Etihad Economy Class Review
After flying with Emirates a few times, last week I flew Etihad Economy Class for the first time. It was not planned though. It all started while searching for cheapest flights to Australia. As usual, before making an online flight booking, I check out my favourite platforms for flights comparison like Skyscanner and Google Flights. Etihad and Emirates are the two favourite airlines because they serve Europe with a broad range of flights from all major airports and they offer cheap airfares to Australia.
Flying Etihad Economy Class to Australia
I was looking for a good flight price and I was lucky enough to stumple upon a return flight ticket to Australia for 835 Euros! This is rare, even in low season. If you consider that for a cheap return flight to Australia, in economy class, you will not find anything below 1000 Euro, from Europe. And I never happened to pay less than 1000 Euro in 10 years of travels. Before going into details of my Etihad economy class flight here are a few tips on how to snap at a cheap airfare to Australia.
How to find good Australia airfare deals
If you are a frequent traveller to Australia and want to find a cheap flight, start searching 3 to 4 months ahead and check out Skyscanner and GoogleFlights. You can then make a cross search with a few shortlisted airlines flying to Australia, like Emirates, Etihad, Qantas, Qatar Airways to name a few. Bear in mind that these Australia airfare deals don’t last long, sometimes one day or a few hours, so be constant with your flight search online.
Finding Airfare Deals to Australia with Skyscanner
Etihad Online Flight Booking
After having seized my flight deal on Skyscanner I was redirected to the Etihad Airways website, where I could complete my online flight booking. Before doing so, I did double check other flight options and noticed that the same flight was offered with different flight amendment fees. For changing flight dates Etihad charges between 100 and 200 Euro depending on the class of the economy flight ticket you have booked. So my flight offer was the cheapest airfare, with a 200 Euro fee for changing the dates. If you calculate that 200 Euro on top would make the flight ticket to 1000 Euro, which is the average airfare to Australia from Europe, I believe I still have grabbed a good deal. So I was happy to go ahead with my Etihad online flight booking.
Quick Guide to Etihad Online Check in
The process of online flight booking with Etihad was smooth up to the payment, where unexpectedly the site got stucked, just after entering my credit card details and clicked on “submit”. While it’s unusual to experience this type of inconvenience, there is no need to panic, it may happen if the site server is overloaded with bookings. I would first get hold of the customer service and double check with them. This is what I did, with the help of the customer service I could activate my booking on the phone. I found the helpline customer service very efficient and quick in their response. From Europe the service is available 24 hours, 7 days a week.
Etihad Online Check in
After my online economy flight booking was processed I received an email notification with the invite to sign up for the Etihad frequent flyer card, and I did so. You can then create your own account where you can retrive your flight details, submit changes, check baggage allowances, set meal preferences and use many more functionality. However for the Etihad online check in you need to access the check in from the Etihad home page and not from your own account, because your own account is not connected to the check in. I found this somewhat wierd, because I am used to the Emirates website where you can manage everything from your own account (check in oline included).
Etihad Airport Check in and baggage drop off
I got to the airport Milano Malpensa early in the morning, around 8.00 as my flight was due to leave at 11.15. am. All international flights are called to gate 1 hour before departure and they start boarding 45 minutes. Eithad baggage allowance is 30k for checked baggage and 8 kg for cabin baggage. The airport crew wasn’t that friendly and helpful as I expected, they were giving quick and pretty blunt answers to my questions.
Eithad Economy Class – Seats Comfort and Entertainment
The Etihad economy seats are not as wide as those from Emirates and are a bit dated, too soft and they lack of ergonomic. I flew with an Airbus from Milan with a 2-4-2 configuration and a B777 from Abu-Dhabi with the 3-4-3 configuration. While the leg space feel the same like on Emirates, the seat comfort could be definitely improved by renewing the seats. As for general economy class comfort in the cabin, the blankets are good quality fleece, soft and warm (way better than the beige Emirates blankets!) the seat pillow turns into a neck pillow, after tearing off the velcro strap. I found this handy and more comfortable than small pillows offered on other airlines.
Eithad Economy Class – Seats Electronics and Entertainment
As for the entertainment, similar to the Emirate ICE, the Etihad e-Box entertainment is good quality, with a wide screen, a great selection of films and music programs. The seat electronic is good. All seats are equipped with regular plugs and usb ports to plug in mobile phones, that’s good if you want to work at your laptop or ipad, you can plug in your device and recharge it. The only negative aspect of the entertainment are the announcements and ads. You get an overdose of it, not only before taking off and landing but also whenever you select a program from the inflight e-box entertainment.
Etihad Economy Class Cabin
This is really annoying no matter what you do, beware when selecting your film if you change your mind and want to start over again with a new one, you are going to listen to 3 ads in a row and they last between 8-13 minutes each time. And there is no way to skip them and jump to the selected program, you gotta watch it. I was lucky my seat was just next to the toilet so whenever I had accidentally picked a film and then stopped it to start a new one I had an overdose of announcements. Another thumbs down for collecting the headphones 30 minutes before landing, this is something I had already experienced with Emirates. The reason behind, not sure though, is because a lot of them go stolen. So either you have your own headsets or you will have to stop watching your movie or plan your movie to finish at least 30 minutes before landing
Etihad Economy Food and Drinks
While you cannot expect food in the economy class to be fantastic, I found food with Etihad better than the food from Emirates. I always pick a vegetarian meal on flights, as I prefer a light meal. Portions are big enough not to go hungry soon after the meal and quality is acceptable. They also offer “Bites” in between meals, sort of small snacks like crackers. I had a veggie pie or fruit salad which was a good refreshment. I haven’t seen them going around with tables and glasses of water in the night like Emirates used to do. I think in the meantime Emirates stopped doing this and unless you have your own bottle of water filled you will not get much water offered from the cabin crew. The good thing about Etihad is that they serve food and drinks at the same time, not like Emirates where I remember waiting 40 minutes to get a drink after the meal was served.
Etihad Economy Class Meals
Etihad Crew Service
Right at the boarding gate there has been an issue with the customs. Although we were on a transfer flight the big surprise was they confiscated my newly purchased bottle of water. They asked to empty or drink it. How can I possibly drink 1 liter of water in a couple of minutes? I tried to gulp 0.5 liter maybe and threw the bottle in the disposal bin. This is a wierd rule of the Australian goverment has recently introduced on transfer flights. So for me it was a hard loss to deal with, as I need to drink lots of water on the plane. While I manifested this issue, the chief stewardess from the business class handed over a new bottle of water to me. That made my day… don’t touch my water please
Etihad Economy Class Service
It seemed to be a lucky day, as the flight was only half full, which meant plenty of free seats in th economy class and many in row of 3-4 seats too! My star was shining! After moving 3 different seats and let first families and kids be accommodated, I finally found my seat with the help of a stewardess. I got a seat in a row of 4, just behind the business class and the first set of toilets of the economy class cabin. All in all I found the the cabin crew on Etihad professional, effective, with a friendy and helpful approach which is unusual to experience on economy class flights nowadays.
Here you can learn more on how to find cheapest flights to Australia. Here you can learn how to find cheap domestic flights Australia.
Have you been flying with Etihad economy class recently? ?How was your experience Please leave your tip here below, thanks!
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The post Flying Etihad Economy Class to Australia appeared first on Rocky Travel.