Review of Iberia flight Madrid → Mexico City in Business

Airline Iberia
Flight IB6405
Class Business
Seat 6D
Aircraft Airbus A340-600
Flight time 12:25
Take-off 27 Oct 19, 16:50
Arrival at 27 Oct 19, 22:15
IB   #48 out of 94 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings. 346 reviews
bldavid
By GOLD 2424
Published on 1st November 2019
Flights between Madrid and Mexico City in business class typically cost between 1900€ and 3700 € return. And when I saw Iberia's offer from Madrid to Cancún (with a connecting Interjet flight in economy from Mexico City) for only 980€ return I decided to book quickly.

Booking wasn't as easy as I thought. I booked on Iberia's website using my credit card but I received the following message: Please contact Serviberia via 901 111 5000. Your booking was not completed correctly. So the amount was blocked on my card but my booking was not confirmed. Nice. I tried to call this phone number - impossible from my country. I managed eventually to call Iberia in the UK. I had to give again my credit card number again over the phone, the agent told me my booking was confirmed - but it wasn't. I had to call again a few days later to have it confirmed and to receive a confirmation e-mail.

Do you think I would be happy to book Iberia again on their website?

I received an e-mail three months after booking and two months prior to departure that the the Interjet flight from Mexico City to Cancún was simply cancelled. No options offered. I called again and I was rebooked on completely different Iberia and Interjet flights - but at least I had a confirmed booking.

I first flew Air Europa (on a separate booking) from London Gatwick to Madrid. It took me exactly 100 minutes to get from Terminal 1 to Terminal 4S at Madrid Airport even if I was using business class check-in and security and there were no long queues anywhere.

My flight was scheduled to leave for Mexico City at 16.50

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Terminal 4 is very nice.

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Iberia has a separate business class check-in area at Terminal 4. There were three different queues - I couldn't find out why two of them were much longer than the third one. I was checked in anyway by an agent who didn't speak English very well and didn't know that the code CUN was for Cancún but who was otherwise friendly.

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There was no queue at all at Fast Track available for business class passengers which I appreciated very much.

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It took a total of about 25 minutes to get from check-in to lounge.

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I had to take the very efficient automated train to the 4S (Satellite) terminal.

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The Iberia lounge at Madrid Airport Terminal 4S is called Premium Lounge Velazquez

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The lounge is large and there's enough seating.

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There's an excellent view

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The food and drink choice was theoretically good: several cold and hot dishes were available. I had some paella and salmon and both of them were dry and definitely not very good. On the other I had some sausages as well that were delicious.



The choice of wine and other drinks was moderate and the quality was average

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I like that Madrid Airport is multi-language.

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I left the lounge when boarding started. The gate was a few minute easy walk. Priority boarding was available.

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Iberia's A340 has a 1-2-1 configuration in business class with 9 rows of seats in one relatively large cabin. Some of the window seats are closer to the window while some others are closer to the aisle; the once closer to the window are better. Some of the middle seat pairs have seats right next to each other so suitable for couples while some others are further away from each so even strangers sitting on the same pair of seats do not disturb each other.

It's important to note that the cabin was in an excellent condition.

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My seat

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The seats can be turned into a full flat bed

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Blanket, headphones and an amenity kit were waiting on the seat. The headphones:

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The amenity kit:

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There was a flyer advertising wi-fi:

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A voucher for free 4 MB was later distributed. I didn't use the wi-fi so I'm not sure how reliable the connection was

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My screen before departure

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Cava (spanish sparkling wine) and a hot towel were offered after boarding was completed. The friendly purser came to every seats to introduce himself.

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Push-back was very shortly after the scheduled departure time of 16.50 and take-off was at 17.15

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We were soon over Portugal

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Menu was distributed (sorry about the quality of the photos)




The purser announced over the PA that while Iberia normally offers first lunch then a light meal, the light meal would be first followed by dinner "in three or four hours". I believe that the crew changes routinely the protocol planned by Iberia as this order is better according to the crew's experience - and they're right. It might seem that not enough food was offered on a 12 hour flight but it was actually enough.

So a light meal consisting of Spanish omelette with chorizo served with green asparagus tips, artichoke confit and grilled tomato and fresh fruits was served. The omelette was good if nothing special.

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Dinner was served actually five hours after the light meal at 23.00 Madrid time: cold gazpacho soup and smoked salmon were first served on a tray. Both of them were very good

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Grilled bass with Provencal cherry tomato ragout, pumpking wedges, shiitake mushroom and courgette was served shortly after. It was also very good.

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I had San Simon cheese after the fish

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I selected Three chocolate cake as a dessert. It was also good.

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Nuts were offered about 90 minutes before landing

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Iberia offers onboard entertainment.

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I found the flight views good and easy to use.

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There's a good but not outstanding selection of movies




I first watched a documentary about Maradona

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I watched afterwards four episodes of Chernobyl.

