Silver Fox

United have been fine with me on the 1K line and I have never had to wait more than 1 minute. For SQ the customer service on booking the flight was appalling in so many ways from the time it took to answer, to booking the itinerary, to the comprehension level of the rep, to getting the confirmations, and then having a red flag on my itin because I had to physically show them the credit card that I had made the booking with before it was removed. So from that booking point of view it was more stressful and time consuming than it need to be.

At the airport, check in was sterile and humourless and the only effort they made was to examine the weight of our carry-on (no complaints about this but there was no "banter" or niceties from their side) and despite being *G I was made to feel very unwelcome at the front desk of the lounge at LHR and it was as though they were letting me/us in as a favour.

The boarding experience was OK, onboard service was good apart from the very cramped seats on the A380 to SIN (Y, so perhaps expected but seemed smaller to me than any other Y) and the change of aircraft at SIN was rushed as our flight was a little late coming in and you would think that was my fault when being told "you should have been here earlier" (along with a lot of other people). So, it just left a little bit of a sour taste in all our mouths. I won't recommend them and I won't fly them again unless it is a stellar deal.

fly747first

Exactly. I love SQ, but they have made too many cuts and they think they can get away with them living off its past glory, but that won't work in an era of intense competition.

Aergales

Too bad SQ doesn't have advantage like US carriers where it can ask its goverment to create certain flight ban in order to lower competition without spending money to improve services

KACommuter

Perhaps because SQ consistently behaves as if the customer is at fault every time it screws up?

It has a class leading product in the air but quite the opposite on the ground when things go wrong - as they will sooner or later if one is a frequent flyer.

KACommuter

It has a different advantage - cheap money thanks to state ownership. SQ 's cost of borrowing is much lower than purely commercial airlines thanks to it being perceived as a low risk due to >50% ownership by Temasek.

ac777

I usually fly paid CStar RTW. While booking a zrh-sin flight SQ wanted a 700 USD surcharge, so I chose LX instead. The surcharges on the various legs is getting quite ridiculous...especially when a lot of other airlines have improved their in flight products

nanyang

I rarely call SQ myself - but has been mostly fine for years. I don't have huge expectations. It's a mass transport business at the end of the day. Perhaps it helps if you have status with SQ. Actually my experience with UA has been pretty good when I need to call them - I'm pretty sure having status with them makes it easier (at least you get through fairly quickly).

Hmmm, just did a couple of flights on SQ (in Y) last week. I really don't expect much - on average they are better than pretty much any airline I think of. Then again, it's Y and there are hundreds of other people onboard.

With UA, sad to say some employees are just nasty and run their mouths in a way you would never see with SQ. For example, was planning to go to the UA lounge / club at SFO in March, and one of the agents voiced her doubts about my PPS card and whether I was using a valid card - comment made to her colleague who had my card. Hmmm, who does that... I decided to go to a restaurant instead. And yes, the card is valid, just did not like the attitude and was very annoyed. Can think of a number of similar cases over the years.

EWR check-in is always like your first day in the military.

The reality of things with air travel for regular folks like me is that sometimes things go well and sometimes a little bit worse. On average SQ do a really good job.

What I don't quite understand is how people seem to get so emotional about SQ. It's a company. Not quite understand this talk about arrogance.

Phaze

Yet it's fine for you to use "emotion" in your choices.

The first is an emotional choice and the second seems to have struck a nerve with you.

You've lost all concept of logic in your multiple biased defenses of SQ. You are a firm SQ apologist. That much is apparent. Of course there are plenty of SQ apologists here but even some of them can from time to time step back and assess the product dispassionately. I can only assume that SQ is absolutely perfect for you at every juncture, you've never had a bad experience and they're still offering the best value proposition. Unlikely, but if so, fair enough.

In case the penny hasn't dropped, people pay a lot of money to fly in premium cabins. That might have something to do with why they allegedly get "emotional" as you put it. I would simply call it sense. I expect a certain service for my money. When I see that service clearly deteriorating in conjunction with the competitions' improving, it makes no sense to accept that product as given and continue to give them the same amount of business as I once did - particularly in such a competitive market.

I'm lucky in that I don't fly Y anymore but the 5-page thread on economy cutbacks hasn't gone unnoticed. People are in there saying how the removal of a hot towel will cause changes in their buying behaviour. It's one small example of how these things matter. If anyone with even an ounce of sense at SQ is reading any of these things, they'd take note. Maybe they don't care about economy passengers but they do need to care about premium passengers. Marketing 101 teaches you it's cheaper and easier to retain loyal high yield customers than it is to annoy them, risk losing them and try to attract new ones.

