Inflight Review by : Gan Yung Chyan
/ KUCINTA SETIA
Distributed to All Press Media & Travel Professionals
Airline : Cebu Pacific Air Airbus A320 in Manila.
Routes : Cebu Pacific Air flies from Manila, Clark, Cebu and Iloilo to Singapore with Airbus A320, A319 and A330 jets. On 26 March 2015, it launches direct Cebu-Tokyo-Cebu flights four times a week every Tuesday, Thursday and weekends using A320 aircraft. The flight from Cebu departs at 5.55 am and arrives in Tokyo Narita at 11.20 am. The return flight departs from Narita at 12.05 pm and touches down in Cebu at 4.25 pm. Cebu Pacific Air flies to 27 domestic and international destinations and operates around 700 flights per week from its Cebu hub.
Aircraft : The Airbus A320 has narrow legroom. ***
Safety Demonstrations : Adequate.
Inflight Service : Service is mediocre. The very few air stewards are cheerful and eager to please passengers. Some air hostesses pull long faces at passengers requesting for this and that and they do not smile much. Overall, they attend to passengers' requests very well. They speak competently in Tagalog and English but not Mandarin and other Chinese dialects. There is a brief inflight game on every flight.**
Postcard / Stationery : Cebu Pacific Air issues free logo barf bags and Philippine immigration arrival forms. Nowadays, foreign tourists are not required to fill in immigration departure forms. Filipinoes must fill in departure forms before checking-in their respective flights from the Philippines. There are no postcards.***
Inflight Magazine : Smile is the official inflight magazine of Cebu Pacific Air. ***
Sky Shop : There is an inflight duty-free catalogue . Cebu Pacific logo souvenirs are listed in Smile. The airline regularly sells useful items. This month it sells different kinds of socks, backpacks and luggage covers, to name some. ***
Onboard Meals and Refreshments : Onboard hot meals can be booked online in advance but it is not certain whether the prices are lower than or same as those sold onboard. Cebu Pacific Air's web-site does not provide the assurance and must make an effort to address the issue. Hot meals are standard Filipino food, beef and chicken dishes with no memorable taste. Refreshments and juices are also served. **
Surcharge : Passengers do not need to pay a surcharge if they want to sit at the emergency rows. Cebu Pacific Air has eliminated fuel surcharges.****
Bookings : Cebu Pacific Air also accepts online payments via PayPal. Electronic tickets are issued at official web-site www.cebupacificair.com and received via email. There is a pdf itinerary attachment. There are no refunds for ticket cancellations. Web-check-in boarding passes must be printed from the web-site under "Manage Booking". Online boarding passes cannot be emailed to the passengers.
There is a factual error in every Cebu Pacific Air online booking, which is the error in the Philippine departure tax from Manila, for example. It states departure tax amounts to 1,620 Pesos but departure tax from Manila is only 550 Pesos. Cebu Pacific Air must make an effort to correct the clause on each online ticket issued. Besides, the airline must ensure that its call centre agents understand that a shoulder-travel bag and a small bag or tote bag can be carried onboard under a maximum total weight of 7 kg.**
Check-In and Departures : Check-in at Cebu Pacific Air counters. Cebu Pacific Air regularly delays flights on departure and many times cancels flights for reasons unexplained. From 25 December 2014 to 15 January 2015, it cancelled or delayed domestic flights and several international flights as ground crew were reported on leave during the public holidays. The airline was penalised severely as a result and risked evocation of licence if it repeated its mistake on public holidays. The airline's on-time performance is the lowest in Southeast Asia.**
Ground service in Singapore : Good. It would provide potential customers convenience if Cebu Pacific Air opened a downtown sales and ticketing office in the city centre of Singapore to facilitate off-line bookings and answer walk-in enquiries during office hours, just like Lion Air. The call centre agents in Manila sometimes do not understand phone-in enquiries. **
Ground service in Manila in response to passengers' requests and enquiries : Poor. **
Overall Impression : Cebu Pacific Air, judging from various aspects of its services, is a two-star airline with plenty of room for service improvement. It needs to put in effort to project its image as a reliable LCC.
