Service flow on airlines

[Flashback]

How many airlines have you flown on, where you sit there and scratch your head at the order of service?

Well, I've done that on a few, but TK has left me really scratching my head.

I'm currently flying IST-TNR (via MRU) and the departure was 2.10am IST time (GMT+3), it arrives in MRU around 12:30 local time (GMT+4). My head was sitting somewhere in between GMT+5.5 (Sri Lanka), GMT+3 (IST, AMM, DOH) and GMT+1 (LON) ..... Presumable most people would be trying to get some kip not long after taking off, if nothing else to try and adjust better to the timezone if they've started elsewhere. The destinations being GMT+4 (MRU) or GMT+3 (TNR).

There are 2 meals, which are dinner and breakfast.

Now........ On the first menu page, where it has the dinner options, it says you can dine on demand. OK, sounds good......... used to this on Qatar. I'd tell QR I want this meal at this time and this meal at that time, regardless of the order of them on the menu.

On the next page, it has the breakfast menu, but the header is Before landing.

So, I think - great! I'll goto sleep as soon as possible, then have breakfast around 7.30am IST time and have 'dinner' just before landing.

OK, so there's a few issues here:

• There are no sleeping aids other than a pillow at your seat when you board - you have to wait till they're ready to come and hand them out. As 45 minutes had already passed since pushback, I just ended up going to sleep as is. I think about 15 minutes later someone came past asking if I'd like sleeping gear (blanket.......), but I was half asleep so just ignored it.
• While you can dine on demand, that only applies to the main meal the onboard chef tells me ........
• ......... and you have to have it before breakfast, you can't move/change the timing of breakfast.
• So, it's dining on demand - sort of, but also sort of not!

Am I the only one sitting here scratching my head? Lots of the connecting traffic is likely European originated, perhaps some US. I don't get why breakfast isn't the first meal served (as who is going to get onboard at 2am and have a full 3 course meal anyway??) which fits local time for both the origin AND destination, with a more lunch/dinner like meal reserved for just before landing which fits local time for both the origin AND destination.

Please help me out here

 

[MEL_Traveller]

It’s an odd one, and I’ve pretty much given up.

There might have been quite a few connecting passengers in economy who don’t have lounge access and would be hungry. So a meal is appropriate. Maybe it should be called ‘supper’ instead of dinner?

Ye old ‘breakfast before arrival’, even if that’s 5pm in the afternoon after an overnight from europe! But hey, the best thing about breakfast is the plate of cold fresh fruit to quench your mouth after a sleep.

As for meal nomenclature… my stomach isn’t smart enough to distinguish between proteins, or between carbs. Whether it’s a steak and bread roll (dinner) or bacon and croissant (breakfast)… it’s food. A protein and a carb. A steak vs bacon isn’t going to reset my body clock one way or the other

I suppose though that most people would prefer a breakfast after waking. Fresh fruit, croissant, bacon (or chicken sausage!) and eggs.

 

[Flashback]

I guess I got to have peach icecream, and a pear strudel for breakfast, at least! Plus a spicy Mexican mocktail.....


Usually the meal times will either match your origin body clock, or your destination body clock. That's why this makes no sense, as there's only a 1 hour time change so they should essentially be one and the same, instead of reversed.

 

[Mattg]

It always confuses (and annoys) me when airlines run a drawn out dinner service, then serve breakfast 3 hours before landing, on a 6-8 hour overnight flight. This leaves barely a couple of hours to actually sleep.

 

[sudoer]

It always confuses (and annoys) me when airlines run a drawn out dinner service, then service breakfast 3 hours before landing, on a 6-8 hour overnight flight. This leaves barely a couple of hours to actually sleep.

Qantas from anywhere in Asia...

 

[Flashback]

It always confuses (and annoys) me when airlines run a drawn out dinner service, then service breakfast 3 hours before landing, on a 6-8 hour overnight flight. This leaves barely a couple of hours to actually sleep.

And me, too! I did at least get a small bite to eat on MRU-TNR, which is far better than AF ever used to do when I had tag flights with them (very common in Africa), where you'd be lucky to even get a glass of water in J. It tasted better than it looks!

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Qantas from anywhere in Asia...

Flew down from Singapore a couple days ago. 6hrs55 flight time. Dinner was served all on one tray and wrapped up pretty quickly. By the time I got charged, made the bed and pulled on my eye-shade the screen said we had 5hrs32 left.

While the card said hot breakfasts would be served 90 mins before landing, in reality they let pax sleep until around 45 mins before.

 

[Mattg]

Flew down from Singapore a couple days ago. 6hrs55 flight time. Dinner was served all on one tray and wrapped up pretty quickly. By the time I got charged, made the bed and pulled on my eye-shade the screen said we had 5hrs32 left.

While the card said hot breakfasts would be served 90 mins before landing, in reality they let pax sleep until around 45 mins before.

I've had mixed experiences on Qantas from Asia.

I do recall flying SQ in Y though on SQ231, the 0045 departure from Singapore. Breakfast was served a full 3 hours before landing. Crazy.

 

[Cruise Luxury]

Agree it can all lack thought.

Several years back, pre-Covid I flew from Melbourne to Dubai in Emirates business class A380. The flight was around 10pm at night, from memory. So keen for dinner and bed.

The gally for the A380 is at the back of the upper level. We were about half way along.

For whatever reason it took them about 90 minutes to get around to serving nuts and drinks. Then they started dinner service, but they decided to trial a new system where everyone in the first half of business class got served all three courses first, and then everyone in the back half got served after.

So we waited and waited, as the smell of garlic bread and mains got brought past us from the back of the plane to service everyone ahead of us over a coughpy 90 minute period!

In the end “dinner” was served around 1:00am, and it totally killed the experience.