seats apart [...ummm, I didn't], because we can't change them (after asking supervisor) - go to the ticket counter and maybe they can help...

Any ideas? There don't seem to be any MH PNRs on the QR booking (they seem to use a different locator system), so you can't even self-serve. Have also tried making changes on all the other OW websites (IB,AY, JL, etc) but can't seem to touch the MH-operated QR codeshare

Anyway, I maintain this is a major downgrade - book QR allegedly "5* service", get moved onto ageing MH A330s...

billy.f

Last time when they changed my flight from QR to MH, I contacted MH first and their agent said my ticket was booked through 'travel agent' (I bought my tickets directly from QR's website) and I need to contact them to change it. So I contacted QR using their live chat and the customer service agent managed to book my seat for me.

brunos

I fully understand your frustration due to this swap, caused by QR behavior with AirBus.

I am just trying to understand your seat number issues. 5J and 6K do not exist in Qsuites. So it might be 5K and 6J. These are rather far away window seats separated by a high fixed shell. I can understand that the automatic IT reallocation of seats would naturally allocate 5K to 5K and 6K to 6K. Both are the row window seats on the right side of the aircraft.
I have flown a few times on MH A333 pre-covid. It's really not bad. The "throne" seats like 6K or 4K (not 5K) are great.

kt74

Yeah, my bad, I meant 5K and 6J. They are solo window QSuite seats, so you would expect to reallocate to solo window seats and not next to a stranger... When you say, they're great, how is the throne footwell for people?

nick5000

If the flight is operated by MY but sold by QR with a QR flight number, do we earn avios and qpoints according to QR or MY charts?
For example L class is 20 qpoints with QR, but only 10 qpoints with MY.

SullyofDoha

If it is booked as a QR ticket code starting with 157, it should earn under QR's chart.

kt74

Flew MH KUL-DOH earlier this week, when my earlier QR was rebooked onto MH. A couple of observations:

Seat selection
MH website does not recognise QR booking reference, and neither QR or MH call centres can allocate (or reallocate) seats, even after several HUACA. However, MH online and app check in recognises the QR reference at T-48 hours, so you can check in and issue paper (but not Apple wallet) boarding passes for all your segments, so I suggest you make sure you can OLCI as early as possible to get your preferred seat - my flight was near-as-damn-it full

KLIA check in
Contrary to what I was told by MH call centre (who told me to check in with QR ), you check in as normal with MH with Premium check in at row D (not signposted). OWE pax hoping for Emerald check in can dream on... it's not open for the late flight. The Aerotrain wasn't working either after midnight, which means a slow bus transfer to the satellite terminal

KLIA MH lounge
If you're on the 3am MH164, then don't expect anything from the lounge. Just as it was pre-Covid, while the satellite Golden lounge is notionally open 24 hours, the offering is scaled back after MH2 departs. The Platinum dining room is closed; in fact, there is no catering on the Plat side whatsoever, although I was welcome to sit there, all alone, with the aircon switched off. The bar is also closed, although there is some basic beer and wine in the middle island in the business class lounge. There is some leftover hot food from earlier in the evening, that isn't replaced - congealed pasta, white rice, overcooked veg. Staff are cleaning the lounge, so it's pretty noisy with banging plates and trays, vacuum cleaning etc. Definite step down compared to the a la carte dining at Plaza Premium First which QR used to send you to

MH inflight service
Super friendly staff and proper recognition of OWE - IFM welcome, first choice of meal, etc ...but the hard and soft product are not a patch on QR. The guava juice and satay after take off are delicious (much better than SQ), but then the food service goes downhill. No dine-on-demand, woken up 2.5 hours before arrival for breakfast, wine is either "French" or "Australian". There is a proper seat/mattress topper, which was nice, but I'm not a fan of coffin seats, even in the throne seat. And the IFE is poor - limited choice and terrible interface

Arrival in DOH
All KUL pax were loudly directed to the transfer desk, presumably to get boarding passes reissued (?). I ignored this completely, and went straight to Al Mourjan and then the gate, and no problems at all with my MH-issued boarding passes


Satay - v good!


Hokkien Mee, but not like any Hokkien Mee you would get in KL, and not in a good way...

KingCanute

In my experience, the staggered single seats on the other side of the cabin are preferable to the throne seats, which seem a better idea than they are in practice. The MH crews are certainly more idiosyncratic than QR, but again in my experience they can also have more longer serving crew members, who if you score one where you are sat can be quite entertaining.

The food is OK, the movies are much more heavily edited than QR, but there are way worse airlines to fly with.

kt74

This is true, MH is not bad... But if you booked and paid for QR, and your flight was cancelled and replaced by an MH flight, then that would be a downgrade.

nomadabroad

Plus their sneaky and dodgy fare structure where you could be buying the most expensive flexible fare but earns zero avios or qpoints/tier points.