Royal Air Maroc

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  • TominScotland
    Participant

    My first experience of flying RAM, Manchester – Casablanca – Heathrow. Overall, nothing wrong with the service in Economy. Good catering for 3 hour flights, somewhat short on smiles but on time and reasonable comfort for 737-800 aircraft.

    I did not realise the scale of RAM’s hub activities in Casablanca, with a network covering many European destinations as well as West Africa, North Africa, Brazil and the USA. Long and multiple queues seem to be the order of the day – not really the airline’s fault.

    Two interesting things happened on my return. I checked in online and received my boarding pass via e-mail. Nowhere was there any indication of the need to print this off. On arrival at the airport, with hand luggage only, I joined a long queue for Security. There was a police check at the head of the queue – rejected the e-boarding pass and demanded a paper version. Sent back to the check -in desks and questioned why this requirement was not on the website – “police” was the only answer I got. So if anyone from RAM reads this, you might want to inform passengers online about this?

    On board, I was in the second row of Economy and not feeling great. during the meal service, rather than try to get past 2 carts on a full flight, I decided to duck forward through the curtain. I expected to be told off but managed to get into the WC before anyone stopped me. Just starting to sort myself out and there was a loud banging on the door, I opened it a crack and the lady cabin attendant demanded that I come out and go to the rear. I closed the door after explaining that I did not feel well. She then opened the door to continue the discussion, by which time I was already ‘in action’. She did retreat after that!! I wondered if anyone had encountered similar with other airlines – it was something of a surprise.


    MarkivJ
    Participant

    Other than EU, US, Canada, Oz/NZ and a few developed SE Asian countries, I always carry a print out of my electronic boarding card as these police checks happen quite a bit in these countries.


    Swissdiver
    Participant

    As MarkivJ, I almost always carry a paper version of the boarding card, especially when I don’t know the local regulation as I saw airports where you could not enter the terminal building without a paper…

    As for the lady banging on the door, I guess a passenger complained. But I find this totally unacceptable. It happened only once to me, not so long ago (on KLM?). The purser told me the smoking alarm was ringing (wrongly – I don’t smoke)! Luckily I was almost done, still it was quite unpleasant…


    FDOS_UK
    Participant

    Tom

    I take it that you are not used to being/working in the Maghrabi part of Africa?

    What you experienced seems about par for the course.


    TominScotland
    Participant

    FDOS, not worked in Morocco before but I have spent quite a bit of time in Tunisia, Egypt, the Middle East and Iran – more than the Maghrabi region, I grant. I guess my point is that if RAM want to become truly international and compete beyond point-to-point they need to address things like this.


    FDOS_UK
    Participant

    [quote quote=826377]FDOS, not worked in Morocco before but I have spent quite a bit of time in Tunisia, Egypt, the Middle East and Iran – more than the Maghrabi region, I grant. I guess my point is that if RAM want to become truly international and compete beyond point-to-point they need to address things like this.

    [/quote]

    The ME and Iran are different cultures to the Maghab, Egypt is somewhat a Maghrabi country, but different.

    Policemen have high status and tend to make things up as they go along – 5 mins later, you may have been fine with an electronic BP.

    In terms of using the loo, the FA was just enforcing the exclusiveness of the cabin – I’m sure if you’d explained to someone that you were ill, they would have been helpful. FWIW, on Egyptair short haul, the crew would stop the economy pax deplaning until after the business class had left.

    Don’t forget that you are dealing with a culture with a relatively high power-distance dimension (Hofstede) of 70, compared to the UK’s 35. This does not make for egalitarian treatment and if you’re in economy, you use the economy loos unless there is a good reason.

    Culture eats strategy for breakfast, lunch, dinner and any other meal you can think of.


    Swissdiver
    Participant

    Egypt is somewhat a Maghrabi country

    Don’t tell this to an Egyptian, unless you are prepared to run fast…


    FDOS_UK
    Participant

    [quote quote=826382]

    Egypt is somewhat a Maghrabi country

    Don’t tell this to an Egyptian, unless you are prepared to run fast…

    [/quote]

    Technically speaking, the Maghrab starts around Tripoli, but culturally there are some similarities with Egypt – one of my Egyptian associates was the one who shared this view with me 🙂


    Swissdiver
    Participant

    He wanted to be nice to you, probably. 🙂

    I went more often to CAI than to ZRH airport… Plus Ms. SD is half Egyptian, from a rather old family. Trust me, not Maghrabi at all!


    FDOS_UK
    Participant

    [quote quote=826392]He wanted to be nice to you, probably. ?

    I went more often to CAI than to ZRH airport… Plus Ms. SD is half Egyptian, from a rather old family. Trust me, not Maghrabi at all!

    [/quote]

    No, he was briefing me on how to deal with a group of rather pushy delegates.


    Swissdiver
    Participant

    Honestly I find not many common points between say an Algerian and an Egyptian, while there are many between a Syrian and an Egyptian. But of course this is a matter of perception. Since however you seem to like Hofstede’s model, except for the LTO (you probably know what IBM stands for in Egypt), the model shows very similar variables between Syria and Egypt. Unfortunately neither Algeria not Tunisia were modelled.
    All: https://geert-hofstede.com/countries.html is a great tool


    SimonS1
    Participant

    I saw on Aviation Herald that a RAM 737 suffered an engine failure when departing Lisbon for Casablanca. The pilots continued the 50 min flight to Casablanca on one engine….


    stevescoots
    Participant

    After having to sleep on the curbside once in India i always carry a paper document. I had a 6 hour wait after arrival from international to domestic and planned to just nap in the lounge but could not get into the terminal without either my ticket/BP and had to wait for the airline staff to arrive, so it was curl up on the mud outside with my luggage!

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