Has Thai Air Lost Its Mind?
 

Just a few hours ago, there was yet another message on my answering machine that said to call Thai Air due to ANOTHER schedule change. Now, those of you who've been following this saga, know the headache this has all been...to say the least.
So, on the phone I went and on hold for about 15 minutes. Then I was told that there's been an aircraft change and a time change...AGAIN? I really didn't want to hear what the new time was as I had just contacted my serviced apartment building around week before last and asked if I could have my apartment a day early...as Thai Air had changed things around so and scheduled me to arrive the night before my original arrival date.

Plus, I will also have to miss a
day's work and lose a day's salary to leave on an afternoon flight instead of a night flight and then also pay for another night in BK at my building.

So, I thought...what now? Well, thank goodness the NEW time change was only about an hour difference from the last time change which was nearly an 11 hour difference, I think it was, from the ORIGINAL time change. A mess!
Then, I was told that I had been put in Business Class to BK and Economy from BK. You remember when I was told that I had been put in Business Class both ways and then 6 days later found a machine message saying that it was a computer error and that I'd really been bumped from the now non-existent Premier Economy down to regular Economy.

So, I just basically won't believe
anything until I'm on the plane.
I've flown them for nearly a decade, but this has been more than irritating and I've really about had it. Happy Travels!

So you have what you had before only an hour different.

Guen, I'm curious what the schedule change is?

We're booked on the same flights in December in Biz Class and I don't see any changes to the schedule at all on their site.

Still shows as departing at 12:10 PM from LAX and departing from BKK at 7:30 AM (on the return) on Thai's website.

Filmwil...I don't have the old paperwork in front of me, and didn't have it in front of me when I talked with them. But, I said to the person, on the phone, that it sounded like there might have been a change of time of about an hour and she said, "yes". The schedule you just mentioned sounds like the schedule I was just given today. They've called so much that who knows what they're talking about. Happy Travels!

Guen
You fly out of LAX don'y you? have you ever considered EVA? we have found them GREAT value for money (i guess the routing for you would be TPE-BKK?)and their Buisiness class product is way cheaper than Thai and we found it to be excellent. Their prem economy (Elite) looks great too and a friend of mine who has flown Thai Biz for 10 years said he will now switch to Eva after using them this year (and he flew prem ecconomy on Eva)

I have flown EVA (Evergreen) on every flight over so far. This last time I tried Thai (Prem Econ)

Frankly, I preferred EVA. That long haul is just too long. I think I need the little walkabout in Taipei.

Thai changed my flights a bunch of times and it ain't over yet.

I'm not necessarily holding that over them....I know the airlines are all having to make some adjustments to stay in business. But I don't think I'll fly them again.

In the past whenever I needed to deal with Thai on the telephone, I found it a lot more worthwhile to call them in Bangkok, and not their US number. The Bangkok people are enormously more knowledgeable than the US counterparts, at least in my experience.

As for switching to another airline, I'm with United and Delta, so need partners of those two airlines.

Plus,the mileage that I get on these S.E. Asia vacations,usually twice a year, is what adds up and gets me my free plane tickets to Europe in the spring. Happy Travels!

Smeagol...Funny you should mention Eva. I said to the person, on the phone, that folks are irritated with Thai Air and are switching to Eva. There was dead silence for quite a while. Happy Travels!

well lets hope they get the message and stop all this swapping about with flights.....

As for calling Thai Air in BK, it's good that it works for you, but I'm not running up my phone bill calling them plus having to deal with the time difference. They need to get their act together here...or else they'll be losing customers.
They have told, me a few times that they didn't have an answer to a question because they had to wait for BK to contact them which is understandable, but other times I can ask several people the same question and get different answers. Happy Travels!

Guenmai, sounds like a mess! Hope it all works out for you in the long run. Hope you get BIZ both directions for all the trouble they've put you through.

Aloha from HNL, by the way.....

Carol

I forgot the Honolulu GTG is this weekend. It's too bad that I couldn't make it this year. I'll really miss you all. I was wondering where the regulars were on this forum. I guess Bob and Karen are over there,too.

