"Monarch flight" = BE WARNED!!

“"Monarch flight" = BE WARNED!!”

Written on: 07/08/2012 by benturner101 (1 review written)

We flew out B'ham to Ibiza on 25th July having flown with Monarch some years earlier & having a great experience. However, when we were taken out to the plane we soon realised that the in front of us was'nt a nice shiney modern Monarch plane but an ancient foreign plane. (That looked like it has been stuck together in patches!) operated by an unknow Lithuanian airline)

When we boarded we were greeted by a pleasent non-Monarch crew whose first language clearly wasn't English.

The inside of the plane looked every bit as old as the outside of the plane with those blue "plastic" covered seats i remember from the 1980's, that were dirty, absolutely tiny legroom (anyone over 5 foot struggled) and no entertainment at all, not even just audio, that again we had when i started flying in the 1980's!! Which made flying with my 7 and 5 year old children a real joy!

It was then impossible to understand any of the announcements, which made me nervous if there had been any emergency. When the plane took off you could smell fuel fumes in the cabin. By this point i was getting nervous for our safety in this very old plane & also angry that i thought i had booked & paid to fly with a reputable British airline that had modern safe planes.

There was a poor Monarch rep on the plane who got a verbal battering throughout the flight & blamed everything from there expanding business to the recession!?!?

At least we thought things might improve on the return flight - they did not though - it was the same plane & crew!!

I wrote a complaint email & have just recieved a whole £30 off my next booking. I'm afraid this does nothing to reassure me my next flight would be a better & safer experience. We are looking at Florida next year & would NEVER even consider booking with Monarch now as the thought of 8 hours on a dodgy plane is worth paying the extra for BA or Virgin.

DON'T EXPECT A MODERN MONARCH PLANE IF YOU BOOK A MONARCH FLIGHT you could end up on any old random plane.