WOW Air Didn’t Wow Us

*Update: WOW Air ceased operations on March 28th, 2019*

When booking our flights for our three week trip to Europe, we booked one with WOW Air from Amsterdam, Netherlands to Reykjavik, Iceland. I have of course heard many people complain about WOW since it’s a budget airline and doesn’t offer a lot of extra amenities. I understood that and was willing to take a bare bones flight for this leg of our trip since it would only be a couple hours. For our other flights, I had booked Icelandair since I’d read they had decent leg room and my husband is tall enough to really appreciate the extra inches between rows.

Change in Plans

Booking was straight forward and we received our confirmation with no issues. We had no worries about our flight until my husband received an email during the first week of our trip. This email was letting us know that our flight from Amsterdam was now departing from Brussels instead. Cue the panic as we dropped our bags in our hotel in Aachen, Germany. As we were meeting up with friends that night, we didn’t have time to address it until the next morning. It’s always stressful when flights change unexpectedly, and even more so when you’re in a foreign country with limited access to Wi-Fi.

Phone Call from Hell

After we dragged ourselves out of bed in the morning he called WOW Air’s customer service number to find out what was happening with our flight. Having worked in customer service since high school and even in a call center for time, I can understand that it is a difficult job. However, the representative that my husband spoke with on that phone call was extremely rude and unhelpful. He had the volume up so I could hear the entire conversation. While frustrated, he stayed calm and outlined our situation to the representative and asked what our options were. The representative treated the conversation as though he was belligerently screaming at them, which was rude. He was repeatedly told that we did not have reservation by the representative when he provided our confirmation number.

In the end, we had to forward our confirmation email and the email we’d received regarding the change to our flight to a general inbox and were told by the representative that they would look into it and get back to us. This was not a phone call to make a customer feel warm & fuzzy about an airline. 

Second Call’s the Charm

That afternoon, we tried calling again to see if we could get this situation sorted out. This time my husband spoke to a representative that was much more helpful and far more pleasant than the one he’d spoken to that morning. They were able to pull our reservation up in the system without any issues and explained that the Amsterdam flight had been cancelled entirely. Our options were to either depart from Brussels on the same date as our original flight, or to fly out of Amsterdam on a different date. Since we had already made reservations for our time in Iceland, we really wanted to keep our original date. The representative was also able to provide us with information regarding submitting a claim for reimbursement for our cost to travel from Amsterdam to Brussels for the flight*.

While the situation was far from ideal, this phone call left us feeling a bit more positive about WOW Air.

Bugging them for Baggage

After receiving our new confirmation for the changed flight, we had to email them a couple times to get confirmation that our checked baggage had carried over from the original booking. The new confirmation we’d received didn’t show the baggage and we did not want to have issues upon arriving at the check in desk on the day of the flight with baggage.

Easy Check-in

The check in process was thankfully smooth for us in Brussels, and the representatives at the counter were both friendly and professional. It is worth noting that many people that were checking in around us had issues due to their bags being too large to fit within the airline’s guidelines. A word to the wise would be to measure your bags well before flying with budget airlines!

Delays

There was a slight delay, but it didn’t affect our flight very much. Originally scheduled to depart at 11:35am, our flight didn’t actually take off until noon. This only resulted in a minor delay though since we only landed ten minutes after our original arrival time. Definitely not something I would hold against WOW Air.

Seats and Sleep

Boarding and getting settled into our seats went smoothly. I had booked myself the window seat and my husband in the middle since it wasn’t a long flight. On longer flights I often sacrifice the window so he can have the aisle seat. This time we got lucky that it wasn’t a full flight and there was an empty seat in our row. A win for both of us since he got the aisle after all. As I’d read online, there isn’t a lot of legroom on WOW Air flights, and at 6’2”, his knees were touching the seat in front of him. The seats were comfortable enough with adjustable headrests, reclining, and even hooks for hanging your coat on the back of the seat in front of you.

However, on the downside there was no inflight entertainment beyond what you bring with you. There is not any included food or drink, but it is available for purchase during the flight as well as in advance. As we napped for most of the flight, we did not order any food or drinks.

WOW Air Didn’t Wow Us

Overall I would say our experience with WOW Air was fine. The change in departure cities was an unforeseen obstacle which was poorly handled by the first representative we spoke with. However, the second representative was far more helpful and we did end up where we needed to be when we needed to be there. While I probably won’t be singing WOW Air’s praises to everyone I meet, I also won’t be warning people off. Just be aware of the baggage limits and amenities offered before booking so you’re prepared before flying with WOW Air.

*Getting reimbursed for Extra Travel Costs:

Since our original flight was from Amsterdam, we had booked a room for the night before the flight near Amsterdam’s airport. Unfortunately for us by the time we got the email from WOW Air informing us that the flight’s departure city had changed, it was too late to cancel the room reservation. To get to Brussels for our flight, we had to get up extra early and take a train to Amsterdam.

We submitted the receipt for our train tickets about ten days after the flight (could not be submitted before the flight per the instructions we’d received from WOW Air.) A month later we’ve received confirmation from WOW Air that they accepted our claim and outlining our payment options. They were offering a cash refund on the card used to purchase the train tickets, or a WOW Air voucher with a value of about $10 more than the refund. Not being certain of the next time we would fly with WOW Air, we replied back to them that we wanted the cash refund to our credit card. Per the email from WOW Air, the cash refund took approximately 9-10 business days to be processed. 

Interested in my experiences with other airlines?

Have you ever flown with WOW Air or another budget airline?