One hit and two misses! (Manchester Airport (MAN))

Member Name: janharper

Product:	Manchester Airport (MAN)
Date:	22/06/01 (101 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: usually good facilities

Disadvantages: bad on a saturday night in winter!

In January this year I flew to Cyprus from Manchester airport. Even before the plane took off we underwent a bit of an ordeal.

The first problem was that when we got to Manchester airport I received a text message from my holiday company telling me that I had incorrect airline tickets and that I should go to information and ask them to sort it out.

I couldn't find a kiosk that was open for Helios Airlines (see my op on this if you want to know more about Helios). Information at Manchester told me to go to Hurculean Airways. They said that they didn't know where that was and couldn't direct me. I attempted to ask for more information but was ignored by the person behimnd the desk who was more concerned with ordering what she wanted for her coffee break.

There was no Herculean Airways. By this time I was frantic. There was still an hour to go before the Helios desk opened and I didn't relish the thought of worrying about my invalid tickets for another hour. Nobody seemed to know anything or even want to help.

An airport cleaner eventually came to the rescue. He asked if I needed help and then advised me to go and have a coffee until the kiosk opened. He had seen the same thing happen many times before, he told me, and I shouldn't worry. He promised to come and find me when the desk opened and he did. He even had the Helios representative with him. Everything was sorted out very quickly but the man had gone before I got chance to thank him.

He was the one person who made Manchester airport a hit!

We eventually went through into departures expecting a three hour wait but ended up waiting for seven hours. This, of course, can't be blamed on Manchester Airport. They can, however, be blamed for having no facilities open on a saturday night. It was 7pm and all the shops were shut. There was one coffee bar open and nothing else.

We had to content ourselves with window shopping and playing
cards for ten pence pieces! It was the longest seven hours I have ever spent and it would have been so much more pleasant if the shops had been open. At least we could have gone shopping. If we had know that everything was closed in departures we would have stayed in the lounge on the other side where the shops were open!

So, if you fly from Manchester on a Saturday night, in winter, don't expect anything to be open in departures. If you are relying on duty free shops for cigarettes or a bottle to take with you, get them before you go through, or at least check if the shops are open before you go through.

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