Emirates or Qatar from Bkk to USA.

[bamboozled]

Greetings fellow Miserables....I'm looking to book a flight shortly from Bkk to USA and have a choice between Emirates and Qatar. Prices are more or less the same but Emirates has a longer layover....but is slightly cheaper. Do people have strong opinions about these two airlines? I have flown Qatar in the past and though a distant memory I don't remember any negatives. Not sure I've ever flown Emirates. However, I'd be in the airport there for about 5 hours hanging around. They are also advertising no change fees and it's nice to have that flex. Not sure Qatar. Anyone care to input on this?

 

Thanks!

[DaLa]

Flights can be delayed, cancelled , problems, no matter which airline. Sometimes it's pot luck that you have a good flight and bad luck when something goes wrong, and you can have a poor experience with certain crew on occasions. I use Emirates and have found them reasonably good and efficient in the past 10 +years.  I've had  a couple of issues but you expect that if you fly frequently. I try not to have more than a 3 hour layover so that would be my deciding factor.  In this present climate I  would  think the no change fees is quite important. Dubai airport is huge,  just a mile long repeating shopping centre. If the plane doesn't have a gate allocated you can be up for a 20 minute circuitous bus ride around the perimeter fence, then when you finally arrive you are subjected to a ridiculous (as in an ineffectual) security check.

[MrJ2U]

I heard Emirates offers COVID-19 insurance for 30 days on flights.

 

https://www.gqmiddleeast.com/travel-eats/emirates-is-offering-multi-risk-travel-insurance-free-with-all-flights

 

[Leveraged]

The airlines and planes are pretty much identical. The hub airports, Dubai and Doha, are big shopping centers and Dubai is fully open with zero restrictions other than loose mask mandates. 
 

The layover airport will be the deciding factor. Whichever layover airports are the most open with the least restrictions is the flight I would take. 
 

Both airlines are great. 

[MRToMRT]

With Emirates its mainly A380s so you know what the standard is, with Qatar you need to check what plane they are going to fly on your route, they still have some "lesser" planes. This esp relevant if you are flying in business.

[bamboozled]

Thank you for the input, good info. Do they both or neither serve alcohol? Personally, I like to have a couple drinks and take a Xanax and that lets me sleep a decent bit....works for me. The Qatar site is not loading well so I haven't been able to get the details on baggage and change fees. Not sure what's up with that. Certainly will book direct and not with a consolidator. I can deal with any long transit ultimately but those long late night/early layovers are uncomfortable, being in that zombie/walking dead state for hours on end. I once flew Bkk to NYC and it took about 48 hours due to weirdness that I can't quite recall. This was with Thai back when they did that route. Funny story....my return flight out of NYC...I went to the airport on my departure day all set to go and....there was no Thai to be seen anywhere. They had killed that route and up and left JFK and LAX completely. Didn't have any planes there nor even an office. But they had still sold me a ticket. Amazing Thai(land).

[bamboozled]

2 hours ago, MrJ2U said:

I heard Emirates offers COVID-19 insurance for 30 days on flights.

 

https://www.gqmiddleeast.com/travel-eats/emirates-is-offering-multi-risk-travel-insurance-free-with-all-flights

 

Pretty wonderful!

[DaLa]

4 hours ago, bamboozled said:

Thank you for the input, good info. Do they both or neither serve alcohol? Personally, I like to have a couple drinks and take a Xanax and that lets me sleep a decent bit....works for me. The Qatar site is not loading well so I haven't been able to get the details on baggage and change fees. Not sure what's up with that. Certainly will book direct and not with a consolidator. I can deal with any long transit ultimately but those long late night/early layovers are uncomfortable, being in that zombie/walking dead state for hours on end. I once flew Bkk to NYC and it took about 48 hours due to weirdness that I can't quite recall. This was with Thai back when they did that route. Funny story....my return flight out of NYC...I went to the airport on my departure day all set to go and....there was no Thai to be seen anywhere. They had killed that route and up and left JFK and LAX completely. Didn't have any planes there nor even an office. But they had still sold me a ticket. Amazing Thai(land).

Resident partygoer here. Yes they both serve alcohol. The upstairs bar on the Emirates A380's are good fun and sociable. I have only had one dry flight in 40 years; I'm restless on a plane , can't sleep and can't watch films with a low droning noise in the background.

I had one flight in economy where I went to stretch my legs at the back and thought there was a guy there waiting to use the bathroom. After 5 minutes I started talking to him and he said he couldn't sit for hours either. He then disclosed he would go to the back and open one of the cupboards in the galley where they keep all the alcohol miniatures. We had a great alcohol fuelled chat for 2 hours and then returned to our seats. I half regretted that session when I arrived at my destination.

[bamboozled]

17 minutes ago, DaLa said:

Resident partygoer here. Yes they both serve alcohol. The upstairs bar on the Emirates A380's are good fun and sociable. I have only had one dry flight in 40 years; I'm restless on a plane , can't sleep and can't watch films with a low droning noise in the background.

I had one flight in economy where I went to stretch my legs at the back and thought there was a guy there waiting to use the bathroom. After 5 minutes I started talking to him and he said he couldn't sit for hours either. He then disclosed he would go to the back and open one of the cupboards in the galley where they keep all the alcohol miniatures. We had a great alcohol fuelled chat for 2 hours and then returned to our seats. I half regretted that session when I arrived at my destination.

Hmm, I don't think I've ever been on a plane that had an upstairs nor a bar of any sort. I've been on a good number of flights, too. I hope I run into the situation such as you describe. I don't have any problem watching films, though, and quite enjoy zoning out to 4 or 7. The key is to have decent headphones, not the one the airline gives you.