The Air New Zealand product is terrible, it's as expensive as a Jetstar ticket with add ons but with surely staff and old aircraft.
This flight was the second leg of a trip that began in Auckland, New Zealand. I was unable to find a way to select seats in advance. The boarding passes we were given in Auckland did not have seat assignments for the second flight. There was no way to check on it until personnel showed up at the gate in Los Angeles, immediately before boarding time. The flight was overbooked by one, and since I was traveling with my sister, we needed two seats. We waited in considerable anxiety for everyone else to board and when one person did not show up, we had to take whatever was left. At least we finally got on the flight although we were the very last to board. We were not able to sit together, of course.
The food was not as good as Air New Zealand. The veg pasta was pass-able but the veg cibotta sandwich was dry, hard and not up to par. The coach staff were attentive and accommodating.
I flew United from San Francisco to Auckland. My connecting flight from Auckland to Christchurch was canceled with no explanation. I was finally told the cancellation was due to fog. Even though it was clear when we landed. I am from San Francisco, I know what fog is! And I didn't see any fog. I was told the next available flight was 7 hours later. Unacceptable, they should have had a flight ready to go as soon as it was deemed safe to take off.
Two hours was not enough time to transition from the international to domestic terminal. You have to go through customs, a biological hazard check, gather your luggage, take a bus to the domestic terminal and recheck your luggage. The bus was slow and crowded and the lines to recheck your bags were very long. We missed our connecting flight. Initially, the Air New Zealand officials were not helpful at all in helping to get us on another flight. Told us we would have to buy another ticket for a flight 11 hours later. Found another agent that was more helpful. He helped arrange to get us on standby for another flight three hours later. Had to ride in jump seats next to the flight attendants, but at least we eventually got to out destination.
At Coolangatta International it is difficult to hear voice boarding announcements when away from screen announcements.
Would have been nice to have decaf coffee as an option, and perhaps a scone
New Zealand crew were attentive. We were not informed that we needed transit document to pass through New Zealand. A checkin employee helped with this for which we were thankful.
They announced food service but then never came around. We also couldn’t land so kept trying to get to runway and then had to come up and go around happened like 3 times and cause the child next to me to start throwing up
The only thing that was less than excellent was the food server at dinner. (I had the chicken.) It wasn't that it was poorly heated or in difficult-to-open containers; it was just that it had a very peculiar taste. And I use that to describe not just the main course but the dessert as well. Very odd flavours for what seemed to be a mainstream item. I did like that the airline offered us a free glass of wine. The breakfast omelette wasn't bad, although it was quite bland.
