Flying with Tap
Searching for cheap flight tickets
When I was planning our trip this year, we knew we will be going to Portugal for sure. An average round trip flight to Lisbon in June costs about $650-750 CAN. It’s pretty affordable considering June is sort of getting into their high season. I asked a couple of my coworkers and they said the flight tickets can be really cheap (and sometimes they will throw in really good deals) when you purchase them earlier in the year.
So, I’d been going on Google Flights and Skyscanner constantly around January to see when we can strike the best deal (it’s like checking the stock market). I would also follow some facebook groups like YYZ deals or Next Departure to see if they found any exclusive deals that they only know about.
At the time I was doing alot of research into how to get cheaper flights. Some people say browsing in incognito mode will not let the airline know that it’s in high demand, therefore they will not raise the price. Some people also say checking on Tuesday will be the best because that’s when they list new prices after seeing a week’s demand.) After checking every week for awhile, I realized there was not much of a difference in deals or any fluctuation in price.
Becoming a bit desperate, when I saw the price dropped to around $675, I caved and immediately purchased 2 flight tickets. Lo and behold, the very next day, TAP posted a deal and the price dropped to a new low which is $550. Having my jaw dropped, I quickly called their customer service. So if there is something you should know about purchasing a ticket is that every airline has a different rule when refunding a flight ticket in different country. TAP’s rule, however, allows the user to refund in 24 hours after purchase. So, luckily, I got the opportunity to do a switch and got our ticket for cheap.
My ProCess of booking with TAP
When booking with TAP, like any other airline, they have economy and business class. But even in economy class, they also have different tiers of what’s included.
Discount: The cheapest tier which includes basically nothing.
Basic: Includes one checked-in bag and the ability to refund partial of the ticket (if there is any special circumstances).
Classic: Includes the same as basic but with two checked-in bags plus seat reservation.
Plus: Being the most “high class” which includes everything, with some perks like having 3 bags, reserving seats in the "more room for your feet” area, “fast track in customs” and priority luggage.
Considering it’s an international flight and it’s Portugal’s official airline, I would think all economy class would at least include free seat reservation and one free checked-in bag. But because I wanted to save money, I chose Discount. I was thinking, we will pack less, wash our cloths on the trip, have all liquids contain under 100ml and just have our carry-ons. Closer to our flight, we realized it wasn’t doable. We needed to have at least one checked-in luggage. So, going back to the site, we saw adding a luggage costs $120 CAD…. and it’s ONE TRIP. So in total, we had to spend $240 round trip. In the end, I technically didn’t save any money from my first purchase. :/
The different “package” for economy class
For one trip. YIKES.
At least we got a free meal.
Seat Reservations
Having the discounted flight ticket meant that there were no seat reservations. So when you first booked, you are randomly assigned to a seat. It can be the standard seats or if you are lucky, the “Economy Xtra” (more leg room). If you are booking for 2 people, don’t worry, they will put you and your plus one together. If you want to move (depending on the distance of the flight), for the international flight, they will charge you $52 for moving to another standard seat or $90 for Economy Xtra. Yes. They will try to have you pay for everything. But have no fear, I had already beat the system.
After much research online, I learned a trick on how to move to any unoccupied seats without any penalty. The trick is to do it just 3 hours before your flight. At the T-minus 3 hour mark, TAP opens up the seats to everyone. The map will be shown without the money sign and you just pick whatever seat you want.
Our dreadful 36 hours
Our flight from Toronto to Lisbon was not a big hassle at all. One little thing was that going through custom at the Lisbon airport took us at least 2 hours.
So after one week in Portugal, our next destination was Morocco. We booked a flight from Faro (closest airport from Lagos) to Lisbon as a connecting flight and from Lisbon to Marrakech. It takes about half an hour to fly from Faro to Lisbon which is a very short flight compare to the 3 hour bus ride. However, this was not the case.
We had been waiting for a long time at the airport and no one from TAP came at the boarding gate. We thought the flight was just super delayed. An hour past boarding time, people were starting to question what was going on. For us, we had a connecting flight to catch so were extra nervous. We finally found out that the flight was cancelled through the TAP mobile app. At this point people started to panic. Airport staff said we had to get out of customs and talk to the TAP agents. Luckily there was a phone booth we can call for someone to help us. After 3 transfers, someone finally instructed us to wait at the gate and someone from TAP will come and let us know what our next steps would be.
