Thai AirAsia Strands Passengers On Bus After Remote Stand Mix-Up

I’m confused.
So gate-wise 136 passengers have boarded (or at least left the terminal building). Only 113 were on the plane and they still decided to leave. Aren’t they supposed to count the people on board ? Did nobody ask where these 20 passengers were? I find it bizarre even from a security pov

A Jet2 flight recently managed to take off from Manchester having left 31 passengers waiting on a stairwell having got lost between the scan and the jetbridge ! Doesn’t seem routine anymore to do head counts . I haven't seen one for a long time

Confused. Were the missing passengers on the same bus but unable to board quickly enough before they shut the doors?

Well, at least the bus was about as comfortable as on-board Air Asia.

Eh, still slightly better than Lion Air.

@Maryland That should not matter. No matter how fast or slow they were that should never be the reason to shut the doors. They were already considered boarded passengers with their boarding passes scanned at the terminal. The flight crew should not have closed the door on them. Like Lucky said there are procedures in place such as communication between flight and ground staff and doing headcount of the passengers. I remember on some of my flights even two crew members would do the headcount for ‘total’ accuracy.

Well, had a similar incident on Lufthansa (LH), where the bus delivered us to the wrong plane. It was only discovered once passengers of a second bus arrived (which was actually the first bus from their perspective) and some of their seats had already been taken ...

I remember the old days of Air Asia when there were not seat assignments and they used a hand clicker to do a head count. When you handed in your boarding pass, you had a number on the ticket between like 1-160. And someone sat with A4 paper and crossed out the corresponding number with a pen when you went to the boarding gate. At LCCT in Kuala Lumpur, there would be boarding gates literally feet apart and more than once I was on a flight that people boarded thinking they were going to Singapore, but got on a plane going to Penang. The staff announced the destination to make sure people were on the right plane. Seat assignments were just done for monetization.

The Thai Air Asia team was strikingly worse than Malaysia Air Asia or the other countries. I contacted Tony Fernandes, founder of Air Asia, about this and it improved afterwards. It would be common for check in agents to just walk away from their desk for 10-15 minutes for a bathroom break or to get a cup of coffee. Really chaotic situation in an already chaotic country.

When I see Thailand and mistake, nothing surprises me. When I see Thai Air Asia, I bet stuff like this happens more often than is reported. And lately, with Air Asia overall, prices are frequently the same as carriers like Malaysia Airlines, Vietnam Airlines and Batik/Lion group.

Air Asia, at least the Indonesian group, is more comfortable than most North American airlines, and with better service as well.

Yes. I thought they required cross check, like when doors are armed. What i can't understand is how you have missed people! Thank you Stanley C

Baliken, um, no, not at all. Garuda is more akin to US3. Air Asia, including Indonesia, is like Spirt, Frontier, Allegiant, at best.

Definitely a confusing situation.
From the ground side, was it a separate bus with those 20 passengers? Did the driver not know where he was supposed to go? Was the driver late in relation to the previous buses and the crew just assumed they were no shows?

Airplane door has been closed and boarding stairways has been retracted by the time last bus arrived at that bay. Passengers on that bus kept asking why stairways has been retracted and bus door were kept being closed to them.

Bus did arrive at the correct bay but boarding stairways has been removed upon bus arrival.

"As is standard at many airports in many parts of the world, this flight was departing from a remote stand, meaning that passengers were shuttled from the gate to the plane on buses."

It's typically only "developing locations" like LAX or LHR that have subpar arrangements like this. 😉

They still do the hand clicker...or at least they did on my last flight DMK-KVB in July!

That's really egregious... One person slipping up is expected, but the entire cabin and ground crew screwing up is exceptional.

Thanks . I can't imagine their mystery. And even before a count, one might notice a visual deficiency of passengers?

I took eight flights with Air Asia flying to four countries in late 2024. It was the first time I flew with a foreign budget airline and might be the last. Unsure if the saving will compensate for trampoline stress on a vacation. On one flight, the airline crew discovered a mechanic failure after the gate agents checked in all travelers onto the buses. So the buses circled around on the tarmac and rest and merry go around again for at least ninety minutes. Many of us felt we might not make it safely to the destination on the same plane. All flights were at least 85% full. The flights turned around as soon as all travelers were on board-- no time to clean the airplane. It was the first time that I watched gate agents carefully weigh and measure the carry-ons permitted no more than 7 kgs. Indonesian AirAsia staff were the most pleasant to deal with. Online check-in with baggage was super infuriating. Never contemplate flying a domestic budget airline.

Passenger counting is not a universal practice in aviation. A lot of airlines do it (e.g. UK CAA-regulated carrier must do it) but many don't. Most European carriers don't count passengers before departure and rely on data from manifest.