Thai Airways Royal First Lounge, Suvarnabhumi Airport (Concourse D)
I had read several outstanding reviews on Thai Airways ground service for Thai Airways First Class passengers departing Suvarnabhumi Airport. About 4 days before our Bangkok-Sydney flight on Thai Airways, I found award space for 2 passengers on Thai F and booked it right away for me and Karen. My parents were already booked on Thai F on the same flight months earlier. I was pretty stoked about trying out both Thai First Class as well as the Royal Thai First Class lounge in Bangkok. We had a 10 hour layover in Bangkok and it gave us more than enough time to enjoy whatever the First Class lounge had to offer.
We arrived at Suvarnabhumi Airport early morning on our flight from Kolkata. We slowly made our way to the Royal First Lounge on Concourse D.
The Thai First Class lounge has 6 semi-private rooms referred to as “Private Corners” on the website. Since the lounge was quite empty so early, we were able to secure one such room for ourselves for the entire period of our stay in the airport. The semi-private rooms are great in a way that you have exclusive use of that space without any intrusions from other passengers in the lounge.
By the time we had freshened up, one of the lounge attendants came by inquiring about breakfast. We ordered a simple menu of eggs, toast and bacon.
After breakfast, we moved from the semi-private rooms to the slumber rooms. There were 2 slumber rooms in the lounge and me and Karen shared one of them while my parents shared the other. The couch/bed is kinda narrow for sharing of 2 people but we managed to sleep for a few hours anyway.
One of the best benefits of access to the Royal First Lounge is ability to secure a 1 hour complimentary spa treatment at the Royal Orchid Spa next door. I had gone to the front desk and made appointments for all of us. I was told that there are only 3 concurrent 1-hour appointments available so I opted to go after Karen and my parents were done.
The Thai Royal Orchid Spa is located right across the corridor of the First Class Lounge.
While Karen and my parents went for their spa treatments, I was offered a welcome drink and a cold towel.
I spent the next 1 hour exploring the common areas of the waiting/meeting rooms in the spa.
I had opted for the 1 hour Royal Thai Massage while Karen and my parents went with the 1 hour “Touch of Silk” (Full body oil massage).
Once I entered the suite, the masseuse directed me to the amenity kit containing change of clothes and waited outside. Before I knew, my one hour of massage was over. It was fantastic and my neck and shoulders especially felt great.
After leaving the Spa we went back to the lounge for lunch.
The First Class lounge has both restaurant style sit-down service as well as buffet menu. We opted for the restaurant style sit-down service first.
My mom opted for some pad thai and rest of us went with chicken massaman curry. The food was quite tasty. We went to the buffet menu for seconds though :).
After lunch, I decided to go back to front desk to get our boarding passes. We were informed that Thai Airways does not give boarding passes to passengers arriving on Spicejet (low cost Indian carrier) and we had to clear immigration and customs and check-in outside.
We only had about 3 hours to go for the flight so we rushed to exit the transit area. We filled out the paperwork for Visa-on-arrival for my parents and then proceeded to clear immigration and customs. We then made our way to the departures level upstairs and arrived at the Thai Royal First Check-in area.
It was quite an experience to have the airline agents come to you with all the paperwork done while you relax on a couch. After check-in, we proceeded through a dedicated Thai Airways Premium cabin immigration line and also a separate security line. There was no one else on either of those lines and we were back in the transit area within 5 minutes (from check-in). There was a buggy waiting for us just past security and drove us back to the lounge. Superb !!
I cannot say enough good things about the Thai Airways ground crew out of Suvarnabhumi airport in Bangkok. From arrival to departure, we were treated really well by every single Thai Airways personnel we came in contact with. The customer service and genuine hospitality from the personnel rates as one of the highest I have ever experienced flying in any premium cabin on any airline.