Air China and Japan Earthquake

by Sebastien
(Back in Tokyo)

I left Tokyo right after the Earthquake on my flight with Air China, and they were really accommodating with all the schedule changes.

When the Great Tohoku Earthquake stroke Japan, I was in my University in Tokyo. After the first quake over, came the fear of radiation, the panic buying and all the crazy nonsense that just takes place in moments like these.

Luckily, March is also the month for scholar vacations in Japan, and I had a flight to China scheduled only 4 days later. The problem is: once gone, I was not in a hurry to come back!

So my vacations that should have lasted 2 weeks lasted 1.5 months. But Air China was very cool with me. I would just call 20 hours before the schedule flight and ask to postpone 1 or 2 weeks at a time. I did it 3 times!

Once the person on the phone told me that I should not be able to postpone more than 1 month, but their manager told it was okay.

The details that count: they were always available (up to 2 min waiting once), have very good English speakers, always polite, and quick to proceed. Compared to my experience with phone/internet companies, it's like night and day!!