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The flight show as we were approaching Mexico City

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The lights of Mexico City

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We landed at Mexico City at 22.15, exactly on time

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Thank you for reading my flight report!
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Verdict

Iberia

9.5/10
Cabin10.0
Cabin crew10.0
Entertainment/wifi9.0
Meal/catering9.0

Iberia Velázquez Premium Lounge - 4S

7.5/10
Comfort10.0
Meal/catering5.0
Entertainment/wifi10.0
Services5.0

Madrid - MAD

8.5/10
Efficiency8.0
Access8.0
Services8.0
Cleanliness10.0

Mexico City - MEX

7.0/10
Efficiency6.0
Access8.5
Services6.0
Cleanliness7.5

Conclusion

Booking with Iberia was a nightmare with a complicated payment process, a call center almost impossible to reach, schedule changes and flight cancellations with no alternatives offered. But all was eventually sorted out.

Terminal 4 at Madrid Bajaras Airport is modern and efficient. Priority security for business class passengers is useful.

The Iberia Premium Lounge Velazquez, the business class lounge at Terminal 4S at Madrid Airport is large with enough seating and good views but food quality was definitely very low.

Iberia's A340 business class seats are comfortable and the cabin on this flight was in a good condition. The cabin crew did their best to please the customers. Food was good if nothing extra-ordinary. The flight left and arrived on time. The overall on-board experience was excellent.

Information on the route Madrid (MAD) → Mexico City (MEX)

Les contributeurs de Flight-Report ont posté 8 avis concernant 2 compagnies sur la ligne Madrid (MAD) → Mexico City (MEX).

Useful

La compagnie qui obtient la meilleure moyenne est AeroMexico avec 7.5/10.

La durée moyenne des vols est de 12 heures et 0 minutes.

  More information

6 Comments

If you liked this review or if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to post a comment below !
  • Comment 528769 by
    KévinDC TEAM SILVER 6743 Comments
    I agree with you about the Velazquez lounge, it's nice and large with good views, but the food is basic. Sorry to hear about all the trouble you had with the booking process. I've also found Iberia's IT to be lacking. Nevertheless, the onboard product is quite decent and it's always cool to get to fly an A340-600.

    Thanks for sharing!
  • Comment 529068 by
    Fouvolant 15 Comments
    Thank you for your report Bldavid. Quality and quantity of pictures and comments are just perfect . . . not too much not too little ! I specially appreciated reading your report because I did book this deal as well. I will fly to Cancun next March from Nice via Madrid and Mexico (I paid 75 euro the return ticket NCE-MAD with Iberia). I also booked on Iberia.com and did not have any problem with the payment; the tickets arrived in my mailbox few minutes after booking. But since May, 22 when I booked this deal, all flights have suffered a change of departure time, the worse beeing 10 hours for the CUN-MEX leg. I called Iberia France and they changed the CUN-MEX flight in order to give me a good connection time in Mexico.
    Will you report the flights MEX-CUN-MEX on Interjet ? I would be indeed very interested to know what you think of this airine. I have read indeed many things on the Web and most were not very positive. Thanks again
    • Comment 529104 by
      bldavid GOLD AUTHOR 311 Comments
      Hi Fouvolant, thank you for your comment. A few things to know about Interjet if booked together with your Iberia flight:
      - MEX is an old and crowded airport, and it's not always easy to find your way around. On the plus side there are a lot of eating options
      - You can only check-in for your Interjet flight at the airport
      - Interjet is a single-class, economy-only airline
      - No lounge access or priority boarding even if your long-haul segment is booked on business
      - Legroom is huge: you only have about 180 seats for an A321
      - Both flights I took were absolutely full
      - Basic service: one drink and a snack are included. There's no buy-on-board service.
      - I got my boarding pass in Cancún for both segments and my luggage was sent all the way to Madrid. You connect at the same terminal in Mexico. The Iberia lounge at MEX is near gate 24.
      - Domestic and international flights leave from the same area at Mexico Airport which means that you don't need to pass border control when leaving the country.

      Enjoy your flight!
  • Comment 529164 by
    Fouvolant 15 Comments
    Thank you Bldavid for yourinformation concerning the Interjet flights. Best regards
  • Comment 529295 by
    atco 134 Comments
    Excellent report Bldavid,

    I too have found Iberia's IT to be an absolute disaster. My buddy and I booked flights through BA from MAD-LHR in Business and tried to select seats. Should be fairly simple right? No chance. Their website would just crash and error out.
    Call in and get the seat assignment then? Well took ages to find a number then I called it, pressed 1 for English and after 5 minutes of ringing with no answer gave up.
    Eventually my buddy called Iberia in the UK and managed to get the seats assigned.
    He had no end of issues as well with his Iberia+ account because they had his name listed with his surname twice.
    Iberia's website and all around organisation are a complete shambles so I am hopeful that at least our flights will be fine!
    Oh and we originally booked on the A340-600, got changed to an A350 and now since changed to an A330 :(

    Thanks for the comprehensive review of roughly what to expect both at MAD and on board.

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