After half an hour, we saw people on our flight were gathering on the first floor (our gate was on the second and it can overlook the first floor). So we quickly went down to see what was going on. At this point, it was pure chaos. TAP agents finally showed up and said the flight is cancelled and they have no reason why. (It was sunny with minor clouds that day) They said we had to wait for their corporate management to give them more instructions on how to proceed with all us stranded travellers. Another half hour passed by and they finally said they will assign new flights for everyone but it was just an announcement. Another half hour later, the agents finally started to assign new flights to customers. There were no announcement made that they were beginning to re-assign people so we quickly got in line to avoid being left out. When we got to the agent, due to me getting the discount flight ticket (not Chris), we had to wait until all the other people who had purchased higher tier tickets to get served first.
When it finally came to us, they assigned us a new flight to Lisbon in the late afternoon and to Marrakech the next afternoon. So everything that was preplanned in Morocco from hotel (riad) to taxi pickup to our desert tour has to be all rearranged. Luckily, the people at our riad and tour was very accommodating. Finally, we were told that we will get 2 meal vouchers plus a free overnight stay at a hotel nearby the airport at Lisbon because we have a connecting flight. However, that ended up not being the case.
While waiting for our flight to Lisbon, again there was a delay. While we were waiting at the gate, we saw a group of guys, who were also originally on our cancelled flight, making a scene as they were pretty agitated over how TAP had treated everything. They had been complaining to the crew and it turned out they had a wedding to catch. Since the flight was supposed to be boarded by 6:30pm, we waited for another 2 hours! This made the guys extra angry, so angry that grouped together to write a review on TAP lol.
This guy in the middle is reading his review to his friends
You can tell we are just mentally and physically exhausted
When we got on the flight, over half of the seats were empty. Chris and I had a tin foil hat theory, our flight might have been cancelled because of low number of seats purchased for the flight we booked compared to a surplus of TAP planes landing at that airport going to Lisbon throughout that day. Most of the other stranded guests on our original flight where reassigned to another flight that was currently being boarded at the airport earlier that afternoon while we where stranded. Taking into account fuel costs, the fee for landing at the airport, low number of tickets purchased and the large surpluss of half full planes arriving at the airport during the day, our conspiracy theory is TAP cancelled our flight and re-allocate the passengers to other flights to save money on a flight that would be costing them money to land and operate. This is a tin foil hat conspiracy of ours, we don’t know the reason why our flight was abruptly cancelled with no explanation.
When we arrived to Lisbon (9:45pm), we quickly went to the TAP information desk in order to get our meal and hotel vouchers. The agent at the desk told us they have no obligation to provide a hotel room given the circumstances. If we want to, we can book a hotel that was under 130 euros and TAP can reimburse us later. All the hotels near the airport where almost 300 euros for a single night and had no vacancies on such short notice. So we left that conversation even more upset and defeated. Another problem we encountered was that when we were in Faro, the agent asked us if we wanted to check-in our bags because they can do it for free. So i checked in my bag full of clothes and travelling gear. Paranoid that TAP would loose our luggage because of this constant string of screw ups, we decided to request to have our luggage given back to us.
So now, in order to get our bags, we had to asked the airport ground crew to grab our bags for us out of TAP’s possession. To do this, we needed to get out of the gate and we couldn’t go back into the gate until the morning and go through custom again, since customs was closed in the evening. Chris and I discussed, and to avoid more trouble with this company, we decided to sleep in the airport. We waited for another hour, then we got our checked luggage and slept on a bench near the security desk.
Empty seats from Faro to Lisbon
Sleeping in the Lisbon Airport
After a terrible sleep on the bench, we managed to check in again, go through customs and get to the gate area without any problems. Again, our flight to Marrakech got delayed. But at this point, we couldn’t be any more surprised. But in the end, the plane finally arrived and we where on our way to Marrakech.
This was our first nightmare experience with an airline. After reading a lot of reviews on this matter, it was a common issue with TAP. Lisbon has been a popular destination recently so the airport has been pretty busy. If one flight is delayed, it causes other flights to be delayed. Under the EU law, if the flight was cancelled or delayed for more than 3 hours, you can make a claim and can be compensated for 600 euros (dependent upon the distance). After we got back to Toronto, we reached out to a company that can help us with compensation with cancelled flights. We haven’t had any update yet at the time of writing this post, but hopefully we can get something back!