chris955

Best..Singapore by a country mile.
Worst...Aeroflot by 2 or 3 country miles.
I have flown with maybe a dozen different airlines but they were the standouts. Virgin Atlantic were also fantastic.

Wishwewerethere

Not in Business class

Grayling

Doesn't turbulence affect business class then

michael_w

Avoid Air China. Flew Sydney-Beijing -London with them this year. Never again.

koalakim

My vote for Singapore for consistent service and all round flying enjoyment even in economy.

Flew Qantas last year only from MEL to SIN and it wasn't great, no foot rests which is not good for DVT when you are only 5ft, forgot my main course, drinks service was a bottle of water and just general "thank goodness I'm not going all the way to London"!

Emirates, I've not flown with them in a while but used to find service up and down depending on the crew and they were always very slow to serve food, we were almost at Dubai one night before I got my dinner!

Flown with Cathay and they were fine. Malaysia also ok but you can see where they cut corners compared to SIA but they have biggest seat pitch.

Don't fly BA as they don't come to MEL but didn't have great service on flight to Singapore but would prefer them in an emergency! They seem to handle them well!

Avoid Aeroflop and Korean although their safety record has improved.

I guess airline also depens on if you want a stopover to break up the journey.

KK

Jon77

Best Singapore Airlines - good consistent service, good food, good entertainment, good with kids, good airport hub.

Worst I have been with on the Australia - UK route is KLM. We flew in a Boeing 747 that I don't think had been touched since 1974. No TV in the back of your seat, just a big TV set at the front and one half way back. They put a movie on every now and again, just the one movie at a time of course. Although it didn't matter for me as my headset jack point didn't work anyway.

Food was awful and the service very poor That was a VERY long flight.

debsy

I like Singapore and Emirates, but last week I flew with Thai from Brisbane to BKK in economy and I was surprised - I thought it was even better than Singapore

Centurion

Ah - Yes. Brisbane to BKK has a decent plane. However, BKK to London has some of the roughest 747's still on the route. No seat back TV in economy would make for a very long flight me thinks.

debsy

Yeah, it was a very nice plan. I flew with Turkish from Bangkok and they brilliant

Been there

Air New Zealand the best surprise in 50+ years of flying. Makes quaintass look ordinary

DadAgain

I've always stayed away from Cathay specifically because they have the 'no recline' seats. I'm damned if I'm sitting on a plane for 12 hours without being able to lean back a bit! - Having said that I had heard rumours that Cathay had moved away from those seats following to many customer complaints? (Can anyone verify?)

For me BA/QA have always been the best to fly with:
- decent timetables, minimal transits,
- BA from HK used T5 which is sublime compared to any other Heathrow terminal (although I think they've moved HK flights back to T4 now?)..
- Excellent 'emergency fallback proceedures' (Family were well looked after when their SYD-LHR flight was delayed for a week due to volcano in Easter 2010)

- and of course the ability to use the same FF points accrued rapidly here in Australia via work travel, hire cars, hotels, credit card spending etc etc etc... (I know other airlines have FF schemes - but I've not found anyone that enables ME to accrue flights quicker)....
- Add to that the wife now being eligable for QF family discounted flights and its a no brainer for us...

4pax BNE-LHR return at xmas for about $1200 (perhaps a little more - I dont remember how much I paid?).... and for that money I dont really care if the cabin crew arent as stunningly beautiful or servile as the Singaporeans!

DotSpot

The seats still recline, but when they do recline they don't move the back so it doesn't infringe on the person behind. The back of the seat is fixed and the seat kind of "opens out" into your own space. Haven't flown on them since the refit but apparently they are quite comfortable.

Have flown on Cathay, Singapore and Malaysian. Singapore the best by a mile (although I have heard Emirates are much better). Cathay weren't too bad, but IFE broke down 1 hour out of HKG and we had a 12 hour flight with no entertainment. Malaysian were good, but IFE nowhere near SQ levels.

Apparently QF are OK on the A380s, but the 747s are a bit rattly and the IFE isn't that good (PTVs are very small). The only problem with EK is that the connection is in DXB, so you have a 7 hour flight followed by a 12-13hr flight. SQ/CX/MH are both more of a 50/50 split.

Check out http://airliners.net/discussions/trip_reports if you want to read trip reports from the airlines, some very good information/photos on there.

Minnow

We will have to fly with our now 2 year old, so she will be 3 by the time we fly and such a long flight I must say I am a little worried about that for me and other passengers.... she's (so far ) been a very good flyer, just have to hope it stays that way

h2oskineil

About the seats.....
http://www.airlinequality.com/Product/Yseat-CX.htm

Grayling

No they are not.....the splits are about the same.

From Brisbane it is about 7 hours to Singapore/KL but then 13 hours or so to UK.