Premium Class a waste of money (Thomas Cook Airlines)

Member Name: davlav

Product:	Thomas Cook Airlines
Date:	24/10/03 (14838 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: none

Disadvantages: Its a charter airline

Recently flew Thomas Cook airlines to Western Canada. Paid a supplement approaching £150 to fly Premium class (on top of a return fare of over £650) as the flight to Calgary is 9hrs and the flight from Vancouver is over 10 hrs and charter flights can be notoriously tight on leg room.

Do not waste your money - and think twice about flying Thomas Cook! We recieved only part of the additional services advertised as being part of the Premium Class. Seperate check in at Gatwick/Vancouver? Was open to anyone on the flight, so became a bun fight with no rep from the airline to sort it out (check in was by an independent handling firm). Priority luggage unloading? Cases were almost the last off the aircraft on both legs of the flight. Priority boarding onto aircraft? Was not announced at Gatwick but to be fair, was at Vancouver.

It might be petty but these small touches that were advertised were not offered. On top of this, the Premium seats (looked good until close inspection) were dirty (beverage splashes in numerous places) and more importantly, broken. The seat in front of me and to the side of me were unable to stay in the up right position for take off or landing. The crew were informed but did not seem too interested. Surely this contravenes some CAA regulations.

The food was awful, the entertainment was the same on both the outward and return flights and the outward crew were not very friendly (however, the crew on the return flight were excellent and a joy to be amongst, even the Captain!). We also left Gatwick 90 minutes late with no explanation as to why.

I have asked Thomas Cook for a part refund on the supplement we paid for Premium class stating in greater detail the above. At present they are refusing to entertain any form of refund or compensation and are refuting the broken seats (well they would wouldn't they), the dirty condition of said seats. They also claim that priority boarding and check-in was
in operation for the flights (but I was there and they were not!!). They cannot explain why our luggage was not given priority, despite massive labels tied to the handles (should not be advertised if they cannot deliver). They admit that the entertainment should have been different on both legs and apologised for the unpalatable food.

It seems charter is charter no matter how they dress up the service. Scheduled Air Canada ecomony worked out to be about £17 less at the end of the day - we should have chose that service and at least had the benefit of a more professional outfit.

Summary: