This was the first time that I had flown with Air France and believe me after I' ve used my return (I KNEW I should have gotten a single!) it will be the last.
I usually fly with Asiana but this time Air France were cheaper so I didnt really think about it.
With Asiana the official
luggage allowance is 20kg (which,
p.s I think is ridiculous for a
long haul flight, how am I supposed to fit a years worth of stuff into 20kg?) but... they will let you take up to 25kg for free and last time I flew they let me off with 26kg. If you do get charged with them its 12pounds a kilo.
Before my flight I called Air France to ask how strict they were with baggage to see if it was the same situation. I was told on the phone that they would let me off a few extra kilos.
So I arrived at Manchester with 26kg (I'm a girl, I dont do travelling light) thinking that maybe I'd have to pay for one which I was prepared to do.
The guy on the check in was miserable and unfriendly. He said he wouldnt put anything over 20kg through and he didnt care what they'd told me on the phone, if I had an issue I had to take it up with the ticketing desk because that wasn't his job. After trying to (politely) argue my case he begrudgingly said he'd let it through at 22kg but no more.
So I went over to the ticketing desk where I was basically told "tough luck". The fact that I'd called and asked got me a shrug of the shoulders and a "theres nothing I can do about that". If I wanted to pay the excess baggage then i could but it would be 175pounds!!
So I had to take out stuff - hair straightners and
hair dryer included which is abominable, and leave it with my parents. Off I went back to the check in queue and this time I ended up with a different woman, equally as miserable and impolite. I'd managed to get my case down to 21kg but she said no, that wasn't exceptable and I had to pay 25pounds extra. I counted to 10, did an astounding job of suppressing my rage and calmly pointed out that the other guy had agreed to put it through if it was less than 22kg. That got me another shrug of the shoulders and a firm "I dont care, you have to pay it." I ended up giving in and paying before I lost the battle with the rage and ended up banned from the flight!!!
Before I left I checked with her that my baggage was checked all the way to Seoul, as once when I'd flown to the states I'd had to pick up my case and recheck it. She looked at me like I was the stupidest person alive and rudely told me that 'yes, of course it was checked all the way'. Duh.
It didn't get much better...
I requested a vegetarian meal and didnt get it. I told the stewardess that I'd told them when booking the ticket and when I checked in. Surprisingly enough I got ANOTHER shrug (have I mentioned how aggravating that is??) and a "well we dont have one for you."
The rest of the food was actually pretty good (once I'd picked out all the animal parts) and had I eaten meat I probably would have enjoyed it. They also get bonus points for having about 15 kinds of cheese in every dish (after 9 months in korea with only nasty plastic slices to show for it it was more than welcome).
The
entertainment was okay. It was slightly annoying that everything was constantly playing and you couldnt start films as and when you wanted to watch them. But there was plenty of choice of movies and
tv shows. I had a choice of 5 movies, a few documentarys, some cheesy 70s tv shows, kids cartoons,
games (including millionaire which was hours of fun until I got the remote stuck in the chair and couldnt get it out to play again, oopsy) and about 10
music channels.
The first class part looked great - it actually inspired me into thinking maybe I should get a real job and start making some money!!! The seats were huge and they had big snazzy tv screens and nice fluffy pillows.
The coach part was decidedly less swish. It was no worse than any other airline but nothing special. There was an average anount of leg room but unfortunately for me, I didnt get to enjoy it.
I had a girl infront of me who insisted on having her seat as far back as it would go for the entire flight. Now I'm pretty tall (about 5"11) so theres hardly enough leg room for me as it is. My knees ended up jammed into the back of the seats for 11 hours. I asked her on several occasions to put her chair up (even half way would have been nice) but she didnt. I then asked 2 different stewardess' to ask her. One did ask her but didnt do anything else when she still wouldnt budge. The other said she would, walked off and never came back.
I was also slightly worried about the amount of rattling and shaking the plane did (I'm not the best of flyers). The entire interior sounded and looked like it was going to come crashing down around my ears at take off,
landing and everytime we hit even the slightest bit of turbulance. It didn't fill me with confidence.
While I realise that its a french airline it was also kind of annoying that they all refused to speak english to me. I blatently didnt speak french as everything I said to them was in english and I had a perfected blank expression everytime they spoke to me in french (I did german at school!!). But every conversation consisted of them asking me stuff in french, me guessing what it was they were asking, replying in english and getting the next question in french.
I actually had no problems with my case. It got to
seoul at the same time as me and in one piece which considering the rest of my flight I'm going to put down as some act of god and nothing to do with the airline. It was also very punctual and both flights (I had to change
in Paris) took off and landed on time.
I paid nearly 600 pounds for rude check in staff, half the luggage I actually wanted to take as I wasnt prepared to pay their extortionate excess charges of 25pounds per kilo, no proper meal as I had to eat around all the meat, and 11 hours of having the seat infront trying to take my knee caps off. Thanks Air France. It was great.
29/05/05
My friend scott has just come back from a jaunt in England. He took the same Air France flight as me. His bag was 25kg and nobody said a word. They just put a "heavy" tag on it. If you thought I was mad before then you were very wrong. Air France beware, there is a VERY angry letter on its way to you.
Happy Travels? I think not 
