Review of Royal Jordanian flight Hong Kong Bangkok in Business

Airline Royal Jordanian
Flight RJ183
Class Business
Seat 1A
Aircraft Airbus A330-200
Flight time 03:30
Take-off 13 Aug 13, 21:35
Arrival at 14 Aug 13, 00:05
RJ   #18 out of 96 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings. 60 reviews
flyingjapans
Published on 28th October 2013
This is the next leg of my trip back from Japan. I have already posted the two first segments HND-PEK and PEK-HKG a while ago.


1. Paris CDG - Amman (Royal Jordanian 118, Airbus A321, Crown Business, FR)

2. Amman - Bangkok (Royal Jordanian 182, Airbus A330-200, Crown Business, FR)

3. Bangkok - Hong Kong (Royal Jordanian 182bis, Airbus A330-200, Crown Business, FR)

4. Hong Kong - Singapour (Singapore Airlines 861, Airbus A380-800, Economy, FR)

5. Singapour - Tokyo/NRT (Singapore Airlines 638, Boeing 777-300ER, Economy, FR)

6. Tokyo/HND - Beijing (All Nippon Airways 1255, Boeing 787-800 Dreamliner, Business, EN)

7. Beijing - Hong Kong (Air China 117, Airbus A321, Business, EN)

8. Hong Kong - Bangkok (Royal Jordanian 183, Airbus A330-200, Business) YOU ARE HERE

The return flight with Royal Jordanian was scheduled at 9:35pm, and even if there were a lot of morning flights from Tokyo to HK, none of them were affordable. So I had to go to Hong Kong a day before and spend a night there.

But that was an opportunity to do a bit more tourism in HK for the second time in less than a month. From my hotel the Novotel Tung Chung, I went to the city center using the Tung Chung line. I met my friend living in Hong Kong at Hong Kong Station.

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Let's walk for some hours in this cosmopolitan city.

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As Typhoon Utor was dangerously getting closer to Hong Kong we decided to get in touch with RJ's in-town check in counter to know if the flight is delayed or even cancelled.
Apparently the inbound flight was on its way to Bangkok so there should be no problem.

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It is now time to turn back to the airport. 30 minutes to get from HK central to Tung Chung, followed by 10 minutes needed to pick up my suitcase and get to the terminal with my hotel's free shuttle bus service later, I arrive at the airport round 6:15pm.

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As Novotel's shuttle bus cannot drop us at terminal 2, I will need to walk for a bit towards it.

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Here we are. HKG's terminal 2 was unknown to me until I discovered on my RJ ticket summary that it was operating its flights from terminal 2.

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Check in opens on time, 3 hours before scheduled departure. There are already some people waiting for Economy class counters to be opened. There is a red carpet in front of business class counters. The agent will check me in in a few minutes, register my frequent flyer card and hand me my boarding passes as well as an invitation to Traveler's lounge.



Some flights arriving from/leaving to China are cancelled probably due to bad weather.

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It's time to relax a bit in the lounge! Let's go towards the departure hall.

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Immigration and security checkpoint go faster here than in Terminal 1 as there are much less passengers. But no stamps on passport unfortunately :(

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After 2 minutes of train ride I arrive in terminal 1's departure hall.

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Flying First or Business class on any oneworld carrier or holding a Sapphire or Emerald frequent flyer card allows you to enter any oneworld lounge in your departure airport. Therefore even if RJ prefers to invite its passengers to go to Traveler's Lounge (is it cheaper, less good?) I will go first to CX's The Wing which is probably HKG's best business lounge.

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My boarding pass will be stamped by staff which means I won't need an extra eligibility check if I decide to exit the lounge.

I am hungry and I go straight to the buffet which has noodles, veggies, fried rice, dimsum and other snacks such as sandwiches.



My selection

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I browse the internet with lounge's wifi

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I go up to the first floor and there's some hot snacks which are not available elsewhere

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Magazines
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Noodle bar



I decide to taste some tapenade which actually tastes good.
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Restrooms are clean as always.

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An information panel on typhoon Utor

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I decide to visit another QF's business lounge which is already described in some reports written by Leadership.

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The staff will look at every details of my boarding pass as if it was an police inspection. She will have a little chat with her colleague and finally allows me to enter the lounge by stamping it once more.

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This lounge is very quiet : these lampshades are beautiful

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There are hot dishes such as fried noodle and awful chicken with creamy sauce and a lot of light snacks.



Magazines and corporate picture with an A380
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Let's visit today's third lounge : The traveler's lounge which is RJ's official lounge

This is my boarding pass with already stamped twice
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The invitation sponsored by RJ

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Entrance

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Lounge staff will also stamp my boarding pass : this lounge is opened to passengers holding special credit cards so I suppose they cannot enjoy as many features as airlines guests can.

