Exleftseat

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and I don't know how one could possibly send the "second" choice to BR while keeping the "first" choice with CI.
Looks don't matter, the attitude of the F/As at CI or BR is fantastic and all in favor toward the flying customer. And that's all that counts. The Gulf cariers operate on the same principle and that's why they are successful as well. I used to fly CI but have switched to BR as they are *A, so I can speak with some authority. English is hit or miss, but never a problem. If you want to help or need help, there is always a way to communicate.

flyhen

LOL, I fly BR as well, mainly because of their association with *A. But safety, and their service attitude also are important factors. Being from Taiwan myself, I don't really have any problem connecting err I mean communicating with them, but yes, some of them need to take Engrish lessons.

Exleftseat

Think about it this way. On Asian airlines all F/As speak little or better English. I for one have never felt completely lost. On an U.S. airline, if they don't have a foreign speaker onboard, you are completely lost if you don't speak English. On an Asian carrier, the F/A whose English is poor(er) will send someone who can do better. The U.S. F/A will ignore you forever because they feel you ( the pax ) are unable to communicate with them, not the other way around. Big difference.

flyhen

I agree, FAs in NH, JL, OZ, BR, CI don't really speak good english. But on SQ and CX, it's a different story. I found myself "slowing" down when speaking to NH, JL FAs. Sometimes even resorting to writing kanjis on ipads. But nontheless, service is excellent on most asian carriers.

Exleftseat

SIN and HKG are former British possessions and their school systems are set up to teach the English language. Not necessarily the same in other Asian countries which indicates that their countries' airlines hire staff with above average education, not just anyone without a high school diploma as in the U.S. if I am not mistaken.

CDKing

BR is no brainer on the TPAC segment

6 across (UA 787) vs 3 across (BR 777-300ER). Dreamliner looks cramped. Ill post pic later to show the difference. Aisle access to all seats and good amount of solo seats. They face the wondow if you like window view. Much more private

BR is closer to a International F product than a J product compared to UA, BR Royal Laurel seat is more spacious than UA GF seat.

Dom vs whatever $10 a bottle bubbly UA is serving

I'm sure there is more that I'm forgetting

Kacee

The only reason to take UA would be the cabin pressurization and ability to upgrade as a UA elite.

The seating, food, and service on BR will be much better.

sinoflyer

BR service has a distinct native Taiwanese feel; CI service is more pan-Chinese to the point where Taiwanese-ness is de-emphasized. BR corporate color is green (duh), whereas CI has no green in it whatsoever. This is no accident, IMO -- people who are familiar with internal politics should know what I am talking about. I think this difference in corporate culture goes into FA selection as well. IMO, BR female FAs are encouraged to speak Mandarin with a Taiwanese twang, almost schoolgirl like, that I would expect to be frowned upon on CI. They at CI still think that they are "classier" by speaking Nanking Mandarin.

Little of these matter much to the Westerner, but it's fun to try and observe the differences.

I wholeheartedly recommend Royal Laurel over UA. The food is pretty good, not as good as NH or OZ, but completely not at the same depth as UA. The Rimowa amenity kit is a plus. The lie-flat seat is comfortable, but the footwell angles into a narrow space that gets into the way of my feet. I prefer UA's seat and IFE, but other than those, I can't say much negative about BR.

bocastephen

Quite often the BR B fare is far cheaper than the UA W fare - depending on the destination. The problem is upgrading - which has become next to impossible, especially ex-LAX, SFO and JFK.

The two issues I have with BR are catering (you need to a 'book the cook' arrangement to get anything substantial and tasty) as their portion sizes, meal frequency and quantity are small based on current reviews, and the AVOD has a tiny fraction of what UA offers. If they fixed those two issues, their product would rank among the best non-suite J cabins in the world.

channa

Definitely BR.

Also, you can pre-order your meal online.

Last trip, I flew SIN-TPE-SFO on BR in J. I pre-ordered for SIN-TPE, but decided not to for TPE-SFO. The BR lounge agents paged me in the TPE lounge and asked what I wanted for dinner so they could make sure they had it. They thought it was an oversight or an error when I had pre-ordered one meal but not the other.


So the Kool-Aid is green at BR vs. blue at CO, is that what you're saying?


The sounds and tones in Japanese is much more divergent from English than Korean or the Chinese dialects. It's not surprising it's more difficult speaking to NH/JL than the others.


If you're saying buy a Y fare and fly UA BF, I agree.

But if you're suggesting buying a C fare and upgrading to UA GF, I disagree. BR Royal Laurel is better than UA Global First.

DesertFox62

Well, the comments are in, BR it is then, though not for the nice looking FA reasons alone, Ms. DesertFox will kill me if she saw this.

Kacee

Thanks for the details, this is useful information.

As a relatively frequent UA Int'l traveler, I now dread their BF food. And I've generally seen all of UA's AVOD offerings (at least those I would consider watching). They are very very slow to update movies and (especially) TV episodes. For a less frequent flyer, this would be less of an issue.

I would not suggest buying C TPAC on UA versus any of the major Asian carriers

cyanchan15

Commenting on school system, just FYI Hong Kong now has finished conversion of higher education system. It's no longer the British (3-year) way but aligned to Chinese one.

npei

Last week I flew JFK-TPE on Royal Laurel class, and they messed up my pre-order confirmation. But they still had 2 full-meal multi-course choices (braised sea bass, and lamb chop I think), in addition to the low-cal tailored-for sleep dinner service. I had the sea bass, and found it tasty & portion size ok, unless you are super hungry. The friendly FAs also offered 2nd helpings of Haagen-Daaz ice cream & Dom, I couldn't resist

Their AVOD choice seems slightly less than UA Biz, but plenty even for 2-3 continuous 15-hr flights.
After watching AVOD for 6 hrs, I grabbed ~6hr decent sleep, woke up once to go to bathroom easily with easy aisle access.
The breakfast service (choice of Chinese vs Western) was also decent portion size, especially Chinese congee with multiple tasty side dishes.

Compared to 787 Biz which I have flown 2x, BR 1-2-1 configuration & soft product blew UA out of the water.

username

Last week I flew UA C SFO-TPE. No one in the 2nd C cabin got the porridge. FA said they didn't load enough. In the Let's Eat thread, someone said UA is known for its porridge shortage. So, here is the contrast

The thing is if they messed up your pre-order meal in UA C, you probably get 10,000 MileagePlus miles. Don't expect that with BR