My recent holiday in Spain was the first time I have flown with JMC and having read other opinions before going I was surprised at the quality of service I received. I didn't have high expectations, after all JMC airlines are only a package operator not a real commercial airline, but in comparison to other package flights I've had they were excellent.

When we booked the holiday the travel agent asked if we wanted to pre-book our seats, as there was a charge for this I declined. The travel agent advised me that without pre-booking we may end up sitting separately, as there are just the two of us and it's only a short flight this didn't worry me. On arrival at check in we were asked if we wanted two aisle seats or a window seat and one next to it. There was no question of us being sat separately.

~~~ Seating ~~~
The seating on our flight was, as usual, cramped. I think there is little you can say about this after all these flights are extremely cheap (the whole holiday cost only £340 for two of us). Fortunately it was a short flight of only about 1 hour 40 minutes so the cramped conditions were bearable. Also we had young children sitting in front of us who didn't recline their seats, had they done so I would have found the table jammed into my ribs.

~~~ Food ~~~
Although our flight was short we still received a hot meal. Being a vegetarian I have had some extremely unpleasant experiences of unidentifiable airline food. With JMC my hot meal did at least have the contents written on the lid, it was a bean casserole which was edible. The food is nothing special but then in economy class it never is, I also noticed they were serving children's meals to the kids in front.

~~~ Service ~~~
The on board service had both good and bad points. On the negative side drinks were not the first thing to be served, in fact everyone started buzzing the staff to order drinks with their meals, the drinks trolley was brought round after the food. The positive side of the on-board service was the lack of it! This may sound strange but on my last flight with Britannia (see opinion!) we were constantly harassed by stewardesses who seemed to have been trained by used car salesmen. JMC offered no such hassles, as cigarettes and drink are not sold on EEC flights anyone wishing to purchase gifts was invited to press the call button and the rest of us were left alone. Also although the in-flight magazine showed charity scratch cards for sale these weren't pushed under our noses for the usual guilt trip.

~~~ The Return Journey ~~~
The return flight with JMC unfortunately didn't contain myself. The day of our return there was a strike in Greece which left JMC (and undoubtedly other airlines) with some problems. To minimise these problems a different plane was sent for our flight. Unfortunately this was a smaller plane which was unable to take 7 of the passengers and we were among the "unlucky" seven. I say unlucky because we were routed on a flight from Barcelona to Heathrow and then given a limo home or in our case to the car at Gatwick. This meant we arrived home about 3 hours later than we should have. JMC as a company did do their best though and our homeward flight was Business Class with Iberia – watch this category for an opinion!