Tiger Airways... Unlike what everyone thinks

I'm back, well... for the time being anyhow. Cheryl and I headed off to Adelaide last weekend kinda as a celebration thing after ending my semester of Pharmacy learning. Having bought some rather cheap fares with Tiger to Adelaide, we headed to South Australia to relax. Neither of us have been to Adelaide before so we were looking forward to the weekend with much anticipation. We stayed at the Stamford Plaza Hotel which was nice, but maybe more a 4.5 star rather than a 5 star hotel. I still prefer the Sofitel in Sydney that we stayed at in November 08.

I have heard of so many negative reports about Tiger Airways ever since they started flying. I have flown on them in the past and they were fine, except for a 3 hour delay which we experienced. Our flight was scheduled to depart at 4.05 pm from Canberra and we took of at about 4.20pm, arriving at 5.30pm, which was about 15 minutes late. A little late which is to be somewhat expected with the likes of budget airlines but nothing unbearable like the 3 hours or more that everyone has been complaining of.

2 days later we were back at Adelaide airport, 3 hours before departure. There was a passenger who was disallowed from checking into a Gold Coast flight, because check in had closed just 10 minutes before. She was made to purchase another ticket for the next flight out even though the boarding call for the flight was 40 minutes away. Its a strict policy, but fair as seriously, Tiger has to turn around a 180 seater in 30 minutes, which is really fast.

After checking in, Cheryl and I went to eat Hungry Jacks at Adelaide airport. The plane we were due to board was coming in from Hobart, with an ETA (estimated arrival time) of 1440. Not long after eating lunch we saw the plane land from Hobart. With about 150 or so passengers hoping off, we started boarding at about 1455 or so. But with only 117 boarding the aircraft, we pushed back at about 1515 and headed to Canberra. We arrived at 1720 pm, pretty much on time.

So there you go. Tiger Airways, on time for both flights. Not like the massive delays that everyone hears from the media. I don't know if Cheryl and I were lucky (if you could call it that) but let me just say that Tiger is seriously like any other LCC - Low Cost Carrier. Would I fly them again? Yes. Would I recommend them to others? Yes, especially since both landings were smoooth, unlike other airlines I have flown.

Thank you Tiger for an enjoyable flight to and from Adelaide.

More to come later from Cheryl. Gold Coast in two weeks and then Penang 3 weeks after that.

Alex