Since I moved out to Bali two years ago, I have tried various Indonesia low fare airlines as my transportation preferences for going home to Jakarta and Bandung. But these past few months I only stick to one airline, Indonesia Air Asia. There are many reasons why I chose this airline thought I’ve heard so many complains about it.
First, it offers reasonable price, with many interesting promotion as well.
pic from http://www.tucoo.com
Second, the online booking system makes my life sooo much easier. I couldn’t figure out why no other Indonesia airlines are following this great system. We, the customers, don’t have to be worried to lose our ticket because we can print as many copies as we like anytime, anywhere. We are able to make transaction earlier; when other airlines open their booking period most early two weeks before flight. We also can choose any flights that fit to our budget.
Third, Air Asia is the official low fare airline for Manchester United therefore I can enjoy Christiano Ronaldo pics as long as I want in the cabin. O yes, fly never been this fun.
Of course we still have to face delay issue. Hello, this is Indonesia we’re talking about. But still, I think so far Air Asia handles it quiet well. Here are some interesting notes and tips that I got from my own experience flying with Indonesia Air Asia. I hope it would be useful for you.
Ticket and online reservation
1. Join their Red Alert newsletter. You’ll get promotion information earlier than anyone who read it on the newspaper.
2. Be careful when you’re doing online transactions; make sure you don’t have any problems with your credit card (expired, over limit etc). NEVER, EVER click the stop, refresh, close button when air asia is processing your transaction. Make sure that your internet connection is performing well also.You’ve been warned.
3. NEVER EVER do any online transaction at public computer.
4. After finishing the transaction, travel itinerary will show up on your windows, do not close this window before you print its hardcopies or pdf or save the html (thought air asia will send this itinerary to your email address, but hey, you’ll never know what will happen next)
5. Check what written on your ticket over and over. Check all payment to make sure you do the transaction correctly, check your schedule, date and time. You don’t want to miss your flight and having trouble at the check in counter, will you?
6. When you’ve already received the travel itinerary in your inbox, put it in separate folder, to help you find it easily.
7. At the worst case when you lost your print out ticket, do not panic. Call their phone center, or go to their booth at the airport, they will ask your name, your credit card number, your flight schedule and they will print the tickets for you.
Simple huh?
Read this one to handle flight delay
1. Usually air asia team informs any flight delay few hours before. So make sure your cell phone is always on.
2. When you hear your flight is about to be delayed, whether it ruins out your whole schedule or not, do not stand still. Ask the staffs if there are any other flight schedule that’s available for you. If not, be insisting that you have to reach your destination on time, therefore you have to take other flight from other airline. Since airasia ticket is unrefundable, your money is not repaid as cash but as deposit instead. You can use the deposit to buy any airasia ticket at some other time.
Boarding time and on the plane
1. You can choose your site freely in the cabin. Nice actually, however it causes some other problem. Passengers tends to be rush on boarding time. Some passengers don’t mind to push, kick, step on other foot.Sucks! My advice is, be patient. It doesn’t make any difference whether you go into the cabin first or last. The plane won’t go anywhere, Honey.
2. Keep your boarding ticket. Trust me, you never know when you need it. Sometimes they do passengers recheck and recount in the cabin.
3. Pay attention to the stewardesses when they’re demonstrating flight safety guide. They demonstrate it more detail than other airline’s stewardesses.
4. Have some meal before you depart. Food and beverage are not included in your ticket. Thought they forbid passengers to bring food into cabin, I use to keep some snack in my handbag. The prices they offer for food in the cabin are three time more expensive than the retail prices.
Last but not least, please follow all the rules in the cabin, turn off your communication tools –underline this one people- , listen to cabin crews’ instruction and do pray. Then you can sit back, relax, and enjoy your flight…
