Bring your Business somewhere else (Austrian Airlines)

Member Name: Mizio

Product:	Austrian Airlines
Date:	01/04/01 (306 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Early flight to Vienna

Disadvantages: Small seat, no entertainment, aweful food

I have taken Austrian Airlines twice. Once, many years ago, to go from Rome to Graz and back. My flight was late and lost my connecting flight in Vienna to Graz. I had to wait 8 hours at the airport and got a voucher for a meal. On the flight to Graz I was given a seat at the back of the plane that could not recline, thankyouverymuch for customer service.

A more recent experience (about 8 months ago), was a business flight to Vienna from London. I fly a lot for business (unfortunately) and my standards are pretty high. My company spends a lot of money on business fares and I expect the money spent to give me the opportunity to be fresh and ready for a hard workday abroad. The experience I have had with Austrian indicates that the money was totally wasted.

The plane had the biggest business class I had ever seen. It was a 737 and it was virtually all business. Which should have brought immediately a suspicion: with so many business class seats, the level of comfort couldn't be that high. And in fact it wasn't. The seat was just like an economy class seat. We were all cramped with the laptops and newspapers. Despite being a short-haul trip, I expected some kind of enterntainment: there were no magazines (just a few newspapers), no videos, nothing really.

And then the worst bit: the food. Everyone knows that Austrians are famous for their mountains and skiing but not for their food. Yet, one would expect that the food served on their national airline would be eatable. There were 6 of us and no-one touched the food on either flight from and to London. Unbelievable.

If you happen to fly to Vienna or Easter Europe (to which Austrian has a pretty decent network) on business, use somebody else. As simple as that.

Summary: