Air Travel in the Philippines, Part I
I travel a lot… How much? Well, I am usually purchasing airline tickets weekly. I am currently in Singapore, Manila tomorrow, Kuala Lumpur Thursday, Hong Kong Friday, and then I go to the States for 10 days. I try to get home at least 1 or 2 days per week, but it doesn’t always work out that way.
I was booking tickets today, and this idea hit me for my first column when I was on the PAL website and they yet again did not like my US credit cards. Why does travel have to be so difficult, and what can you do about it? How is the easiest way to get around and get things done?
Well, my travel is usually fairly complex… My company has had several travel agents and they usually goof things up, somehow. Trust me: It is no fun sitting in the Athens airport trying to rebook a mis-booked flight. Therefore, I usually book my own travel online, using the airline websites or, my favorite, Expedia. There are some problems when booking travel in the Philippines:
1. There is a Philippine law that states that air travel originating in the Philippines must be paid for in the Philippines. Fine, if you are flying Philippine airlines. Not so good if you are flying Cathay Pacific and using a US credit card. You then have to make the reservation and physically go to the local ticket office to pay for it. Forget trying to buy for someone else not travelling with you… Photocopies and fax of the credit cards, passports, etc. This impacts many of the travel websites or airline websites, particularly US-based, where I have my expense accounts. One of the reasons I use Expedia is that their call center is in Cebu, and they can book the tickets. This normally works, but Expedia sometimes has its glitches (Like TODAY…AAAARRRGGGGHHH!!!). You can also book complicated tickets departing from Hong Kong, and just buy a separate ticket to Hong Kong. I have found that, particularly, fares also can be cheaper from Hong Kong or Bangkok, particularly trans-Pacific flights, and Europe flights also tend to be more convenient.
2. Philippine-based companies often do not like US credit cards. Ever go into SM and see 7 different credit card scanners? One word in my mind: Ridiculous. However, you cannot change it. Local ticket offices are usually very crowded… Remember, 10% of the population works overseas. There are always people travelling and never a “slow” time at the ticket offices. Don’t forget traffic and all the other things associated with going in person.
3. Cebu Pacific, Seair, Air Asia (The best of the lot) and the other discount carriers are booming, offering cheap fares as low as 0 Pesos. Wonderful! However, you can expect to be self-loading cargo (Queues) and the taxes on the fares are not so cheap. For example, last month I flew to Gensan… RT fare was 2,000 Pesos, Taxes were around 3,000 Pesos…More than the fare. Do not expect so much as a free water on these flights, and prepare to pay baggage fees. (Don’t dismiss this… When Rebecca travels with me, the amount of “Pasabulong” we carry used to astonish me… Cooking oil??? She got the message when I had to pay US$150 extra in Macau for overweight bags. Sometimes it is best just to let the lesson happen… Gotta love ‘em, though, and can’t live without ‘em.) Also, and I can’t stress this enough, avoid ANY Domestic connection through NAIA… You may be delayed, bumped, etc. The discount carriers often only have one flight per day to some locations, if that many. Also, for business, it is better to book on a major airline than a discount, particularly if your business is urgent. Also, customer service on these airlines, particularly Cebu Pacific in my opinion, is horrendous. Expect to wait on the phone at least an hour if you call for anything, and expect little to no resolution of problems. I tend to fly these guys ONLY if I have no other options (Business, remember?). Sometimes, it is easier and cheaper just to buy another ticket than to try and rebook.
4. For domestic travel, schedules are often fairly limited, and can also sell out fast, particularly on less popular routes or during holidays (Big one there… If you want to travel in the RP during Holy Week, All Saints, or Christmas, book FAR in advance.) Also, Filipino airlines have a very annoying habit of giving incorrect information on the phone or web… They say “Sold Out” but there is space available, or worse, they say “Space available” and you get to the ticket office and the flight is “Sold Out”.
5. ALWAYS remember to bring a printout of your ticket to a Philippine airport. They have this habit of not letting you into the terminal counters without one, requiring you to go find a printer before you check in. Last year, I was in over 75 different airports, and the only places I encountered this silliness was the Philippines, India, and Colombia, and in India, 100 rupees took care of the problem. This is easy to forget, particularly since most airlines only issue e-tickets now. (BTW, my normal procedure was to just show them a confirmation on my Blackberry… No longer… MUST be printed physically.)
