Adam

Aug 24, 2023

Chaos and confusion, Europe to Australia via Xiamen

Where to begin? Chaotic and uncoordinated from beginning to end! Their booking site shows one price in the calendar, then much higher when you go to book. You try to request a special meal: after a lot of emails and even requests to send your passport by email (!) you are told it can’t be done. Meat meals only. You try to check-in online. “This option is being implemented”. Except it’s not. The flights from Amsterdam are jam-packed and everyone’s randomly allocated a seat before checkin is opened, so there’s nowhere to move seats to even if you come early. Yes you could (perhaps) have bought a seat during booking if you feel $54 US is a fair price for 67B. The booking process loses my frequent flyer number (deliberately?) Confusing emails (some only in Mandarin) are sent about how to pay for a return flight if you’re denied entry for covid reasons. You have to register a RAT test on a dysfunctional government website (yes, August 2023 and still RAT tests!) Airport Checkin is full of misinformation: Skyteam check-in staff have been told that bags and boarding passes are good only to Xiamen, then you’ll have to leave the airport and go through the whole process again. This is “because there are so many people on the flight”. Hello?!! Amsterdam to Xiamen is chocklablock full, with nice attendants, reasonably clean plane and 31” legroom, but it’s chicken or beef only, and no bassinets mean screaming babies are randomly scattered around the plane. People who wanted windows have been given aisles and vice versa, couples seated apart, etc, and it was all solvable; 11hrs is a long flight. “De-planing” is met with long unexplained delays. Xiamen airport is a confused mess. Eventually, after 90 minutes chasing our luggage, it’s discovered that the bags DID go through, but it’s not possible to check-in till 3hrs before the next flight (9hrs). You have to join the massive customs queue anyway. Transfer passengers are guided (well, not really … you eventually find it by queueing in the wrong place) to a subterranean basement for 6hrs; I try my luck with the free hotel. 2.5hrs after landing I’m there. It’s good (but be prepared to share a room), but you have to find 100 yuan somewhere for the taxi (on a Sunday it was only 25 each way but you should allow 50). Money changers charge a whopping €5 commission even for small amounts. Hotel has no free wifi for foreigners and staff speak zero English. Check in again (regardless of whether you went to a hotel or not) maximum 3hrs before the flight. Oh, except if the immigration or customs officers have found something they don’t like about you. My neighbour (from Spain) was detained by them for 3hrs over questions about her Australian visa which were already resolved in Amsterdam. She shouldn’t even have had to deal with them as she was planning on staying in transit. Once again the terminal wifi is not working for foreign phones. There’s no help desk. Sit in boredom in an extraordinarily dull terminal. Yes I saved €100 but it was absolutely not worth the hassle and stress. Stick to more professional airlines.