I'll also miss dragging you to the Shanghai Tang store in Ala Moana like last year. But, we can always drag each other into the one at Paragon when we hook up in Bk in December.

guenmai
We miss you out here in the islands. B and K and DS and I spent the day together yesterday, driving around the island. It was lovely!

Yes, I'll make it to the mall without you this year, I guess. But Paragon awaits...

Carol

You certainly have lots of Star Alliance options from LAX.

Who flies from LAX that's hooked up with either United or Delta? I know Singapore Air does, but do you know, off the top of your head which other ones do? I don't have time to research it now. Happy Travels!

Guen, I believe (flying West from LAX) your options are:

Thai
Singapore
ANA
Asiana

There are, of course, other options if you fly East via Europe, but who wants to do that?

Sure: All Nippon Airways, Asiana, Air Canada, and of course United, Thai, and Singapore. I think China Airlines too. You could even fly SWISS or Lufthansa.

Air China not China Airlines.

A stopover in Zurich enroute to BKK sounds like it might be fun. I think it is about 6 hours more flying than going west. Higher priced, tho.

Oh, Air China connects in Beijing. I think a Chinese visa would be required just to transit PEK.

Thanks, but I'm not taking that airline and I'm not going anywhere near Zurich in the dead of winter. I don't want the delays. Plus an extra 6 hours? Yikes. Happy Travels!

I looked into ANA. Maybe I'll look into it more in the future. Happy Travels!

You can fly Korean Airlines and deposit miles to NW, if you don't want to fly NW itself. China Southern is another partner, though I'm not sure why one would pick them over NW.

I don't run up my phone bill to call Bangkok, or anywhere else in the world. I buy a card online from masterbell.com or similar site, and I can talk for hours and hours and hours for $10.

When Thai cancelled the JFK-BKK flight and I couldn't get thruto the LA or NY office, I called them on Skype. BIG DIFFERENCE between the US agents and the ones in BKK.

Rizzuto...Thanks for the info. Before I moved, only 15 minutes away, from where I had been living forever, I had a really cheap overseas company connected to my phone.
It was the kind of company that you didn't have to pay anything to have a monthly service, but only paid for the actual call overseas.

However, when I moved, I had to get a new number and there went the cheap company connection. It's almost impossible to get through to the old company as I think they have one customer service operator, probably stuck in a closet somewhere to answer all calls. Smiles. So, I haven't made any overseas calls for a little over 2 years. I just haven't felt like going through the whole headache of trying to find another company. It's headache enough just dealing with Charter with my regular hookups.

And I didn't own a computer until 2 months ago, when I was kind of forced to get one due to family crisis issues so that I would have 7-day computer access. I'm low tech and haven't even figured out the new MAC laptop yet. I have a very busy life. Happy Travels!

RKKWAN...I'm with Delta and United, not NW. Happy Travels!

I thought you wrote NW. But NW = DL in terms of most partners. And NW will soon be DL anyways.

So, NW, Korean Airlines and China Southern can get you to BKK while earning DL miles.

Thanks, that's good info to know. Since the non-stops no longer exist and I'll have to fly from L.A. through Japan to get to BK in the future, like before the non-stops existed, then I can now easily choose another airline.

I just try to stick with the foreign carriers as it's very easy to cancel if one has to and then only lose $100.

With the American carriers, if one cancels one is basically stuck with the ticket to rebook it within a year of when it was ticketed. That's a headache for me. I have elderly parents. When I had to cancel last month's trip to BK, at least on Thai Air, I just called and canceled and they deducted the $100 and credited the rest to my credit card and that was it. Happy Travels!

Guen,

To answer the question of the title of this post: YES!!!

I don't know if you've heard, but I just found out, rather unfortunately, that last night Thai Air has AGAIN changed the flight schedule for LAX-BKK-LAX!!!

They will now continue the non-stops (leaving at the original departure time of 9:30 PM, and axing the scheduled 12:10 PM departure) until at least January.

Seems our good friends at TG cannot sell their A340-500s (the aircraft that is capable of doing the non-stops) so they're keeping them on that route (as many had predicted would happen.) I guess the cost of keeping those planes grounded is worse than the fuel-eating costs of operating them.

