hemmia

Has anyone flown to and from Canada with Zoom or Transat - any comments?

kodi

I have not flown on Zoom, but have flown on Air Transat many times. IT is a charter airline, so you do usually get better prices than on regular scheduled airlines like Air Canada. Usually there is not as much leg room. They stuff more people on their planes. But if their schedule suites you and price is an issue, go for it. I usually do. If you want more leg room, go for the regular scheduled airlines.
Air Transat has been around for a long time , so not to worry in that regard.

Judy_in_Calgary

I have not flown either of them. There is quite a lot of discussion about this topic on the British Expats forum. From those comments it seems that both airlines are okay. People generally seem to give higher marks to Zoom. If you can afford the Zoom upgrade that gives you a bit more leg room, people say it's worth it. As kodi says, these are budget airlines. From what I've read, they provide pretty decent service for the price. As with seat sales on the budget airlines, be aware of restrictions that apply to the tickets.

SusanInToronto

I've booked to fly Zoom to Paris later this year. think Air Transat had more flights from Toronto to Paris, but Zoom was cheaper. I'm trying to keep costs down. A friend has flown Zoom a couple of times and said it was pretty good.

Hana

Hi Hemmia!
My husband and I flew Zoom last fall from Calgary to London in their version of business class (I believe it was coined Premium - not sure). We found that the extra money (which was not all that much by the way!) was a great investment!
We had an excellent experience with Zoom - practically no line ups at check in, flights left on time and even arrived earlier than scheduled. Flight attendants were pleasant, accomodating and the premium was in my opinion - was almost as good as business class on other airlines!
I would have no hesitation in recommending Zoom and will be looking to fly with them again in the future!

c2Paris

I flew Zoom last October to Paris. I was on a tight budget and what a relief it was to find them! It is the lowest fare I have ever paid to France. Economy class was just like any other airline I've been on, but a peek into the premium seats had me jealous. I'm definitely going to spring for the extra next time. I've never been able to afford premium seats on any other airline, but their first class is even affordable!

Excellent service, attendants and I felt very well taken care of. I highly recommend Zoom!

Tootsall

Our family has just (Aug 11) returned from Munich where we flew Calgary-Munich non-stop and reverse return. I booked the tickets early (December last year) and (since all four of us are 6' and 6'plus), paid the premium to reserve exit aisle seats each way.

The problem with this was that, although legroom was more than adequate, we had to put up with the inevitable "gang" standing around waiting to go into the washroom. I suppose one might pay the extra premium for their "club class" but then, might as well fly Air Canada/Luftansa because the price isn't going to be much different.

The washrooms were clean (despite an amazing, non-stop use of them on a 10 hour flight) and odour free (contrary to my expectations).

Legroom in the regular seats (wide-body AirBus) was virtually non-existent and I don't know how those people could stand it. Seat width was... shall we say "more suited to the very slim"?

The outbound trip was on time and as-advertised. The return trip was about 6 hours late...even though the luggage scare had happened only the day before apparently the delay had more to do with a weather situation in Calgary followed by some rapidly expiring "flight hours" by the air crew which necessitated a quick run to Montreal (!) before the Munich portion.

If I were travelling with a gang of friends on long-haul then I suppose I might consider their club class... or if it were a short trip. Otherwise I don't think I could take the lack of legroom. Otherwise everything was fine (except it too an hour for them to unload baggage at either end and the "meals" were..... pitiful? However, the price was right and the non-stop Calgary/Munich & return was attractive.

The other drawback was a much-tighter-than-normal check bag and carry-on bag limitation: 62" combined and 23 kg for checked and a small, 10kg c/w size limit for carry-on. Barely adequate for a 3 week trip (although we found that we did take stuff we didn't need).

Gavin

We did Toronto-Glasgow return in Premium Economy with Zoom once and it was fine. Seat pitch in premium economy is 36 inches and economy is 31 inches. For comparison Air Canada economy is usually 32 inches. I worry a bit about the ability of a very small airline to cope with problems like a plane out of service unexpectedly. No experience with Air Transat.

mmmmtl

It's worth checking out Canadian Affair (www.canadian-affair.com). I've used them a number of times and no probs except once there was a prob with the booking (i.e. the ticket wasn't booked and my credit card wasn't debited - not sure wahat happened, it was as if I'd never called. In any event, the price had gone down in the meantime, so I eneded up getting a cheaper flight).

They use planes from MyTravel and Thomas Cook - two big UK charter companies, and when i last flew with them a couple of years ago, they had some of the most modern planes around (eg seat back movies, with choices). Had a look at their site recently, and on one of their planes - 757s I think - they were advertising something like 35 inch seat pitch?

Anyway... I've usually found them to be cheapest (though surprisingly KLM/Northworst comes close at times)