China Eastern Airlines
 

I'm looking at a trip to Hong Kong and possibly stopping over at Shanghai.
China Eastern Airlines allow me to take advantage of this and at much cheaper rates. However I have only read horrible review about this airline. Noted that the reviews are a few years old as there hasn't been any recent ones.

Just wondering if any of you have taken this airline and your experience?

This isn't first hand experience but my parents just came back from Shanghai and took China Eastern there and back. I asked them how it was when they came back in comparison to the other Airlines they usually take to Asia (Cathay etc) and all they said was it was average. They didn't have any issues by any means but there was definitely nothing special or memorable about the experience.

GOD the airline sux.....and its not the service. The service is average - pretty much what you'd expect for what you pay for. The bad part are the planes and the food. The food is shit crap, and the planes are god awful. I had to take them when i got back from HK 3 weeks ago. If you can take another airline, like Eva or China Airlines (they're taiwanese, not mainland...weird, I know) , or pay just a little more for something else like Cathay or JAL, do it. Seriously. I WOULD NOT CONSIDER China Eastern again unless there was ABSOLUTELY no other flights....

I took them for a route from Seoul to HK (stopover @ Shanghai).

It's a budget airline and I don't find them particularly bad or good in anyway. I can't remember if I was served food, so I can't comment on that.

All is good in my books, given the price. But because you are taking a long haul flight, you may want to look into other carriers w/ better equipped airlines/food/service..etc.

take oasis airline :troll:

on a serious note..don't have first hand exp either but frds/family told me the planes are garbage quite a while ago...dont know if it's better these days. Regardless i would pay a little more for cathay to have a better peace of mind.

I'm taking that airline, but I can't complain, $1,287 to fly to HK during peak hours > $2000.

You get what you pay for. I'm stopping in Beijing for 1.5 hours before connecting to HK. A family friend took it once and he said it was average.

DO NOT FLY CATHAY LONG HAUL TO HK!!!

Their new seats are absolutely horrible!

Trust me...your back and entire body will thank me.

LOL!
I knew Ch28 would chime in on the Cathay comment! :lol

China Eastern may be bad compared to Cathay or AC, but they are a LOT cheaper... So what's more important to you, having built in entertainment and "better" food (admit it, the food may be better but it's still horrible), or saving like $1600 on pair of round trip tickets?

I've taken China Eastern at least 3 times and its not that bad.. Of course can't be compared to the more expensive airlines but for the price you pay its decent.

thanks for the input guys. Yes i can save quite a bit on a pair of tickets and i'm not too concerns about inflight entertainment or food. I'm more concerns about flight delays of up to a few hours or I've heard that if you don't confirm your flight prior to departure, you are SOL at the airport as they've given your seat away.

I've flown this airline quite a few times. Yes, maybe the flight attendants aren't quite as pretty or refined and maybe the food isn't quite as good, but overall, it's a very good airline.

I wouldn't pay anything more than maybe $100 to fly with Cathay or AC over China Eastern. China Eastern, IMO, is as close to a full fare airline as you can get with budget prices.

Co-worker of mine flew on China Eastern and got mega fucked 4 times with layovers in China. He got home 3 days later and they lost his luggage. :lol

i never really care which airline i fly when i travel....

direct flight and price are my concerns....