Review of Finnair flight Singapore → Helsinki in Economy

Hello everyone and welcome back to another trip report.
As stated before in my previous trip report, I made this booking with Finnair between Sydney, Australia and Chicago, USA via Singapore and Helsinki in February 2022 when there still wasn’t a lot of options for leaving Australia to travel aboard and at the time Finnair was by far the cheapest option to make the booking in Economy class.

As the first leg of the journey was on Qantas, I arrived into Singapore-Changi’s sprawling Terminal 1 from Sydney on an Airbus A330-200 pleasantly surprised with the quality of the soft product. This left me with high expectations for my next two flights of the trip with Finnair, as previously I had heard good things about their long-haul, economy class product. 

As I had a four hour layover in Singapore between my Qantas and Finnair flights and they were both on one booking, I decided to head upstairs and check out the Pay-per-use Plaza Premium Lounge in Singapore’s Terminal 1. Entry fee is around $50 SGD per person, a bit steep, but worth it if you want the chance to have a decent meal and freshen up with a shower before travelling on an ecomomy class flight. 

PLAZA PREMIUM LOUNGE REVIEW:
After paying at the desk I was given a receipt which guarantees me entry to the lounge for 3 hours and access to all of the amenities inside. Showers, however, are available at no extra cost but must be booked at the front desk due to sometimes high wait times. I immeadiately booked a shower suite and only ended up waiting about five minutes before my name was called. 

The lounge also has fast, free wi-fi and a good view of Singapore’s Runway 02L/20R for all the plane spotters out there. There is a decent selection of light meals and snacks at the buffet, as well as selection of hot and cold beverages (all self-service I might add). I had a Dr Pepper soft-drink and some chicken and rice. I don’t like to eat too much before getting onboard flights because I want to enjoy the in-flight service. 

Also my apologies for the lack of photos inside the lounge, it was very busy at the time of my visit and I didn’t want to take photos of the other patrons. The crowdedness was the only negative point I could find about this lounge for an otherwise good and comfortable experience. 

Around fifteen minutes prior to my flights boarding time, I exited the lounge and made the long walk to my boarding gate at the other end of the terminal. Luckily, Singapore-Changi has pretty good signage so I made my way to the gate without too much trouble. 

BOARDING:
Singapore-Changi is the only airport I have come across so far with the security checkpoint at each individual boarding gate and the security checks were just opening as I arrived at the boarding gate, so I was able to make it through quite quickly before a line of passengers started to form. 

As I was one of the first passengers through the gate, I was able to score a window seat where I greeted by the view of OH-LWD, the fresh looking Airbus A350-900 which would take me to Helsinki on this long, overnight flight.  

Around about 30 minutes after I arrived at the boarding gate, the first boarding calls were made for Group 1 and 2 to board the aircraft. Thankfully, Finnair boards in groups unlike most Australian airlines so the boarding process is very orderly. Unfortunately, a few passengers did not follow the instructions, however the gate staff quickly put them back into their original boarding group. 

At the gate desk my boarding pass was scanned and I proceeded down the steaming hot aerobridge onto my Finnair Airbus A350 flight.

ONBOARD:
At the door I was greeted by the flight’s cabin manager who directed me down the second aisle to my seat 34H, an aisle seat. For long overnight flights like this where there is no view out the window anyway, I honestly prefer the ease of access of an aisle seat to avoid climbing over my seatmates. 

However, the fustrating part of the process was at the time of booking I paid $34 AUD to reserve a window seat in the rear economy class cabin of the plane, but somewhere in the 24 hours leading up to the flight I was moved out of my paid seat automatically into an aisle seat. I hoped to fix the error at check-in, however online-check in was not available and since I checked-in with Qantas they were unable to move my seat on the Finnair flights. 

Anyway, on the way to my assigned seat I passed through Finnair’s new business class cabin which honestly looked very homely and comfortable and I would like to give it a try sometime. Unfortunately, Finnair was not offering any paid business class upgrades for this flight. 

Eventually, after passing the many passengers trying to fit a variety of objects into the overhead lockers I arrived at my seat 34H. Waiting for me at the seat was a pillow and blanket, which were nice but quite thin and cheap, as well as a bottle of water which I always appreciate. Unfortunately, Finnair has not yet brought back in-flight magazine’s after the Coronavirus pandemic so the seat pocket contained only the safety card.

