SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

>Serendib
>Its a shame you know so little about your national airline!
>I work with them, they are excellent! Almsot every
>pilot,manager,travel agent I have met says that the New
>SriLankan Airlines beats the old Air Lanka hands down!
>Try chatting to their CEO (Peter Hill) an Aussie with 20+
>years experiance of the Airline world and he will tell you
>what sort of transformation has occured.

Pakistani,
I have intricate knowledge of the airline, thank you very much. My first cousin is a first officer on the 330/340 and my uncle is a captain on the 320. Peter Hill maybe experienced, but us Sri Lankans are definitely not happy the way he is running the airline. What he says does not count. What matters is what the people who work for the airline think.

>The old Air Lanka with its ancient Tristars has not a patch
>on the new airline with its A340/A330 fleet. In fact Air
>Lanka was comparable to PIA/Aie India in the past, and now
>it beats those two airlines hands down!!!!! Embaressing to
>admit as I am Pakistani! 🙂

Firstly, we got the 340’s and the 320’s before Air Lanka became SriLankan. What has always been the hallmark of Air Lanka/SriLankan has been cabin service. Granted, the 1011’s may have been old but that has nothing to do with the quality of service.

>Since Emraites took over senior management positions, they
>have had some VERY good quality people on board. The CFO is
>an Indian guy who has knowledge of aircraft that would make
>people on this forum blush!

Pakistani, you don’t know who I am and you don’t know what I know. So, before you jump on me for making baseless statements let me tell you this. I am a Sri Lankan. Also, I am patiotic. But, that does not cloud my judgement on what I know first hand about SriLankan. I am not running the airline down. On the contrary. It is a great airline and it has always been better than PIA or Air India. Not because of the quality of planes but because of cabin service. Selling 49% of the airline to Emirates has not been a good solution, sure we inducted 330’s into our fleet, but at the same time there are quite a bit of issues that have been problematic.

Sam.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

Serendib
Its a shame you know so little about your national airline!
I work with them, they are excellent! Almsot every pilot,manager,travel agent I have met says that the New SriLankan Airlines beats the old Air Lanka hands down!
Try chatting to their CEO (Peter Hill) an Aussie with 20+ years experiance of the Airline world and he will tell you what sort of transformation has occured.

The old Air Lanka with its ancient Tristars has not a patch on the new airline with its A340/A330 fleet. In fact Air Lanka was comparable to PIA/Aie India in the past, and now it beats those two airlines hands down!!!!! Embaressing to admit as I am Pakistani! 🙂

Since Emraites took over senior management positions, they have had some VERY good quality people on board. The CFO is an Indian guy who has knowledge of aircraft that would make people on this forum blush!

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

Hi folks,

Just a quick message to say Thanks to everyone who responded … less than 4 weeks to my holiday flight now , wish it was tomorrow!

Gary

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

Apologies regarding flying to Oz, I forgot they stopped. But I can categorically tell they were cheaper than Emirates. I have sold many many seats on Sri lankan to Oz, SIN, CMB, MLE. When the Tamil tigers hit out at CMB airport ,Sri Lankan lost a lot of business. Fares were slashed when they started operating again. I was selling seats with UL for under £350 on many routes. I have spoken to UL account manager in London as they came to visit us in Manchester to tell us what they will be doing to increase awareness that the strike had nothing to do UL or the british tourists. I have spoken on many diffrent occasions with UL about fares, contracts, routes and Interline agreements with EK, and EK’s fares from what I have noticed on contracts and CRS systems are not undercutting UL. What would they acheive by doing that? They hold a vested interest in the airline, they have pumped money into them? The only route that they would be competitive on would be the LHR-DXB / CMB-DXB, but then it goes down to the travelling public. People are aware that EK are a good airline, Air Lanka did not have the best reputation, but it’s now when UL are a good airline to fly with they struggle to convince people to fly with them because other people’s opinions sway them to a diffrent airline. If you know the airline and confident they are a good airline and are puntual, competitive, decent aircraft, friendly service (Sri Lankan’s are renouned for this), you are on a winner!!, and It’s unfortunate that some travel agents won’t sell them even more.

It’s upto people to make there own opinion, as we have.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

>Fantastic airline to fly with, food, onboard service,
>friendly, and good seating arrangements.
>I don’t know what that person was saying when he says there
>not as good. I have flown many times with Sri Lankan and
>with Air Lanka, Air Lanka were awful. Emirates have done a
>good job, but Sri Lankan hospitality is out of this world,
>You will enjoy the flight, trust me.

