We're considering this airline for our flight to Paris from the West Coast. Anyone have any knowledge of it/experience with it? Comparison with American Airlines?

Thanks!

Comparison with American Airlines:

1. You probably won't get any useful FF miles for your trip.

2. Low frequency means you will be depending on no problems because you may have few alternatives if there is a glitch. (I've seen people wait days for reaccommodation when they booked with a low frequency carrier.)

As for quality of service, I have no personal experience. Maybe they're very reliable.

Notwithstanding the above comments, I have personal experience with Tahiti Nui having flown with them LAX to Papeete, Tahiti this past summer. I found the service to be very nice and attentive, and the newer Airbus planes had individual TV monitors.

Anna Roz

I am flying to Paris next week on this airline. It will be the second time. I thought the attendants were very nice, the food is above average FOR AIRLINE food and the individual TVs are a great way to pass the time. The inside of the plans are a very pretty blue and appeared to be taken care of and clean.

They have some type of connection with AA because you can use your AA miles to upgrade, but you cannot get AA miles for the flight. I wonder if this would help if there was a problem with a delayed flight etc. like Flyboy pointed out. Maybe someone can answer that question for both of us.

Thank you all for your comments. Actually, it was an American Airlines person who mentioned this option to me, and it was definitely for the flight itself, not just an upgrade--will obviously have to doublecheck this. I'd not heard of Tahiti Nui (very rarely travel in that direction) and didn't want to be kicking myself for not going with the American flight with the stop in NY over the nonstop if this new-to-me carrier were to drop out of the sky over the North Atlantic.

I'm planning a trip to Paris and Amsterdam in October 06. I have also eyeballed this airline with the non-stop service from Los Angeles to Paris. If you decide to use this airline. Please post your feed back. Have fun! =)

I have flown Air Tahiti Nui twice with high praise for both trips. Their site will give you an idea of what the planes are like, where you might sit..
they recently won (again) an award for
their inflight service- (I have also flown AirFrance, AirLib, Corsair,& Virgin to London)and I agree. Good food,
very courteous.
A real plus: I am a large woman...and I don't want to inconvenience myself or whoever might sit next to me, so I was thinking of booking a second seat--asked Air France and ATN (thru an agent)
if they would waive the additional charges on the 2nd seat? AF said (they consider it a medical reason, fine with me) and they would not charge all the additionals on the 2nd seat...ATN offered the 2nd seat at half the fare of the first...there are a limited number available, but it was a great
find-and it makes me appreciate an airline that would offer something like this...
I have never flown American...I've used Air France twice (one time the flight was cancelled...AF didn't notify us...my travel agent did...and the chaos on the following day was horrible...and the flight delayed as well).
The planes are Airbus, and since the flights originate in Tahiti, there will always be some people from there on the plane...(some seat availability because of this, but not bad). They fly into CDG 2A, which is a pretty good terminal (as CDG goes). The gates are in a satellite tower which you access via an underground (motorized) walkway(kind of fun in itself!). I don't remember a lot of delays in getting my baggage, or getting out of the terminal.
Their ontime flight record is also very good (a plus after the AF problem)..

If you are thinking of taking the TGV toward Amsterdam, there is a TGV station nearby T2A also...

Tahiti Nui is considered to be the highest quality airline flying this route.

I flew ATN to Auckland from LAX (and back, roundtrip). I liked the fact that we had a lot of room (flight not nearly full), nice flight attendants, and relatively good food.

However, one thing that really bothered me was they had awkward headrests and seemingly no way to lower them a lot. I am five foot 2 and it would hit me at a really odd spot in my head and made it difficult to rest on this 18 hour extravaganza of a flight (3 hour layover in Thaiti as well).

That said, I would still fly them again as long as they were +50 savings. I don't see THAT MUCH of a service difference however. But the individual screens are much better than the communal screen and I enjoyed being the best trivia person on the plane