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There is a special parts for AF and LX's first class pax as well as AY's Plat's

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There's a salad bar, two hot mains and a corn soup tasting good
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To access this lounge's wifi they request us to use Check in places on facebook. This is simply unbelievable!

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Time to board



There is a dedicate line for Business class PAX

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RJ currently uses two long haul aircrafts : A330-200s and A340-200s. They operate a daily flight to Bangkok which continues either to HK with a 332 3times a week or to KUL with a 342 four times a week. Fortunately 332s feature lie-flat seats in Business class while 342s have old recliner seats.



A flight attendant welcomes me onboard and offers me a welcome drink. Rj doesn't offer alcoholic beverages while on ground; the choice is either orange juice or apple juice.It will be the latter for me.

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Menus are handed out. Tonight's service will be a cold snack

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Push-back on time

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Safety vid is shown
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A Lufthansa 748i
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Take off on time, quite impressive if we consider the weather at that time

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A bit less than 3 hours to go.

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Seat control panel

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Meal service begins with a fresh orange juice and some warm nuts

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A first view of my tray : RJ offers tapas at dinner time and a three-course service at tea time… Well!

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Fresh]/i] fruit salad :
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Open-face sandwiches : marinated salmon, mustard roasted beef, tartlet with shrimp
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Dessert : Opera cake, Saint-Bernard tart.
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Nice cutlery
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Let's browse the entertainment system
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We had to avoid flying over Laos and Vietnam for some reason
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A guest survey is handed out by FAs

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We are now close to our target

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And we landed short before midnight

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My RJ experience is not finished yet!
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See you soon for the next leg BKK-AMM.
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See more

Verdict

Royal Jordanian

7.1/10
Cabin8.0
Cabin crew8.0
Entertainment/wifi6.0
Meal/catering6.5

Independent The Traveler`s Lounge

5.4/10
Comfort6.0
Meal/catering6.0
Entertainment/wifi3.0
Services6.5

Hong Kong - HKG

9.5/10
Efficiency9.0
Access9.5
Services9.5
Cleanliness10.0

Bangkok - BKK

7.5/10
Efficiency7.5
Access7.5
Services7.5
Cleanliness7.5

Conclusion

An average flight with RJ. Entertainement system and catering should be improved - a hot dish should at least be offered at dinner time.

I am rating the Traveler's lounge as it is RJ's designated lounge and it is clearly a bad deal if you can go to CX's The Wing just a few steps away.

Thank you everybody for reading this Flight-Report and see you soon.

Information on the route Hong Kong (HKG) Bangkok (BKK)

Les contributeurs de Flight-Report ont posté 49 avis concernant 8 compagnies sur la ligne Hong Kong (HKG) → Bangkok (BKK).


Useful

La compagnie qui obtient la meilleure moyenne est Emirates avec 8.4/10.

La durée moyenne des vols est de 2 heures et 51 minutes.

  More information

7 Comments

If you liked this review or if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to post a comment below !
  • Comment 93380 by
    marathon GOLD 10117 Comments
    Do you mean you must have registered on Facebook to have access to the Plaza Premium Lounge's free wifi ? That would be preposterous ! But then, can't you connect to HKG's free wifi there ?
    I note that countrary to AF's survey's, that of RJ provides balanced options (as many as positive as negative options).
    Thanks for this FR !
  • Comment 93383 by
    KévinDC TEAM SILVER 6668 Comments
    Wow, a day later and your flight would have probably been cancelled. You got out just in time! I bet the flight path was weird to avoid being near the Typhoon. I'm not surprised by the small meal considering it's a short flight, even though it's dinner time. Nice lounge hopping! OW and *A actually honor their policy to allow pax travelling their alliance to any of their lounges whereas ST says that you can do this, but in reality, they always deny you access if you are not flying their airline. What's up with the blurry night pics? Were you drunk from the champagne in the lounge? LOL :-)
  • Comment 93386 by
    02022001 GOLD 4375 Comments
    Thanks for this excellent FR with royal jordanian !
  • Comment 93415 by
    indianocean SILVER 7572 Comments
    What I like about the Wing lounge (level 7) is the absence of ceiling.
    Too bad you didn't take more pix of the QF lounge.
    Very nice report. Thank you
  • Comment 93440 by
    lagentsecret 12186 Comments
    Thanks for sharing this FR

    Nice lounge hopping but Traveler's is far to be on par with CX's lounges

    Catering is lacking a hot dish as you mentioned

    See you soon for the next leg
  • Comment 93496 by
    Papoumada GOLD 7321 Comments
    Thanks for sharing.
  • Comment 93559 by
    A380B77W 4295 Comments
    Thanks for this report :)

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