Welcome to the Ciao experience....Thank you for the ratings everyone :-)
Welcome to the Ciao experience....Thank you for the ratings everyone :-)
Member since:13.12.2004
Reviews:19
Members who trust:15
The joys I have had with Alitalia.(little sarcastic smile)!
I used to fly Alitalia (and their partner Malev Hungarian) a lot. This was for lack of option rather than choice. Thank God BA has a direct route to my main holyday destination now.
TICKET SYSTEM
The pricing is dreadful and every-time you make an enquiry (be that via the internet or phone) the price tag goes up if you enquire with the same phone number or PC (logs ip addresses) so the price magically goes up every 10 minutes (you get the base price if dial with another phone so when at University half of my course would ring Alitalia if I couldn't find cheaper from Thomas Cook.) The price apart from being ridiculous it gets insulting from the service you get (£350 for 3.5 Hours total flying time)
FLYING OUT
I have always flown Alitalia (or Malev) via Heathrow at terminal 2 and the flights have always been for 6:00AM which is good because I could be in Rome/Milan in 2 and a half hours and be at my destination by midday (in Albania just north of Greece). Well that would be good if you flew any other airline but because the airline has 3 flights in a short time span (6:15, 6:45, 7:15) with lets say 200 people each the check in queue is gianourmous.
Alitalia has about 5 check-in booths at T2 plus 1 for their Prima (or Business/First) and also could in theory use 3 from Malev (staffed by Alitalia) and 2 from Olympic Greek. You would think that with that many staff and that many booths the queue would be cleared in no time. Hmmm NO...
See the problem is that Alitalia has more than enough staff easily recognisable
by their green jackets but there is none there at 4:00AM (time which when they tell you to be there) as they all come looking pissed off at 5:00AM (1 hour to check people in, 600+ passengers; Genius), steadily and calmly smiling (to each other as is a sacrilege to smile to the poor sods waiting in line that by this time look a bunch of survivors from Hurricane Katrina).
They occupy all the booths and your little brain joyfully does the maths and feels the heart with joy that things are finally going to move. Eheem Wrong.! As about 95% of them bugger off somewhere (the Costa Coffe on the Departures Lunge is a sea of green by this time, hint hint) and they return after half hour to stand as they watch the cattle (passengers) go through the thin line. You would be forgiven to think that after having had their cappuccino and 'brioche' they would be more cheerful but they as grumpy as my Nan trying to work out a GPS navigation kit.
Anyway one at the time the queue moves slowly (half of the people are turned away at the check-in desk because they have to pay for heavy luggage (20 KG max and they proper adamant on that) which you have to go back to the queue and go the office (serviced by 2 ladies and gent who is the only one not grumpy actually) that charge you £10.50 for KG so say if you have a laptop bag with camera and bits and bobs that weights about 6KB (being economical there) would costs you the best part of £70. Better ship it with DHL (it is cheaper and way safer). Their loss luggage rate is disastrous.
What is funny though is that Swiss Air and Lufthansa have absolutely no queue but Alitalia has hundreds. Ok maybe they don't have some many flights at that time but they always staffed. Olympic have though and you see 200 go through within 20 mins. Weight the bag, stamp ticket, stick tag bye bye Sir, job. Maybe is the Mediterranean way of being chilled out but Air France doesn't do that, nor does IBERIA. I look with envy as their queues move swiftly. Alitalia takes it slow like the flight is due to leave in 3 hours not 10 mins. Inevitably they have to re-shuffle the queue so the people due to leave first (the 06:15AM flight to Milan). People get upset as everyone has been waiting on the queue the same but they understand. The thing they don't understand is, why there are 10 Alitalia lady staff loitering next to queue talking about cosmetics (I owe that to studying Italian at school).
