Finnair to launch Melbourne-Helsinki flights

[Flyfrequently]

I will call Qantas next week and report back.
Interestingly booking J through Finnair in July is sub $4k return
Not sure if I am a fan of their non-reclining bed though - need to do more research.

 

[Saab34]

Seat fees seem stupid. $130-$150 to select a Y seat on a MEL-BKK.

 

[Bofter]

Interestingly booking J through Finnair in July is sub $4k return
Not sure if I am a fan of their non-reclining bed though - need to do more research.

I have flown on the air lounge and was happy enough that I have booked to do so again.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I will call Qantas next week and report back.
Interestingly booking J through Finnair in July is sub $4k return
Not sure if I am a fan of their non-reclining bed though - need to do more research.

The only research you can really do is to fly it. Anything else won’t cut the mustard!

 

[SeatBackForward]

Will be tagging onto AY146 tomorrow from BKK, will be interesting to see how many aboard are continuing from MEL onto HEL.

 

[SeatBackForward]

Cute signage up at HEL

 

[FlyingFiona]

The only research you can really do is to fly it. Anything else won’t cut the mustard!

Agreed. I thought I'd hate it but after flying it I think it's one of the best!

 

[Mwenenzi]

Finnair article 17 Oct 2026 (from a FT post)

How the Helsinki–Melbourne route is flown

Behind the scenes of Finnair’s 22-hour Melbourne flight: how the service is designed, what happens in Bangkok and how much blueberry juice we need.

www.finnair.com

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Finnair article 17 Oct 2026 (from a FT post)

How the Helsinki–Melbourne route is flown

Behind the scenes of Finnair’s 22-hour Melbourne flight: how the service is designed, what happens in Bangkok and how much blueberry juice we need.

www.finnair.com

So stoopid… quote from the article around ‘when are meals served?’

We aim to serve meals when passengers are most likely to want to eat, and to offer as many peaceful moments as possible for sleeping on the flight. ​

Errr… they serve a meal after takeoff, and a snack before landing

I would have liked to have seen the answer to the question ‘how do I sleep when you don’t provide pillows in economy?’

 

[Bofter]

So stoopid… quote from the article around ‘when are meals served?’

We aim to serve meals when passengers are most likely to want to eat, and to offer as many peaceful moments as possible for sleeping on the flight. ​

Errr… they serve a meal after takeoff, and a snack before landing

I would have liked to have seen the answer to the question ‘how do I sleep when you don’t provide pillows in economy?’

Or what proportion of the cabin crew (not tech crew) on the BKK-MEL-BKK flights have their home base in HEL. Some announcements make me suspect the number is not high, perhaps just enough to cover off on having at least someone Finnish speaking. Such arrangements would not be unique to Finnair, but the way the article talks about hotels for cabin crew doesn't fit other announcements about their BKK crew base.

Sometimes PR articles contain a few interesting bits hidden amongst the PR slop. I think their consumption rate of blueberry juice was about as close as this one got, sadly. I am happy the article was shared, but wish they had actually said something more in it.

 

[SeatBackForward]

Finnair getting in on the "Cancel flights with only a handful of passengers" trick, great when they only offer that flight once a day...*sigh*

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Finnair getting in on the "Cancel flights with only a handful of passengers" trick, great when they only offer that flight once a day...*sigh*

Covered by EU261, so €€ compensation, and rerouting at earliest opportunity in same cabin. And duty of care if required. For most economy and premium economy passengers it would be a free upgrade!

 

[Mattg]

Finnair getting in on the "Cancel flights with only a handful of passengers" trick, great when they only offer that flight once a day...*sigh*

What flight/s did they cancel?

 

[serfty]

Covered by EU261, so €€ compensation, and rerouting at earliest opportunity in same cabin. And duty of care if required. For most economy and premium economy passengers it would be a free upgrade!

Not for bookings involving the MEL/BKK AY segments with no transit to/from an EU/UK port.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Not for bookings involving the MEL/BKK AY segments with no transit to/from an EU/UK port.

Correct

 

[SeatBackForward]

What flight/s did they cancel?

A regional hop from SVG (Norway) to HEL, only one flight each day. So sorry, not on topic for this thread.

 

[fairbasa]

Wow, the AY availability via QFF is a mess. A mix of phantoms and married/divorcing availability. And what Finnair has available to its members bears little resemblance to what QFF can actually do. For instance, in two calls to QF all classes were 0 for my date for the BKK-MEL leg. The website was showing all classes as bookable with points. On a third call (30mins later), they could see J on that leg and date, but couldn't book it as part of HEL-BKK-MEL, requiring two separate bookings (with resulting unreasonable point cost). For the following day, the same itinerary was successfully bookable all the way through (one ticket) on the phone, but errored out online when trying there first. Meanwhile, Finnair's own site has no availability on either date in J, but two days ago had availability but only offered as individual segments, while two days earlier it was fine to book all the way. The saving grace in all this is that each call only involved about 5 mins of waiting! And then unnecessarily long times with the really not very good agents... including being transferred three times. So I'd say that if you get any errors when trying to (compulsorily) use the multi-city interface to finalise a booking, don't assume it's phantom or will pass... just sigh and call. And insist they check both through-itineraries and individual segments to see what might be going on.

Any resolution to your booking issue? I tried booking using the multi-city tool HEL-BKK and BKK-MEL but got the same error at the payment page. Had two call centre agents tell me there's no availability on the BKK-MEL leg, but when I try to book just that leg it gets further to the credit card page so I think they're not quite right.

Seems to be some sort of divorced segment logic. Pretty frustrating.

 

[madrooster]

AY (like BA and QF who also operate through flights) have different inventory for MEL-HEL, vs MEL-BKK and BKK-HEL. Therefore it is possible to see availability on MEL-HEL, but not MEL-BKK and vice versa.

You may see inventory on both MEL-BKK and the continuing BKK-HEL, but you cannot book those together without a stopover in BKK.