I'm a bit stuck though as I've now got a hotel room in BKK that I booked through Sawadee for that extra night (last schedule had us getting in 12 hours earlier, hence the need for an extra night in BKK.) I'm praying Sawadee will let get rid of the 1 night (of 3) without charging us a penalty (we still owe them the balance of our stay.) If not, I'll be left to my devices waiting for TG to refund my hotel...which, from hearing others' stories about refunds with them, sounds like it could go on and on with no resolution.

I'd say this schedule change is solid and you should rely on it, but who knows anymore? I was so excited to fly trans-Pac with Thai for the first time, but this is a circus!

Filmwil...Thanks for the update and this is beyond ridiculous. Next year, I'll have to try to save up enough money to fly Singapore Air. I've never had any problems with them.

I contacted Emporium Suites back when Thai Air did the first schedule change, I think it was. I had Emporium Suites put in the reservation for a one night earlier arrival. It's good that I don't prepay. I'll wait up until the 11th hour to see what Thai Air finally does before contacting Emporium Suites to change it again. Thai Air hasn't contacted me as of yet.

I really feel for those who have paid for a hotel reservation assuming they would be arriving a day earlier than scheduled. And can you imagine how furious folks must be who have paid a 5-star hotel room rate.? It's bad enough to lose any amount of money. And for those people who are connected to tours, they must be furious,too. At least I have some flexibility as I'll be in BKK for 3 weeks and won't be traveling around. Happy Travels!



Well, now that this flight is back on, I guess I'm back in Premier Economy and not somewhere, in limbo, between Business and regular Economy. The good part of it for me is that I won't have to pay for that extra, day-early arrival night now and I won't lose a whole day's worth of salary by having to leave on the noon flight instead of the late night flight. Happy Travels!

I have my own Thai story to tell. Trying to book my bi-annual trip back to the states, and using the special birthday discount to get biz. class at a 50% discount for mileage used. You can't book these tickets until 8 weeks before the trip, and naturally I was told all the seats on all flights were full. I was put on the wait list and told to call in every day or two to check.

After two weeks on the wait-list, I decided to go for "plan B" and book an economy seat on SIA (the one-stop flights are quite cheap right now) - then upgrade to business class using my Thai miles.

When I went to the Thai office to get the upgrade, they said "Oh, that's very difficult to do." When I told them I was only doing it because I couldn't get a seat on Thai, a seat was magically opened up for me.

Guen have you considered EVA air? they do premium economy (think its called Elite) and excellent biz class at great prices. We have used them several times to fly from LHR to BKK on biz and we have saved £££ compared to other carriers. Not sure of the scheduling from LAX but maybe worth considering next time?

Smeagol...I'm with Delta and United's frequent flyer programs. Happy Travels!

Yes but maybe nows the time to try something new???

I'll most likely, in the future, go back to Singapore Air which is connected to Delta. I've flown them since the 90s and have never had a problem. I need the frequent flyer miles as I use them, for awards, for my spring trips to Paris and a few other places.

There's nothing I can do about this year's situation with Thai Air. It's too late to try to change things around, to another airline, as airfares now are very high and seats are sold out for my dates. I bought my ticket in Feb 2008 for my Dec 2008/Jan 2009 trip...before the astronomical hikes in airfare. I'm holding on to it, and the airfare I paid, and will just have to hope for the best. Happy Travels!

fingers crossed guen, let's hope they don't change it again.

This is funny. Still see their "new" ad for their "new" LAX-KIX non-stop in the newspaper just yesterday.

So, Guen, if they're operating an LAX-BKK n/s, that means it's a 340-500, which means that they'll have premium economy! So you think you'll be able to get your ticket back to where it was in the first place?

<stirring the pot....>

They *should* be offering P/E...or, at least, one would think.

If you go on their website and try and book the flight though, it only shows Economy and Business.

This means one of two things: either they haven't figured out how to deal with the whole 'there was no economy, now there is' thing or they are reconfiguring the seating (they have 4 A340-500s, so it's possible to reconfigure 2 while the other 2 are in service then swap them) to Economy and Business only.

I hope for everyone's sake (specifically Guen's) that it's the former and not the latter. Only time will tell.