AIRASIA Flyer Beware It's Not Same Same

Posted: 28 Jun 2012 | 11:28 am

While AirAsia remains the darling of the region's travellers, the groups expansion drive into local partnership's is seeing a knock on effect to brand service delivery.

Last night I was on an AirAsia flight from Phuket to Jakarta. Unfortunately this sector is operated by AirAsia Indonesia. For a 1920 departure we were informed less than an hour before leaving that the plane would be delayed 2 hours.

Counter staff said the flight was behind time, though of course, no one bothered to say this at check-in. Later when we boarded the plane was full of trash, and the flights attendants were half asleep.

Catering to a mainly domestic audience there were no arrival cards on board for foreigners so a mad dash to the counter while trying to fill out the form ensured in a nasty lecture from the immigration officer.

I do fly the AirAsia service to Bali from Phuket often and it's heads above the Jakarta flight, but it's AA Thailand. Flights on time, service is good and planes run on time.

Unfortunately plying the Jakarta flight from time to time, I'm more often than not delayed and plane service and cleanliness is strikingly different.

For AirAsia as they continue to expand the network and partnerships, the challenge will be how to address quality issues. There has been a similar paradigm in the hotel sector, where franchising which is often done in North American and Europe is not pursued by brands for the very reasons above.

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