6. Don’t lose your baggage claim tags. They check them in the Philippines and create yet another queue after you leave customs while everyone sits there searching for theirs. Again, I only encountered this in Manila, San Juan, and Colombia… pointless, and another hassle. I tend to simply blow around the line and get selective hearing if the security protests, but I’ve had to argue with them a few times. Why is it silly? They want the actual claim ticket… Your name in your passport (and the baggage tags, too, BTW) is not good enough. I had a missed connection in HKG last month and Cathay took the folder with the claim by accident and didn’t give me a new one… explaining that to the security people is like having a conversation with the wall.
7. Don’t show up at the airport without any cash… 750 Pesos for international. Seems self evident. I have, on occasion, forgotten about the exit tax after not wanting a wallet full of Pesos befor going to Vietnam. Fortunately, at NAIA, there are ATMs nearby, but, in my experience, they are usually broken (or, in local vernacular, “offline”.)
8. If you live here on a tourist Visa, you MUST have a ticket departing the Philippines before your visa expires. This sometimes causes me problems, since I am here on a regular tourist visa until I get married. Most regular tourists won’t have this problem, since they did not originate in MNL, and people with residence can stay as long as they like. I normally have a flight booked, but very sometimes forget the printout before I leave. Now, most of the airlines are pretty good about letting you slide if you tell them something like, “Oh, I’m on the 9:00 Cathay flight on the 23rd” or something like that. I have also never been asked once for it at passport control, despite the signs saying otherwise… It is always at airline check-in. If I’m hassled, usually showing a stack of credit cards does the trick. You do need to be prepared to buy another ticket out, however, just in case. Think of it this way… A cheap one-way fare to HKG, TPE, or BKK can always be used as a shopping excursion, if need be. Just book the cheapest flight ON ANY AIRLINE that you can that shows you intend to leave… Also keep in mind that the cheap fare may not be changeable and you could lose the value of the ticket.
Well, this pretty much covers booking tickets… Tomorrow, I’ll post some hints about airports here, security, hotels, and other things common with air travel in the country. In Part 3, I’ll share some tricks I have learned about making travel easier and more affordable.
I often wonder how on Gods green Earth the RP airlines survive with such an arcane booking system. I booked Cebu P online using a credit card last trip and even got the follow up confirmation …just to arrive and have them tell me I don’t have a ticket….credit card declined (not due to my card) so fortunatly seats were still availible so I rebooked at the crowded counter after waiting an hour for my “number’ to come up …only to use the same credit card which was accepted !!
My only concern is : And this is the same company which does the aircraft maintanance!!!
PS. Excellent info John, strongly advise ANYONE who travels to the RP to read and print this….especially the part about showing a departing ticket from the RP ( had them check several times departing BKK to MNL…this I cannot figure out ….no exit ticket from MNL? No return to MNL! …your stuck in BKK !! …why does Thailand care??)
On my last trip to MNL from HNL, I bought my tickets on-line four months in advance from the Philippine Airlines website. When I checked in, I was delayed, because they wanted to re run my credit card for approval. It was not a problem until I went to the security checkpoint and learned that due to my last minute ticket purchase, I had been identified for additional screening. That was annoying! I think I will take your advice and buy my tickets on Expedia from this point forward. Excellent article BTW. Thank-you for sharing!
Hi Brian,
The same thing happened to me this past April! I had purchased my ticket online (in Manila) and received a confirmation number. Next thing you know, I got to the counter and discovered my credit card was denied. Had to wait in life with number for over 2 hours! Once my number was called, I used the same credit card and viola! It was accepted! I have to make sure this doesn’t happen to me on my next visit. I’m printing this article for my personal file.
Hi John M,Excellent post,and i’m sure it will be valuable to 1st timers visiting Phils.From my experience ( visiting Mindanao)as i live in NW,UK my nearest airport Manchester (1hr drive) i always travel Singapore airlines.I can book full journey to Manila,Cebu or Davao with no hassle.Fly non stop to SG then 3hr changeover to Silk air.We use to fly into Cebu, stopover a couple of nights then on to CDO,but as you mention so much hassle getting internal travel tickets etc.Also there is no same day connecting flight Cebu/CDO so you have to stop over at least 1 night.I find it far easier now to fly into Davao from SG and have extra 30 mins road travel to central Bukidnon.Regards Chas.
2 weeks ago, I helped my sister book a flight in Philippine Airlines HERE IN THE US. Although I am familiar with the arcane payment system in the Philippines, I was confident that the PAL office was more efficient because it is based in the US.
