Well I'm not as big user of FCL's as some but I did have the opportunity to use them again over the weekend.
First the brickbat - SIN FCL. Waste of time visiting there - is it my imagination or is that lounge continuing to deteriorate? I went in, didn't find any food available other than the stock standard cold meats (I know they bring food around - but I didn't have time for that), noticed that the wear and tear on seats and carpet has continued further since I last visited, it was very noisy, so I left and went to the much more pleasant J lounge. There I could grab some hot food and it was - believe it or not - much quieter than the FCL.
Now for SYD FCL on departure - unfortunately my flight into SYD from MEL to connect with QF31 was delayed so that compressed the time I had, although I did reach the lounge about 55 mins before departure. Now I'm more of a regular at the MEL lounge, and this visit confirmed my preference for the MEL lounge, I find the SYD lounge too busy for it's own good. And the staff don't quite have the attention to detail that those in MEL have - for example in MEL when I've been there there they just offer water (still or sparkling) straight up - both times in SYD this year I had to request this not a big thing, but just illustrative of a difference in attention to detail And of course at MEL they are much more cognizant of departure time, basically because there is only ever one flight in the lounge at a time, so service is structured around that. In SYD it took half an hour for my main, which I had to scoff down, because my flight was already boarding.
But nevertheless, the food was tasty and good quality - and I am sure I would have had a better experience if my inbound flight had arrived on time. (Interesting though it is impossible to book a longer QF-QF connection online when booking ex-MEL, the most you can book is about 1:25)!
Next time, if I can I will just go out of MEL and sacrifice the extra 10 SC's - for a range of reasons not just because of the FCL.
First the brickbat - SIN FCL. Waste of time visiting there - is it my imagination or is that lounge continuing to deteriorate? I went in, didn't find any food available other than the stock standard cold meats (I know they bring food around - but I didn't have time for that), noticed that the wear and tear on seats and carpet has continued further since I last visited, it was very noisy, so I left and went to the much more pleasant J lounge. There I could grab some hot food and it was - believe it or not - much quieter than the FCL.
Now for SYD FCL on departure - unfortunately my flight into SYD from MEL to connect with QF31 was delayed so that compressed the time I had, although I did reach the lounge about 55 mins before departure. Now I'm more of a regular at the MEL lounge, and this visit confirmed my preference for the MEL lounge, I find the SYD lounge too busy for it's own good. And the staff don't quite have the attention to detail that those in MEL have - for example in MEL when I've been there there they just offer water (still or sparkling) straight up - both times in SYD this year I had to request this not a big thing, but just illustrative of a difference in attention to detail And of course at MEL they are much more cognizant of departure time, basically because there is only ever one flight in the lounge at a time, so service is structured around that. In SYD it took half an hour for my main, which I had to scoff down, because my flight was already boarding.
But nevertheless, the food was tasty and good quality - and I am sure I would have had a better experience if my inbound flight had arrived on time. (Interesting though it is impossible to book a longer QF-QF connection online when booking ex-MEL, the most you can book is about 1:25)!
Next time, if I can I will just go out of MEL and sacrifice the extra 10 SC's - for a range of reasons not just because of the FCL.