After the check in is done the outcome is one of the two:
FLIGHT MISSES DEPARTURE SLOT IN WHICH CASE:
You leave about 1 hour late and chances are you will miss a connection flight, which the Alitalia operators in Milan make it sound like is your fault are would try every trick in the book to make you pay for the missed flight. (Thank you EU legslation for forcing them to cough up). Not that they would put you in the next connecting flight, noooooo they will let you wait till the next morning and not tell you that but keep telling you that you have to wait a bit until the next flight (which you think OK I will get there soon). Nope you wait until 7:00 AM next day with no sleep. I wasn't the only one that this happened, two of my mates had the same but at least there were in Rome and decided to go (night) sightseeing. Aliatlia refused to pay for a hotel as it wasn't their fault they missed their connecting flight. It definitely was the sparkly elves that prevented them getting there on time.
FLIGHT GETS CANCELLED:
Loads of angry people demand refund or other way of getting to Italy (most of them old couple on romance reviving journey). Two hundred people went to demand action on the little both was asked rather impolitely to move away as they have customers to serve (other cattle to sell tickets for a premium price to), tough if you already paid. After much insisting (initially they said the cancelling of the flight was beyond their control) they came up with a very generous offer (cough, cough) or giving free flights to Rome (to the Milan bounded passengers) and passengers would make their own way to Milan. Initially people were biased by the offer after I rather loudly declined that on grounds that Rome and Milan are as close as Aberdeen and London and a train ticket (which Alitalia said is cheap as chips) costs €100+ and takes 7 hours. They were not amused and started cursing in Italian to each other and only stopped but still fuming inside when I told them in Italian that I can understand them.
OR SOMEHOW YOU MAKE IT IN-FLIGHT (if you do buy a lottery ticket, might be your lucky day):
The London to Milan route is not that bad and is served by nice and tidy AirBus aircraft and some staff are polite but they are really unsatisfied serving you giving you the why do you have to ask look. It is like they feel that there are doing unpaid work and it is a privilege to ask for water on an aircraft.
There is the odd nice cabin crew member but that's just the exception rather than the norm
The electronic equipment are not allowed full stop even though you can place them on a in flight mode (best to just use them deciding on the data sheet for the aircraft).
The food is horrendous when they serve it that is. On early flight you get a biscuit. On midday flights you get a minute ice-cream (in summer) or a chocolate (winter). Supper apparently is not served according to traditional Alitalia custom.
On the other flights there are McDonnell-Douglas from the 70s that make your heart jump at the sound of lose rivets and your gut revolve in the untidiness of the flying tin can.
The pilots are alright though and the landings are quite smooth so much praise for the pilots. They all ex Italian Air Force pilots so they are pretty experienced.
GROUND STAFF:
London Heathrow: As useful as a heater in the desert. Apart from looking like they don't want to do their job their willingness to help a fellow human being is below 0. It was this night when my mum and sister were coming to Heathrow and I knew their flight number and spoken to them just after checking-in on the other end but that flight came and no mother and sister. Well I though probably there is a queue at passport control/baggage/customs but two hours later I got worried. So first point of contact was Heathrow information point, that advised me to speak to Alitalia. Went to the infamous information booth and told them of my concern. Seriously worried that something had happened and Alitalia said we cannot give you any information on the passengers. I tried to explain that is my mother and sister and having my passport on me could prove my identity. They said that they don't have to tell Zilch and was told that they can refuse to give me that information if they want. No offer of help, no sympathy. Right no point banging your head against a brick all so I went to the next helpline ; the airport police that linked me with immigration and they had no information of those to persons arriving in the UK. Now that got me worried. Phones were off, apparently they left on the plane but never got to London and Alitalia refusing to comment. A policeman came with me to Alitalia to talk some sense into them but even he gave up. Well they eventually turned up at half past midnight (4 hours late) because the plane was grounded the flight number remained the same for the replacement plane which was overbooked so they put them on another plane. They just couldn't tell me that and put my mind at peace.
OVERALL:
I would only fly Alitalia if there no choice, but then again I would rather walk
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I'd rather walk too! You'd get there quicker and could stop for a beer on the way :D
Brilliant review.
torr 12.09.2006 14:12
My experience of them hasn't been quite as bad as yours, but I am reliably informed that ALITALIA is really an acronym for Always Late In Taking-off, Always Late In Arrival. Duncan
bengar 10.09.2006 19:00
Hehe! sounds terrible. Ah well, just don't fly - it's way better for the environment, and with all the global warming issues of the moment, i think that's pretty relevant. Good review. ben
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