Nope. I was wrong.
After booking a flight SF-Manila with my credit card by phone & emailing the credit card information, they requested … and get this … a faxed photoccopy of the credit card (front & back), my CA driver’s license AND I had to fill out a form with my personal information - Information they could have easily gotten from my earlier email!
Knowing this Pinoy game, I asked if I could just email them this with attachement. No dice. They don’t do emails just fax (even though we emailed them my credit card info).
Then it took the whole day of back & forth phone calls just to get a confirmation email. Every time we’d call, the different PAL employees would just keep saying that they taking care of it at that very moment.
All this for a credit card purchase of 1 PAL ticket.
This is why I don’t fly PAL. I like my e-tickets done in a matter of seconds, not a whole day of excuses & stress.
Hi John,
A very good column! Really useful information for new readers and an excellent reminder for long-time residents as well.
The exit ticket can be a problem if you do not enter the Philippines and get a Balikbayan visa or are a permanent resident. If you travel with your Filipino spouse, there is no need for an exit ticket as you have 1 year to travel the Philippines before leaving (i.e. Balikbayan visa), and immigration assumes you will get a ticket sometime within that period. A couple years ago I needed to travel and my wife wasn’t going to be joining me and therefore no Balikbayan visa would be granted. So I bought a Tiger Airways online ticket to Macao for .99 cents. After taxes and surcharges it came to around P600. It bought peace-of-mind and I never did use the ticket, but it wasn’t expensive either. Nowadays the fuel surcharges will be much more of course and I wonder if it is still cost-effecvtive to keep buying these ‘throw-away’ tickets.
If you’re not travelling with your Filipino spouse, I do know of an alternate method of getting a cheap exit ticket — book a ferry ticket from Zamboanga to Sandakan, Malaysia. This is cheap, and once you are in the Philippines you can even cancel the ticket and get a refund on much of the price of the ticket. It serves as a valid exit ticket. It too is a ticket you will never use, but at least you can get a refund on much of the ticket price.
One last pointer on cheap fares for those on Balikbayan visas. It is easy knowing exactly when you need to leave the Philippines if you have a Balikbayan visa. Wait for Cebu Pacific to have a Zero Peso fare to HK, Singapore, Macao or wherever, and book a holiday there that is timed for departure a few days before your visa expires. You get a holiday somewhere else for the same cost as re-newing your tourist visa every 2 months over the course of a year. Might as well reward yourself and you spouse with a holiday than go through the trouble and cost of renewing your tourist visa every two months.
Great work, John!
Thanks for everyone’s comments… I avoid PAL at all costs, but sometimes it is simply more convenient for schedule, lack of connection, etc. Expedia will book PAL just like any other airline, but you normally need to SPECIFICALLY tell it to search for PAL (A glitch in their system… it doesn’t default even though you might have MNL in the search).
As an update, I got completely fed up last night trying to buy Rebecca a ticket, and went down to the hotel bar to “decompress” with a Tiger beer… Saw a travel agent in the hotel lobby… They booked the ticket in 3 minutes. They can also book domestic in the RP… so, if you run into problems, this SINGAPORE travel agent completely outperforms the agencies here… They are Summit Travel, +65-6732-3833… Worth saving the hassle for the price a a call.
Hi John, excellent article with valuable information. Since long time i try to avoid taking PAL. But meanwhile also other airlines are not much better. One thing more I learned from others: every time they booked on line and payed by credit card…
same problems as mentioned above… 
What a small world John: I got the same positive experiences with a Singapore Airlines agent…. 
Hi John
I always book Philippine Airlines on line before I leave Kuwait for my internal flights from Manila to Dipolog and touch wood I have never had a problem and my credit card is Kuwaiti which is refused by some sites.
I also book on line for my wife when she comes here using her Kuwaiti card and also never had a problem. Hopefully my luck will hold.
Jack
hey John …. ha ha ha been to alot of airports in the states but had the most trouble in the pines both times i was there and it was so funny i had to laugh about it , i was always smiling when i talked to any one there and had a good time figuring it all and i still ended up waiting a week staying in the squatters area by the airport ..cheaper then a hotel ..had a good time there too .. i found out to be prepared for what u don’t think will happen to u and u will do all right oh and the atm ate my card too ..so now i had to send money to me by western union .. but i had a good time all around ….having fun from Phil R.