One compliment I have towards the seat and in-flight entertainment system was just how new and fresh they were. The whole cabin was also very clean and the in-flight entertainment touchscreen functions worked perfectly and it was very easy to navigate the whole system.

The negative aspect of the in-flight entertainment system, however, was the lack of variety of mainstream movies, TV shows and music available for passengers to stream onboard. One feature I loved though was the addition of a nose-mounted camera and tail-mounted camera, streaming live footage from outside the aircraft to the in-flight entertainment screens. 

The legroom at the seat was good, about the same as on the Qantas economy flight I reviewed in my last trip report. However, being quite a tall individual I couldn’t really stretch out that much, even with the seat reclined. I did find the economy class seats on this aircraft reclined just that little bit more than other economy class seats I have flown in which was appreciated on such a long flight.

DEPARTURE:
 The operation in Singapore on this particular night ended up being very efficient and the doors were closed early and we ended up pushing right on time after a PA announcement from the captain welcoming us onboard and estimating we would arrive in Helsinki about 20 minutes early, something which fortunately turned out to be true.

We eventually made the long taxi to Singapore-Changi’s Runway 02R, the furthest runway from the terminal complex and departed making a series of left turns to pick up our intial track to Helsinki. This particular flight takes quite a random route to Helsinki due to not being able to overfly Russian, Ukrainian or Belarusian airspace, this also adds over an hour to the original scheduled flight time.  

DINNER SERVICE:
Around 30 minutes after departure from Singapore, the cabin crew began their in-flight dinner service. Unfortunately, there was no snack service prior to the dinner service like on Qantas and to my dissapointment there was no choices for the dinner, everyone receieved the same meal. The service from the cabin crew was also very impersonal with them simply coming through the cabin stating what the meal was and placing it on your tray table. Tonight’s dinner was the Chicken Tikki, shown below, the meal was quite tasty, albeit small for such a long flight and the dessert was the Cadbury chocolate bar. For my beverage I chose the famous Finnair Blueberry, which unlike the rest of the meal, did not dissapoint! 

After the dinner service was complete, the flight attendants walked through the cabin collecting empty dinner trays and offering water to passengers before the cabin lights were dimmed for sleeping.

I then drifted off to sleep for a few hours after reclining my seat, I was quite tired after a big day of travelling! At some point while I was asleep, the flight attendants did a duty-free cart service within the cabin, however I did not see this.

One handy feature of Finnair’s new in-flight entertainment system is that it shows what times during the flight the meals will be served so you can plan your sleeping around this if you wish to eat. I have not seen this on any other airline yet. 

When I woke up, I took the opportunity to go for a walk to the rear of the cabin and do the obligatory ‘loo review’ and found the lavatory spotless.   

I also used the free time before the breakfast service to purchase a full-flight wi-fi pass for $25 USD to test the speed and reliability of the internet which was very good to Finnair’s credit and I had no issues browsing the internet or using Flightradar24 to check on our flights progress. 

BREAKFAST SERVICE:
Around two hours prior to our arrival into Helsinki, the flight attendants turned on the cabin lighting once again for the breakfast service. Once again, there was no choice and everyone received the same meal. This particular meal was very small and some kind of omelette dish with potatoes and other assorted vegetables, an unusual choice for breakfast in my opinion but it was quite tasty but very small for such a long flight of almost 13 hours.  

I took the opportunity at breakfast to have some more of Finnair’s blueberry juice before the flight was over and again it was very tasty. I hope I can find some for sale in Australia when I get home.

After the breakfast trays were cleared before landing, I took some time to have a close look at the in-flight entertainment system which has a decent selection of movies and TV shows, especially for Finnish audiences but not a lot compared to other airlines like Lufthansa and Singapore Airlines. The selection of music was disappointing as you can only listen to pre-selected playlists and you are unable to skip individual songs.

ARRIVAL INTO HELSINKI:
Before too long we had begun our descent into Helsinki somewhere over Central Latvia and around 30 minutes later we made a smooth touchdown onto Helsinki’s Runway 15 and after a short taxi we arrived at our gate around 20 minutes prior to our scheduled arrival time. A good effort by the Finnair crew and muchly appreciated as it is rare nowadays to be on a flight that runs early.

The disembarkation process was fairly quick and as I exited the aircraft I took a couple of final snaps, which are shown below: