Manila airport Terminal 3

[Onemore52]

What is going on at the airport these days, whoever is responsible for the improvements there should get a medal for improving the efficiency there.

I arrived on a flight from down under at 5:30 p.m. which might have something to do with the efficiency but no less there was no queue at immigration and the luggage came through within 5 minutes.

Ouside at the taxi rank there was the usual touts wanting 300 percent on top of the usual fare so if foreigners are not aware of this sting then of course they will get caught, so if the powers to be could clean this up that would also be a plus.

While waiting I was approached by a couple of touts wanting 1200 php to go to Pasay, and one of pluses of going with them they said was that the traffic is very heavy at that time of night, so when I asked them if their  van turned into a helicopter for what is usually a 200php fare they just walked away.

So I stayed in the taxi queue and got a metered taxi for 180php to the hotel I was staying at.

But let me say this taxi rort is not confined to the Philippines, when I arrived in Shitney a few weeks ago, the driver with the turban on started to give me a guided tour of Shitney without me asking for it, and after the flight was in no mood for it, so after another detour off the main route I said quite aggressively “I have lived in Sydney all my life, and you are taking the piss, stop the this F..ck..n car now and let me out”which he did, I took 25 percent off the metered fare and put in on the seat and then waited for another taxi.

So no more taxis, went Uber to and from the airport, no problems.

 

[earthdome]

13 hours ago, Onemore52 said:

So no more taxis, went Uber to and from the airport, no problems.

I have used grab from NAIA Terminal 3. Only had to wait 5-10 minutes. Had to pay about 500 pesos though, but it was a longer ride during rush hour, took almost 2 hours. And that was the price quoted from the app before pickup. Gave a nice tip because it took much longer than the app predicted and charged for.

[Mark57]

23 hours ago, Onemore52 said:

What is going on at the airport these days, whoever is responsible for the improvements there should get a medal for improving the efficiency there.

I arrived on a flight from down under at 5:30 p.m. which might have something to do with the efficiency but no less there was no queue at immigration and the luggage came through within 5 minutes.

Ouside at the taxi rank there was the usual touts wanting 300 percent on top of the usual fare so if foreigners are not aware of this sting then of course they will get caught, so if the powers to be could clean this up that would also be a plus.

While waiting I was approached by a couple of touts wanting 1200 php to go to Pasay, and one of pluses of going with them they said was that the traffic is very heavy at that time of night, so when I asked them if their  van turned into a helicopter for what is usually a 200php fare they just walked away.

So I stayed in the taxi queue and got a metered taxi for 180php to the hotel I was staying at.

But let me say this taxi rort is not confined to the Philippines, when I arrived in Shitney a few weeks ago, the driver with the turban on started to give me a guided tour of Shitney without me asking for it, and after the flight was in no mood for it, so after another detour off the main route I said quite aggressively “I have lived in Sydney all my life, and you are taking the piss, stop the this F..ck..n car now and let me out”which he did, I took 25 percent off the metered fare and put in on the seat and then waited for another taxi.

So no more taxis, went Uber to and from the airport, no problems.

 

I agree 100%  Terminal 3 has been a breeze in the last few years   -years ago the old terminal 1 with all the international flights was the real deal  

[Onemore52]

53 minutes ago, Mark57 said:

I agree 100%  Terminal 3 has been a breeze in the last few years   -years ago the old terminal 1 with all the international flights was the real deal  

Yes, just before they switched terminals I waited for 2 hours to clear immigration, not joking.

[Snowy79]

I managed to get a helpful porter to take my bags through from the entrance. The queue was about 100m long. Inside and with self check in I was at security in minutes. 

[earthdome]

Last time we flew out of NAIA Terminal 3 we had a lot of luggage. So I got one of the porters outside that you pay. He took me through a different entrance where there was no queue to get through security. Worth the money to avoid the queue outside.

[JJReyes]

13 hours ago, Snowy79 said:

I managed to get a helpful porter to take my bags through from the entrance. The queue was about 100m long. Inside and with self check in I was at security in minutes. 

After paying the porterage fee, our porter tells the security guard at the door that we are business class passengers.  It was a nice way to avoid the long queue at the entrance for economy class passengers.  So I tipped him well.  Everyone was happy.     

[Jack Peterson]

8 hours ago, JJReyes said:

our porter tells the security guard at the door that we are business class passengers.  It was a nice way to avoid the long queue at the entrance for economy class passengers. 

 My, you seem to live a gifted Life mate, all others have to show a ticket to Security just to get in the Building and I don't think in reality either yours or mine would say "Business Class" Then if that was tried at the security after check in, what are you going to do when either see you are just trying it on. Your Boarding card will say Economy  BTW the bit in red is to say what we are  and believe me there is nothing wrong with that. Want Special treatment you should pay for it. JMHO

[JJReyes]

1 hour ago, Jack Peterson said:

 My, you seem to live a gifted Life mate, all others have to show a ticket to Security just to get in the Building and I don't think in reality either yours or mine would say "Business Class" Then if that was tried at the security after check in, what are you going to do when either see you are just trying it on. Your Boarding card will say Economy  BTW the bit in red is to say what we are  and believe me there is nothing wrong with that. Want Special treatment you should pay for it. JMHO

We travel premium economy because of my bad back.  At the counter, there is either a dedicated priority line for our class of service or we can use the business class line.  But you are right.  The guard never checked our tickets.  He only did a cursory inspection of our passports.  It was prudent to keep quiet and not explain the difference.  If the security guard had questioned me, I might have said, "We are priority passengers." which is accurate.

Edited March 9, 2019 by JJReyes

[JJReyes]

On 3/6/2019 at 6:17 PM, Onemore52 said:

What is going on at the airport these days, whoever is responsible for the improvements there should get a medal for improving the efficiency there.

I have not done any research, but one possibility is the money for reconstruction was borrowed from an international lending institution like Asian Development Bank.  The contract would be through an international bidding process.  The work is usually of high quality.  

You may have noticed that the concrete used for some highways is very good.  It doesn't fall apart after a few years.  I recall Korean construction companies won quite a few ADB contracts for major infrastructures like roads, airports, bridges, and seaports.