The flip side of the equation is that SQ does certain things much better than some airlines and when those fit within my travel pattern and requirements I'm happy to push money their way and extol their virtues to others if I know they'll be flying between those cities. Those instances are now fewer and far between, however. And that isn't by accident. I used to pull some questionable tactics at work to make sure I and my immediate team only flew SQ ex-SIN. Supplemented with my personal travel spend and I pretty quickly had a large reserve value. Plenty of which went to waste, but I didn't care and was happy to do it. Absolutely no chance that'll ever happen again.

SQ is far from worthy of blind brand loyalty anymore. Coincidentally, looking at their latest results that's exactly what they could use right now.

shuigao

Wow, where did all this hate come from? Trying to position yourself as a premium carrier (with therefore suitably premium rates) is being arrogant?

Coathanger

I'm a big fan of Singapore Airlines, having grown up flying them, but I'll concede the point on arrogance.

Their handling of the PPS changes some years ago is a prime example along with limited participation in Star Alliance particularly around the redemption side of the equation indicate a level of management arrogance.

Specifically on pricing SQ rightly command a premium, though as with margins across the airline industry that will slim down too.

24left

I was going to ask the same question, but you beat me to it.

Similar debates on other FT forums over what premium rates and flying mean as well as the never-ending devaluation of FFPs.

No two mainline carriers really operate with the same challenges - even if they are in the same country or same geographic region.

I also thing that some demographic challenges are causing airline management to panic at some carriers and thus not understand who they are really after as customers.

If you really want to see ranting, take a peek on the CX forum or even more so, the Fragrant Harbour Forum on PPRuNe - just 2 examples.

Similarly, barking mad folks on the BA forum are likely due to the constant cuts on BA, some of them idiotic. For calmer ranting, visit AC or AA.

My personal view is if you don't like an airline, don't fly them.

FT is just one of those places where we all get to praise or criticize and engage in heated debate. Very therapeutic some days.

SQ / SIA has some advantages and despite Q4 losses, still seem to be in much better shape than some of the neighbors.

spk307

As someone mentioned earlier, it's all down to value. With Scoot doing well and Norwegian entering the market, SQ should get out of economy and position themselves as a mostly premium carrier. Right now it's a premium carrier in terms of prices.
Even for premium classes, there seems to be plenty of room for improvement. Their lounges are nothing extraordinary, basic ground support, amenities kit nothing to shout about.
More direct routes and less economy seats is the way to go.
One thing that I feel weird about - reviews of their premium cabins show many empty seats. How hard it can be to release these to miles redemptions? The only additional cost is food but it's an easy way to reduce miles sitting on liabilities side of balance sheet!

SQ325

I honestly understand the frustration. SQ pricing policy out of SIN is ridiculous and to me that is pure arrogance and has nothing to do with their Market leader ambition. It starts to erode now, but not for all destinations though. People are not that stupid, and the rise of LCCs (especially Scoot) in SIN is showing that people are not willing to pay SQ "Fantasy-Fares" anymore.
They have always been offering quite competitive fares and promos out of other markets, but hardly out of SIN. To me it shows that they don't care about the Singapore market, I would call that arrogance.

As someone rightfully said above, customers (no matter if in Y or premium cabins) moan a lot about cutbacks. Will it change their booking habit? I think a few customer might switch, but for the rest of us the life will go on and we will get over it (and certainly used to it).

24left

This has been mentioned often on FT when the subject is mainline airlines competing against LCCs, as well as some mainlines owning their own collection of them.

It is interesting to see how differently QF, LH, and AC, just a few examples, all launched and run their other divisions. It is interesting to see how and where AC uses Rouge or QF uses Jetstar. Just like AC or LH can't just dump the back of the bus, neither can SQ.

The challenge for any airline is to figure out who they want to be, eg. a premium brand or a low-market discount brand. Mainlines carriers seem to have a challenge in that area. Some of them like BA, just keep shooting themselves by cutting so much of the ML service, no one will want to pay for it even if they give it sway.


An interesting point. I was on Aeroplan's site earlier looking at some routing back to SIN and some options showed up which are rarely there. So I looked n EF and entire J cabins were empty on some, PE/PEY cabins empty on others.

EGW1

The fundamental problem (like most things in SG) is an inability to accept that there could be a better or alternative way of doing things. Unfortunately, there will be no creative thought process employed and whatever the solution, it will be bureaucratic, shortsighted and based on deep-rooted delusional grandeur. The situation is reflective of Singapore generally, and it will never change. There will be fierce loyalists who will not accept any criticism, and there will be those that fly with other carriers.