Wee Lassie

Hi Guys

Looking to fly home for Christmas to either Glasgow/Edinburgh or Manchester.

As it stands China Southern Airlines are by far the cheapest, has anybody flew with them before, if so , how was the flight? Do they have the screens at the back of the chairs for entertainment as we need to keep 3 children occupied. The travel agents we have spoke to dont recommend any Chinese airline.

Flights are looking expensive at the moment, does anybody have any advice as to when the best time to book is or is it just your luck. We havent flew home before since we came 4 years ago so have nothing to go on.

Thanks

roaringmouse

Would be interested in this too, as their London route starts in June - currently a different airline would take you from Guangzhou. A Chinese friend of mine uses them when visiting his parents (in Guangzhou) and he says they're fine, although service may not be great.
Travel agents tend to only recommend certain airlines for commercial reasons (e.g. with Flight Centre there's a pretty high chance you'll end up on Qantas).

Bermudashorts

I don't think there is a best time to book when it comes to Christmas flights. You could possibly keep your eyes open for another month or two to se if anyone has a special on, but chances are that it won't include Christmas dates anyway. Generally the sooner the better.

I have only used the Chinese Airlines within China (couple of different ones and can't remember which) and they were fine for that.

kmthor - mackay

what prices are you getting , just had a quick look $2390 for December

LINZI

Yes we are looking at flights at Christmas to the uk and they came up as the cheapest for us but we are unsure about flying with them. I would rather fly with Singapore Airlines as we flew with them 6 years ago to come here and we had no problems. But they are nearly $10000 (2ad/2child) with whats coming up. We are looking at booking in the next month so will have to decide soon with who we are going with.
I am not looking forward to flying that far again

Bermuda Girl

I flew with them back to UK for Christmas 2010 and had a dreadful experience.

Major issue was that it didn't seem clear to anybody if we needed a Chinese visa or not.

At Sydney airport I was originally told that I needed one (although travel agent had said not), but after much discussion and checking with superiors they decided that one wasn't required, but they made me fill in and sign a form declaring that I wasn't planning on staying in China.

The first flight was to Guangzhou, and I don't remember anything much about it, so it can't have been too bad. Seem to remember the food was actually quite nice.

On arrival in Guangzhou, all non-Chinese passengers (only about 10 of us) were asked to wait together to be taken through immigration. Then big problem that none of us had Chinese visa. We had to wait together in a room for about an hour, without our passports which had been taken from us. There was a guard to look after us, but virtually no-one spoke english.

Eventually they gave us all a 24 hr visa and took us through.

We then were all told we had to pick up our bags and recheck them in. They hadn't been checked right through. Mine wasn't there, and I wasn't sure if it had been just been taken through or not.

Managed to find somebody who spoke some english, and he was actually fairly helpful, but assured me that if my bag wasn't there then it was not already on the next plane and must have been left in Sydney, and to fill in a lost-luggage claim, which I did.

Got the rest of the way home without further incident. Had a short internal flight through Bejing, and that was fine.

On the plus side, my final leg was into Amsterdam, then directly to Edinburgh, avoiding London. So relieved it was, as that was the couple of days that Heathrow was closed due to snow, and I'd have been stuck there if flight had even got there.

My bags were located in Amsterdam about 3 days after I got to Edinburgh. A women phoned me to let me know, and said they were available for me to pick up from Amsterdam airport. Took a bit of persuading that I couldn't do that as I was in another country (which I had detailed on the lost-luggage claim), but did eventually get the point across. Finally got my bags about a week after I arrived in Edinburgh.

To be fair, most of the airports in northern Europe were in chaos, and it was over Christmas and Boxing Day public holidays, so I don't feel I can blame Southern China Airways entirely for the length of time it took to get my bags back.

I debated trying to arrange a Chinese visa for the route back, but decided it would look worse if I applied for one but it couldn't be processed in time, so would risk going without (having again checked with travel agents and been told visa not required anyway as was just passing through).

Luckily the first flight into China was Bejing, and there was no problem with lack of visa. I'm pretty sure I was just granted a 24hr one without question (would need to check passport to confirm that). They seemed really well set up and unconcerned that non-chinese were passing through their country.

Got to Guangzhou again, and more drama. Can't really remember exactly what the cause of it was this time, but the result was that a bunch of us missed the connecting flight to Sydney, and there wasn't another one until the next morning.

Southern China were planning on putting us up in a local hotel over night, then putting us on the flight the next day. They would transport us too and from the airport to hotel.

However, there was a flight the same evening to Melbourne which I insisted on being put on. Airline was not very keen on me doing this, and I had to talk to a couple of senior people. Eventually they did put me on that flight, but only if I signed a disclaimer that getting from Melbourne to Sydney would be at my own expense, and they had no responsibilty towards me once they got me to Melbourne.

I decided it was worth paying an Australian internal flight to avoid spending any more time in that airport or city. I just didn't believe they would get me too and from a hotel and onto a flight the next day without there being a problem of some kind.

Perhaps I was unlucky, and it certainly makes for good journey-from-hell story now, but I wouldn't fly with them again.

Might consider it if didn't have to go through Guangzhou, as think more of the problems stemmed from that airport and their staff rather than the airline, but certainly wouldn't do the same route again.

Swerv-o

I've never flown China Southern, but I have flown China Airlines through Tiepei and they were pretty good. Don't discount them just because they have 'China' in the name, so maybe see what they are offering.

That was last year at Christmas, and though the plane wasn't the most modern, the focus on customer satisfaction was pretty good.


S

moneypenny20

I might be missing something here and presumably it was a 'had to be there' to understand but none of that story sounds dreadful to me. A minor issue regarding the visa but that's a airport issue rather than an airline one and no apparent issue with the actual flights?

Bermuda Girl

Fair enough - but if an airline is running connecting flights through somewhere then I think it is mostly their responsibility to ensure it goes smoothly.

Being without my bags for 7 days of a two week holiday was very inconvenient, if not exactly dreadful.

Being held in a room for over an hour with an armed guard and without our passports, and nobody telling us what was going on was scary at the time, but in retrospect all was okay in the end. I wouldn't have wanted to have had small children with me though.

Missing connecting flight on the final leg of a 24hr trip back to Sydney was the final straw. Maybe not "dreadful" on its own, but on top of the other two was not fun.

A couple of times in my post I said the actual flights weren't too bad, but as the 2nd person to post specifically mentioned flying via Guangzhou I think my experience would be useful to them when considering whether to fly via there or not, whichever airline is running the route.

Shenni

Are your dates variable or fixed as sometimes by moving a date a bit can make a difference to the cost. Also looking about the 6 months prior to flight is when you appear to get the better deals as that is when they bring in any discounts.

stevemich

whenever I have looked at them (via Webjet etc) the duration for Sydney to London was around 50 hours, compared to 24 ish fo rthe other main carriers.
Maybe this is why they are cheaper?

roaringmouse

There's a review in The Age for China Southern - although it's for premium economy and going to Hanoi via Guangzhou.