They are cheap and they are cheap for a reason! - 2 stories of incompetence - First my brother took the LGW to BKK economy return in May 2004. Outbound no problem. Return flight they dumped all the passengers in the middle of the desert (Dubai) and abandoned the flight due to supposed technical failure but later we discovered they had missed their landing slot at Gatwick. Absolute chaos at Dubai airport and the one lady Phuket airline staff deserted her post and left 300+ passengers stranded. All the Phuket Airlines officials did a runner! No explanations given! After 5 hours of irate passengers spitting nails – an Emirates official grasped the nettle and re- scheduled everybody back to Heathrow or Gatwick on Emirates flights. My brother was delayed around 8 hours. Story no. 2 - thinking maybe my brother had a “one off experience” I flew out same route economy class £456 LGW to BKK in August. Outbound no problem decent flight with average service. Return flight I re-confirmed my flight 72 hours prior with booking reference. Reached BKK airport 3 hours before departure and 3 queues were about 50 metres long already! - and hardly moving. It took an amazing 3 and half hours to eventually reach the desk as the staff were spending 80% of their time on walkie talkies. By the time I reached the desk I was told by the check in girl that the flight was overbooked and I couldn’t fly that day! – Charming! It’s now 2.30 am I am dog tired and no Phuket flights for 3 days! – They transferred about 8 of us to a nice hotel and put us on standby for BA/Quantas. Yes “standby” at peak holiday season! – no guarantee of getting home for 3 days ... lucky B.A. had a seat the next night back to Heathrow (not LGW) making my home train ticket invalid to Sheffield. I complained by email to Phuket Airlines (their website is useless). It appears that standby passengers were let onto our flight whilst valid ticket holders like myself were denied access. No reply by email but did eventually receive a letter reply 3 months later. A long convoluted generalised statement about overbooking problems and didn’t address the real issues. If you want to save money and take a risk go ahead and book - but for me Phuket Airlines nay more!
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