Yesterday I returned from 2 weeks in Malaysia and Singapore, my first and definitely my last trip on Air Asia X.
However, I am fully aware that in any purchase, 2 rules apply, caveat emptor and "you get what you pay for". I got this trip for nothing basically - just paid the taxes and charges of $120, so it was to put it bluntly a bloody cheap trip to KL and as I love travelling, hard to pass up. I added on $20 for seat selection and $13 for the comfort kit. Still a cheap holiday. Given that I knew things were going to be pretty crook on board, at checkin, I decided to pay a bit extra for an exit row seat.
The legroom in an exit row is fine, but pointless when you are crammed into a very narrow seat. I guess most airlines running A330's have 6 across seating. Air Asia X has 9 (3-3-3) and very narrow aisles. Ability to evacuate the aircraft in an emergency was one thought that came to mind during the flight. I wonder about how legal this is in the scheme of things. But with budget Asian airlines, maybe safety standards are not quite the same as ours.
Coming home I had a normal seat and I managed with the legroom. The bonus was that I had a whole row to myself, so I could spread out. Also the flight home was a daylight flight, a lot easier to cope with than the night flight out of Melbourne. You cannot sleep sitting in a standard Air Asia X seat. I arrived in KL feeling like I had done 10 rounds with Muhammed Ali!
The checkin process in Melbourne was fine. At KL, it was ok. The staff sat chatting and fartarsing about for awhile, then decided to start processing passengers.
The LCCT in KL is a dirty, noisy, hot, uncomfortable shed basically. 100 metres across the way is the vast, modern, clean, efficient, air conditioned, comfortable and 90% underutilised Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Tony Fernandes won't pay the fees to use aerobridges etc. Malaysian Airports are too stupid to see that they coould get some revenue for the underused asset.
Malaysia wants us to see it as a modern country yet what impressions do you get when you have to disembark from a plane down the stairs in heat or rain, just as we did when I started flying internationally in 1967. Haven't we made any progress in 43 years??
I also had occasion to use the Budget Terminal at Changi on this trip. It is still a shed basically, but there are sheds and there are sheds! Why is that Singapore can make budget travel more comfortable - at least in the terminal building. No bridges of course, all hard stand.
The stated aim is to make money which they do by overcharging for cough food and trolley loads of sxx_ they wheel up and down the aisles. That's fine, I don't buy Qantas's cough either when they roll out the duty free trolleys! There is no free water on the trip and they don't want you bringing your own on board. I didn't see anyone challenged though. Tony charges you 4MR for a 600ml bottle of water. The same bottle of water at Giant or Cold Storage supermarkets in KL costs 69 sen. You can buy 1.5 litre bottles of water at Giant for 89 sen. Now you know why he can give away flights free - and pay millions to join the big boys in the Formula 1 club.
Given that Tony wants to maximise revenue on his flights, I tried to upgrade to an XL seat at KL airport yesterday. They weren't interested in offering me a reasonable price to upgrade. There were about 4 pax in XL, all the other seats flew empty, a golden opportunity to make more profit on the flight. Why does these sorts of businesses, cut off their nose to spite their face. It's illogical.
Several of my Malaysian and Singaporean friends all said that Air Asia X is really designed for Asians, smaller build so not as uncomfortable perhaps as it is for Westerners. They also said that they would never travel on Air Asia for flights of more than 2 hours. That was their limit. An interesting observation.
Finally, I did one internal Air Asia flight from KL to Singapore. A much better experience. Seats more normal and far more comfortable.
OK, that's my little rant about Air Asia X!