** Poor / two-star
*** Good / three-star
***** Very good / five-star
****** Excellent / six-star (the highest category)
/ KUCINTA SETIA
Distributed to All Press Media & Travel Professionals
Routes : Cebu Pacific Air flies from Manila, Clark, Cebu and Iloilo to Singapore with Airbus A320, A319 and A330 jets. On 26 March 2015, it launches direct Cebu-Tokyo-Cebu flights four times a week every Tuesday, Thursday and weekends using A320 aircraft. The flight from Cebu departs at 5.55 am and arrives in Tokyo Narita at 11.20 am. The return flight departs from Narita at 12.05 pm and touches down in Cebu at 4.25 pm. Cebu Pacific Air flies to 27 domestic and international destinations and operates around 700 flights per week from its Cebu hub.
Aircraft : The Airbus A320 has narrow legroom. ***
Safety Demonstrations : Adequate.
Inflight Service : Service is mediocre. The very few air stewards are cheerful and eager to please passengers. Some air hostesses pull long faces at passengers requesting for this and that and they do not smile much. Overall, they attend to passengers' requests very well. They speak competently in Tagalog and English but not Mandarin and other Chinese dialects. There is a brief inflight game on every flight.**
Inflight Magazine : Smile is the official inflight magazine of Cebu Pacific Air. ***
Sky Shop : There is an inflight duty-free catalogue . Cebu Pacific logo souvenirs are listed in Smile. The airline regularly sells useful items. This month it sells different kinds of socks, backpacks and luggage covers, to name some. ***
Onboard Meals and Refreshments : Onboard hot meals can be booked online in advance but it is not certain whether the prices are lower than or same as those sold onboard. Cebu Pacific Air's web-site does not provide the assurance and must make an effort to address the issue. Hot meals are standard Filipino food, beef and chicken dishes with no memorable taste. Refreshments and juices are also served. **
Surcharge : Passengers do not need to pay a surcharge if they want to sit at the emergency rows. Cebu Pacific Air has eliminated fuel surcharges.****
Bookings : Cebu Pacific Air also accepts online payments via PayPal. Electronic tickets are issued at official web-site www.cebupacificair.com and received via email. There is a pdf itinerary attachment. There are no refunds for ticket cancellations. Web-check-in boarding passes must be printed from the web-site under "Manage Booking". Online boarding passes cannot be emailed to the passengers.
There is a factual error in every Cebu Pacific Air online booking, which is the error in the Philippine departure tax from Manila, for example. It states departure tax amounts to 1,620 Pesos but departure tax from Manila is only 550 Pesos. Cebu Pacific Air must make an effort to correct the clause on each online ticket issued. Besides, the airline must ensure that its call centre agents understand that a shoulder-travel bag and a small bag or tote bag can be carried onboard under a maximum total weight of 7 kg.**
Check-In and Departures : Check-in at Cebu Pacific Air counters. Cebu Pacific Air regularly delays flights on departure and many times cancels flights for reasons unexplained. From 25 December 2014 to 15 January 2015, it cancelled or delayed domestic flights and several international flights as ground crew were reported on leave during the public holidays. The airline was penalised severely as a result and risked evocation of licence if it repeated its mistake on public holidays. The airline's on-time performance is the lowest in Southeast Asia.**
Ground service in Singapore : Good. It would provide potential customers convenience if Cebu Pacific Air opened a downtown sales and ticketing office in the city centre of Singapore to facilitate off-line bookings and answer walk-in enquiries during office hours, just like Lion Air. The call centre agents in Manila sometimes do not understand phone-in enquiries. **
Ground service in Manila in response to passengers' requests and enquiries : Poor. **
Overall Impression : Cebu Pacific Air, judging from various aspects of its services, is a two-star airline with plenty of room for service improvement. It needs to put in effort to project its image as a reliable LCC.
** Poor / two-star
*** Good / three-star
***** Very good / five-star
****** Excellent / six-star (the highest category)
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