TK J, Y, or no to TK until improved service?
 

Newbie to TK here, but with enough home work done to think twice before booking TK. I have a few questions to recent travelers:

1. Are all TK airplanes old in 2-3-2 odd configuration in J except from ATL-IST?
2. Are lounges in JFK & IST open, and if so, how`s the quality in this "virus" times?
3. Does TK really limit one personal item to up to 4kg taken on board, and the rest has to be checked in?
4. When will be the normal catering resumed instead of sandwiches in both classes?
5. Does it really worth to pay for J nowadays? With miles, it is 30K+$90 in Y vs 45K+$215.

From what I saw, TK hard product was very weak, but great meal services made it up for it. Now, both are very weak.

1- No, only the 777-300ER aircraft of TK has the odd 2-3-2 configuration in J. However, TK may do last minute aircraft swaps and they do not pay any compensation or they do not give any extra rights during an aircraft swap.
2- IST is open, with limited food ( mostly individually pre-packaged food ), however, there are limited hot food options as well ( cheese panini in the morning, pide and köfte the rest of the day ). The contract lounge at JFK is closed at the moment.
3- Yes, they do; however, generally they do not weight the item. Instead, they look at the dimensions.
4- Nobody knows it
5- It's up to you. If you value the hard product ( flat-bed, etc... ) it might be worth it, however, if you value the soft product ( meals and drinks onboard, etc... ) it might not.

Thank you, much appreciated.
From what I saw in some blogs and other sources, B789 flies only on ATL-IST route, and JFK-IST gets B77W pretty much all the time - is it the odd one?

One more question:
What are the fees to cancel an award ticket? Is it $25? And how long does it take nowadays?

2- IST is open, with limited food ( mostly individually pre-packaged food ), however, there are limited hot food options as well ( cheese panini in the morning, pide and köfte the rest of the day.

This is not the business class lounge though? Thought it was the IGA lounge started to serve some hot food?

TK in J , Y or No TK
 

TK 's operations have actually improved during COVID. The flights are lately almost always on time, service in J class is good, but the food of course in nothing to write home about. If you value comfort and social distancing J is the way to go. If you are looking for value, that's another story. Miles & Smiles Lounge in Istanbul is not bad. Pre packaged food and deserts with Hot Pide's and Meat Balls. And if you are flying to Turkey, it is the fastest and safest way to fly.

Thank you.
I will be making connection in Turkey, never had to go out of my way to connect there, but since TK is one of a very few airlines, which flies to my destination with quite a few daily flights, I was considering it. Another option is BA, which is I am not a fan of at all, plus more chances of cancellation and being stuck at LHR for a day or more.
TK knows its advantage, and doesn`t sell tickets via Expedia and Travelocity, as they sell it directly nowadays.

And that 2-3-2 configuration in J is a turning off point, especially if you get in that middle seat with no privacy.

No. BOS, YUL are A330 with 2-2-2. ORD, MIA, IAH, SFO and YYZ have been getting the 789 of late. As with any situation, last min swaps are always possible. For sleeping, I think the old seat is much better.

How do you assign/view available seats prior to reserving a seat? Before, if some airlines didn`t show a seat map, I was finding it on Expedia and such. But nowadays, those third parties are garbage, and not only show fake flights with fake prices, they also don`t get an access to TK inventory.

This is the Miles&Smiles Lounge that TK operates. ( Morning -> Cheese panini ( Pre-COVID Domestic Y meal ), Rest of Day -> Pide and Köfte )
The iGA Lounge has always served hot food after the pandemic.


You could view the seat map after entering passenger details when booking through the TK website or you could use paid applications like Expertflyer to pop up the seat map.
Plus, I would like to warn you that do not prefer booking a TK ticket through Expedia, Travelocity, or any OTA as in case of IRROPS, you might get a really bad service from them, especially on TK tickets. It's always beneficial to book directly from the airline.

Chances of middle seat J have to be pretty small right now, You can pick your seat once ticketed, lowering risk further.
777/330 J seat is excellent - despite claims from bloggers.

Soft product is another matter. TK was always weak save for great catering, now thats gone you are basically paying for a bed......and if Y loads are low you might get poor mans biz (empty row) anyway

Due to the restriction of the USA ( non-USA citizens could not board a flight from mainland Europe or UK to the USA - some exceptions apply ), the loads for TK flights are pretty high in Economy Class on the USA-Turkey route.

Plus, when India re-opens their borders, those flights would get much more full than it is at the moment.

I also agree that the 77W/333 Business Class seat is great and comfortable, especially when you don't have a neighbor.
And, it's true that the tax difference and the mileage difference for Business Class would only be for the hard-product.

For the OP;

The only US destination that TK has an open lounge at the moment is Washington-IAD; if you're planning to fly USA-IST, in other US outstations, you would not get lounge access other than a United Club.

"You could view the seat map after entering passenger details when booking through the TK website or you could use paid applications like Expertflyer to pop up the seat map."

You can also get expertflyer services for free which I've often used to check seats when assessing my chances of miles upgrades.

Indeed yes, trying to create a dummy seat alert would open the seat map without any charge in a free account.