Flight Review: First (And Last) Time Flying Korea’s TWAY AIR Business Saver Class To Europe

As the saying goes, curiosity kills the cat, and it was finally my turn after booking T’Way Air for the first time between Seoul and Rome, a 14-hour flight in their Business Saver Class operated by an Airbus A330.

These aircraft used to belong to Korean Air and still come in the same seating configuration including what used to be Korean Air’s regional First Class in the first row so you can snatch up one of these seats if you’re fast for a fully flat bed.

After staying 10 days in Korea for cherry blossom and some relax time I had to make my way to Europe to catch a cruise from Rome on April 12 so the best choice was a direct flight on April 10th (I prefer to arrive 24-48h before my cruises just in case something goes wrong).

The choices weren’t too bad, there was Asiana for US$2,060 and Korean Air for the direct and some flights via Shanghai or Guangzhou for ~ US$1300. Lufthansa via Frankfurt and Munich was available for US$1600.

What caught my eye was Korean budget carrier T’WAY Air for US$885  and interestingly enough I wasn’t able to find anything online in regards to a trip report. Either on Youtube or in general. A few people have done Economy but nobody did Business. This definitely caught my interest.

I booked this flight on Trip.com (found via Kayak) where it was $211 cheaper than directly via T’Way Air’s own website, which by the way is absolutely horrible:

TRIP is one of these OTA’s that won’t let you do anything with the booking except you add it as an extra service for additional fees including reserving seats. However, with the booking code you can pull up your reservation on the carriers website directly and do it there or call them up.

I did just that and then also reserved my seat (1A):

This $885 flight is a VERY affordable one-way, but I should later learn why and even regret not spending a few hundred bucks more for a “real” full-service airline.

As a side note, T’WAY recently acquired two Boeing 777-300ER from Cathay Pacific and will start flying these aircraft to Europe starting this week, complete with the six First Class suites. I wasn’t as lucky and missed the start by two weeks; my flight was to be operated by the A330-200.

I got my boarding pass at the counter and then registered it on the self-check-in machines for the Smart Pass for express security:

I was really open minded about this one and knew they wouldn’t have a lounge.

There is however, ONE Priority Pass Lounge available in Terminal 1 (unless you fly Asiana then you can use the Asiana Lounge with PP as well):

The Sky Hub Lounge was okay, I guess. The line cleared within 5 minutes, and I was able to take 3 small cans of sparkling water for the flight, knowing they would not provide free beverages.

It was finally time to board (or so I thought):

Thankfully, nobody checked my carry-on, which was probably double the weight of the ridiculous 10 kg weight limitation:

The A330 overhead bins are tiny and my Tumi bags almost didn’t fit.

My seat was as expected, the old First Class seat of Korean Air in row one which I knew from numerous flights between Thailand/Korea:

It folds fully into a 180-degree flat bed, which is extremely comfortable, and the blanket they provide is great. The pillow (Economy Class type) was absolutely awful, though.

Here is the regular Business Class cabin (row 2/3) where the seats don’t have the footrest and the bed is slightly angled:

If at all possible, you should really get row one on these A330s as it’s more private and much more comfortable.

An extra set of pilots sat in the two center seats and for whatever reason they constantly got up with all their stuff and created commotion in the cabin. Not every 3-4 hours. All the damn time!

This is a very long flight (14h) and extremely boring because there is absolutely zero in-flight entertainment. T’WAY doesn’t want to spend money on licensing for AVOD so the monitor is black the entire time. No audio, no video, not even a flight map. I will never do a flight like this again, it was hell!

The meal was a basic Bibimbap which wasn’t any better or worse than a similar one you get in Asiana/Korean Air Economy Class. But this one had absolutely ZERO sides, no dessert and no bread. Just a pack of conveniece store Kimchi.

Officially, the meals come with a drink. When I asked for a Coke, I was told only Juice and Coke Zero were free, but a regular Coke costs money (4000 Won). What the heck is this logic?

Ok fine, here is my credit card to pay $2.50 for a Coke. Answer: Sorry, we don’t accept American Express. I had a little meltdown at that point.

The service was absolutely pathetic, aka non-existent. Trash wasn’t collected for the entire flight. It was a field of garbage consisting of both the purchased cans and cups, plus the items passengers brought on themselves.

Why is there no service for 14 hours to clean up the cabin a little bit?

The “Cup Noodle” bit and drinks weren’t actively offered at any point during this flight. It was a bizarre experience.

When I complained about the lack of proper product advertisement, I was told that this service wasn’t a Business Class but a Saver Class. Interesting, because that’s not how Trip.com and T’WAY advertise this. It’s clearly marketed as Business Class, and even the boarding pass says so.

While T’WAY does call it Business Saver Class on the boarding pass (and Business Fare on their website when pulling up my reservation record), OTA’s such as Expedia and Trip.com just sell it as Business Class without any restrictions. They might want to rethink their marketing or retrain their crew because telling passengers the cabin service they bought doesn’t exist is just nuts and might even violate trade regulations.

I would probably rate this as one of the top three worst flights I’ve ever had in my life, and I fly A LOT. the other two contenders for this “honor” would be American Airlines DFW-HKG in Economy Class and a United Economy flight from Narita to Chicago.

Conclusion

This 14-hour T’WAY Air “Business Saver Flight” was what I’d consider a painful self-experiment that I wouldn’t be willing to repeat under any circumstances. Five hours between Korea and Thailand, maybe, but never again on a long-haul service until they improve the service and especially provide some AVOD services.

I would love to know why the cabin crew hasn’t been cleaning the cabin for such a long period. Communication in English was also quite difficult, with only one cabin crew member speaking good English.

As I said, curiosity killed the cat. I shouldn’t have booked this product for such a long flight. It wasn’t even about the money because for a few hundred bucks more, I could have flown China Eastern or China Southern with a full-service experience. Asiana did finally make awards available on their own flight that day, but only ~ 24h prior to departure, at which point I would have lost like $350 to refund the T’Way flight. The cost for the Asiana would have been $1040 buying Lifemiles and adding the tax, a mere $170 more compared to what I paid.

Have you taken T’WAY “Business Saver Class” before?

Source