Usually late, Air J is OK in the air, chaotic on the ground.
Written: Jan 08 '05
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Product Rating:
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Pros: They'll get you there with your luggage.
Cons: You will be late.
The Bottom Line: Late, but you'll get there.
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| mistsy's Full Review: Air Jamaica |
Air Jamaica is bankrupt again. It's always been that way as the company is generally poorly managed, but oh well, if you're going to Jamaica or beyond, they're not a bad choice.
Air J (as they call it) is generally reasonably priced and they're hooked up with Delta in some sinister codeshare deal that is supposed to be good for passengers.
The planes are newish and usually clean. You get a meal on almost every flight (we've flown them from NYC to Montego Bay (MoBay), MoBay to Barbados, St. Lucia to MoBay, Barbados to Grenada...) and free champagne in coach. We like food better than champagne, so we were naturally interested in the meal over the booze. The food is, well, gross. We had a wilted celery salad with canned chicken in it, a roll, and an oreo on one flight. On another we had part of a chicken (seemed like maybe a leg) with tons of bones and shards and overcooked beans and carrots. So don't fly for the food.
The seats reminded me of Aeromexico where the rows are really too close for comfort. If the person in front of you reclines, you'll have maybe 6" of headroom. Very claustrophobic.
Air J has it's "hub" at MoBay and it's utter chaos there. There are about 10 gates inside and 6 outside. They don't seem to plan in advance for flight arrivals/departures so it's anyone's guess what gate you'll be departing from until the last 20 minutes or so. If you're leaving from an exterior gate, you'll join a big, big crowd of people waiting to be let out on the tarmac. Low-ceilinged, narrow MoBay airport is just a travesty of poor design. It's so poorly signed that most people getting off the planes crowd the halls looking for where to go, making the place just a hot sea of sweaty people. There is lots more about MoBay airport you might want to know, but this is an Air J review.
Check in is chaos in most locations, though slightly better in the US than the islands. It's excrutiatingly slow for no reason, blindingly chaotic with people rushing the gate when it's announced, etc. It's all part of the experience.
On the upside, they've never lost a bag of ours, never rifled a bag, never crushed or damaged a bag either.
They also do e-tickets and they have never "lost" one. I know that sounds trifling, but on some of the airlines less experienced with e-tickets, you can get stuck as all you have is some printout you made at home that they have never seen and have no idea about. Air J does OK with e-tickets.
I assume they're pretty safe as they are quite strict about enforcing all those little rules like getting the bag all the way under the seat, even making you remove blankets on take off and landing... I guess so that in the unlikely event of a crash, you won't get tangled in it?
The biggest pain is the total disregard for timeliness and the utter waste of time, needlessly. They'll check your boarding pass 3-5 times at the gate, at the plane, when you're on the plane, when you're in your seat, etc. They'll make you line up to get on the plane and then make you stand there for 20-30 minutes before boarding, they'll land and have no stairs to drive up to the plane, send you out on the tarmac with no stair ready, have no one to drive the airgate to the plane, etc. They'll even insist that you get a sticker for your hand luggage if you didn't get one at check in for some reason. They'll also just sit around on the ground for no apparent reason.
It's not really a big deal if you're patient and flying only on Air J as even if you have a connection, all the other flights are late so you won't miss a connection.
So why am I recommending this airline? You don't have a choice in many cases if you're flying beyond Jamaica and often they're the only jet service to any island. If you can just be very patient, they'll get you there safely and with your luggage at a fair or even cheap price.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
mistsy
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Location: Austin, TX
Reviews written: 125
Trusted by: 40 members
About Me:
Old, cranky, but still, umm, trying to be hip (if it hasn't been replaced yet.)
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