Numerous Grupo TACA flights - Excellent Airline
Written: May 14 '05
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Clean Planes, Efficient, Good Passenger Service, Safe
Cons: None
The Bottom Line: Good budget carrier to South and Central America from the USA. Saving money is offset by odd flight hours and some long layovers.
|
|
|
| norwich's Full Review: Grupo TACA |
I flew roundtrip with Group TACA in March 2005 from JFK to Santiago, Chile for my first trip to South America. I’d not heard of the airline before but Internet research assured me they were safe and reliable. My budget certainly approved of their low fare – US$730 – roundtrip. The low fare though added time to the trip since there was a plane change and long layover in Costa Rica and a short layover and plane change in Lima, Peru on the way to Santiago and on the return. I made the reservation directly with TACA by telephone. The reservation agent was helpful and efficient, worked with me to find travel dates that would keep the cost down, and the e-ticket was waiting for me when I checked in at JFK.
Check in for the 7:00am flight out of JFK was quick and efficient. The ticket counter opened at 3:30am and I was one of the first in line having flown in late to JFK from MSP. TACA allows coach passengers two checked bags with a combined weight not to exceed 100 lbs. I’ll digress for a minute to praise JFK Terminal 4 and the TSA for having in place a smooth luggage handling practice. After flight check in, you take your tagged bags to the TSA facility at the end of the ticket counters. TSA has their equipment set up there. I unlocked my bags and the TSA officer assured me they’d lock them again after they had completed the inspection and before they sent them to the plane. My bags were indeed locked when I picked them up in Chile.
All my flights were on new Airbus 319s. The departure from JFK was delayed due to the heavy wet snow that had been falling for the last five hours. We had a lengthy deicing process. After deicing, the flight attendants performed a thorough visual check of the wing surfaces. They got right up to the windows by the window seat and took a long look at the wings. They repeated this process from many of the windows along the length of the plane. Then someone from the flight deck came into the cabin and looked at something reported by an attendant. A few minutes later, the deicing truck came back and sprayed the wings again. I was feeling quite relaxed about flying TACA after seeing this demonstration of their obvious concern with clean control surfaces on the plane.
All six flights I had for the trip to Chile and back on TACA had this in common:
The planes were clean. The seating in coach was not cramped. All flights were no smoking. There was a large, tasty snack service including that fabulous Costa Rican coffee, Café Britt. Announcements were in English and Spanish and all crew spoke English. Headsets for the entertainment system were free and the videos shown were in English if you selected the right channel on the system. Only one of the six flights was full. None of my luggage was lost, pilfered, or delayed.
Regrettably, TACA did show me they respond well to a large problem that upset their tightly run flight system. About an hour after leaving Costa Rica flying to Lima, the flight deck made an announcement in Spanish that had the passengers groaning. It was repeated in English and I learned that we were returning to Costa Rica due to a weather radar problem on the plane. My layover in Lima was only one hour so obviously I was not going to make the connecting TACA flight to Santiago. TACA impressed me by their handling of this dilemma once we were on the ground again in Costa Rica. Instead of parking at a gate in Costa Rica, they had us deplane to a waiting airport bus. As I climbed into the bus I noticed an abundant crew of baggage handlers quickly unloading the plane. TACA bussed us back to the terminal and told us to go immediately to gate 5. Multiple gate agents were there to assist us with any difficulties the delay caused and there was a plane waiting at the gate. The agent looked at my ticket and told me they were holding the TACA flight from Lima to Santiago. There were about 12 of us making that connection and I was impressed they would delay that flight from Lima for three hours. I doubt the passengers delayed in Lima were pleased. She also said to return in 30 minutes for re-boarding which allowed many passengers to make a phone call about their delay. When we landed in Lima, we parked on the ramp near the flight to Santiago and not at a gate. Again, numerous luggage handlers were unloading the plane and the few Santiago passengers were bussed to the already loaded flight parked on the ramp awaiting our arrival. Both of my checked bags had now made three transfers with TACA and both safely arrived with me in Chile. Good job TACA!
One last comment about the TACA ground operation. I had a five-hour layover each way in Costa Rica. The airport there is small, maybe 12 gates, but quite comfortable with numerous shops. I spent some time watching planes at the gate and the TACA crews servicing them. The three to five man luggage crews searched one another after they finished loading or unloading a flight. After closing the cargo door, each stood in a spread eagle stance and was patted down by another employee. Certainly not a guaranteed method to prevent theft but I’d never seen any other airline do that with their luggage crews.
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
norwich
|
|
Location: Rural SE Minnesota
Reviews written: 11
Trusted by: 6 members
About Me:
Don't tell the bishop - Ye saw me online.
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.