I never said SriLankan was not good. SriLankan and Air Lanka always had great inboard hospitality. On a techincal level, Air Lanka was a much better airline that served the needs of the people.

Sam.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

>When have they been undercutting the price on the routes?
>Since the bombing of Columbo airport by the Tamil tigers Sri
>Lankan lost alot of tourism and passengers would not fly
>with them, they are consistently cheaper than Emirates, they
>even have Interline agreement on most fares as well as code
>sharing on certain flight’s, if you want to go to Oz for
>example it’s cheaper with Sri Lankan, and you can use EK
>flight’s on the same fare. I would prefer to go with Sri
>Lankan as I have a daughter and they have childminding
>services on there flights.

SriLankan does not fly to Australia (Sydney) anymore. I am a Sri Lankan and I am very much aware of the progress of the airline. Emirates have been bilking SriLankan for all its worth and there is a lot of support to cancel the agreement with Emirates. The Colombo airport attack had nothing to do with cutting fares.

Sam.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

When have they been undercutting the price on the routes? Since the bombing of Columbo airport by the Tamil tigers Sri Lankan lost alot of tourism and passengers would not fly with them, they are consistently cheaper than Emirates, they even have Interline agreement on most fares as well as code sharing on certain flight’s, if you want to go to Oz for example it’s cheaper with Sri Lankan, and you can use EK flight’s on the same fare. I would prefer to go with Sri Lankan as I have a daughter and they have childminding services on there flights.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

Fantastic airline to fly with, food, onboard service, friendly, and good seating arrangements.
I don’t know what that person was saying when he says there not as good. I have flown many times with Sri Lankan and with Air Lanka, Air Lanka were awful. Emirates have done a good job, but Sri Lankan hospitality is out of this world, You will enjoy the flight, trust me.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

I flew LHR-CMB a couple of years ago with Sri Lankan and thought it quite good. I going to Sri Lanka again at the end of December with the same carrier. They also use Terminal 4 which is far better than the others at LHR.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

>I would still appreciate any feedback from anyone else who
>has flown with SriLankan, particularly the LHR-CMB route.

I have flown the LHR-CMB route many times. What kind of feedback are you specifically looking for?

Service: Excellent.

Food: Very good.

A nice comfortable flight.

Sam.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

Thanks very much for the information , much appreciated.

Just been onto the SriLankan website , noted that all seats have seatback-TV which is a long-haul must these days. Nice schedule of movies, though still shows June & no August list yet ?? It says that refreshments are served every 45mins, which sounds like a good idea.

Anyway, have joined the ‘Skywards’ scheme for free , which allows advance seat selection. I have reserved aisle & window seats in row 6 , which is the first economy row after business class & apparently offers a little more legroom. Ideally we would have preferred row 29, which is an exit-row, but these can only be allocated on check-in. We might have a possibility of getting these, as we are connecting to LHR from Glasgow with BMI, who have a code-share with SriLankan, so we’ll almost certainly be checking in at Glasgow before anyone arrives at Heathrow!! 🙂

I would still appreciate any feedback from anyone else who has flown with SriLankan, particularly the LHR-CMB route.

Thanks again,

Gary

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

hmmm didnt know that Sam…. i was just going on what the travellers said. Thanx for clearing that.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 23-07-02 AT 03:30 PM (GMT)]>its a great airline since Emirates took share in it. Yup you
>will get A340 and i think it will be a great
>flight….enjoy! 🙂

Sorry, but you have been ill-informed. Ever since Emirates purchased equity in SriLankan Airlines it has been going down. Air Lanka was a much better airline as far as service was concerned.

Whenever an airline buys a stake in a competitor’s airline, it is never for the uplifment of the airline in question. Emirates has been undercutting SriLankan fares and has eliminated some very profitable routes.

GaryLafferty:

I am not trying to discourage you from flying SriLankan Airlines. I was just trying to clear a few misconceptions as far as Kabir is concerned. Enjoy your flight and have a great stay in Sri Lanka.

Sam.

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

its a great airline since Emirates took share in it. Yup you will get A340 and i think it will be a great flight….enjoy! 🙂

RE: SriLankan to Colombo from LHR

I flew Sri Lankan last year from Bangkok to Hong Kong return on their A330’s.
They were very impressive, reasonable economy space, seat-back screens in all seats, good food and friendly service.
If you dress smartly and they over-book economy (which I gather happens a lot with this airline in particular) you may get a free biz class upgrade like I did on the return leg!!
In terms of good/bad seating, it will be a 2-4-2 layout and you should have a pretty smooth ride whereever you sit on the A340, although some might say wing seats are the best for minimising turbulence.

Regards,
Carl