Ahead of our Oman Air journey back to Dublin (or at least so we thought), we were furnished with an invite to the Plaza Premium First lounge at KLIA 1, Oman Air’s chosen third-party lounge for their premium passengers.
Having experienced the main Plaza Premium Lounge a few years back and finding it decidedly average, I was excited to give the ‘First’ variant a try and also see how it matches up as a premium offering compared to Oman Air’s home lounge in Muscat.
For those unaware, Plaza Premium First lounges are framed as a bit of a ‘cut above’ the standard Plaza Premium lounges, with phrases like ‘exclusive sanctuary’ and ‘an elevated lounge experience’ being used to describe them on the Plaza Premium website.
The good news, especially in Kuala Lumpur, is that this also means far less (nearly none) cardholders eligible for access – at least it seemed that only specific cardholders from local bank UOB had eligiblilty. Even then, it was very curtailed as we came to learn about when a man threw a temper tantrum over the inadmissibility of the rest of his family – seemingly only being eligible himself.
Of course for those of us not being granted access on the basis of premium cabin travel, this level of luxury comes at a price; on a random date in a weeks’ time, the standard Plaza Premium Lounge KLIA 1 comes in at around $58 for a 2-hour stay, while the Plaza Premium First comes in at $79.95 for the same day, time and period of stay.
There can be no doubt – the Plaza Premium First lounge is certainly much quieter, and finding a seat was no effort at all. Entering the lounge, you pass behind the admission counters and naturally veer off to the left, with plenty of cosy armchairs, along with table lamps and power sockets alongside floor-to-ceiling windows with great views out over the airfield.
This is incidentally, even though it’s closer to the entrance (and noise), where we ended up parking ourselves, as we wound up not having too long before boarding. Unfortunately, a gang of fellow travellers in a group arrived, sat right behind us and played music on their phones, which significantly lowered the tone of the whole experience. Why are headphones so difficult to use? I’ll never get it.
Meandering onwards, further into the lounge, and there’s a bar firstly on the left with staff ready to pour a drink as soon as needed (which, as usual, was immediate in my case). There’s a beverage list, although I found the staff to be eager to engage right off the bat so there was really no need. I wasn’t gone on the first glass of wine, and he was more than happy to take it back and let me try something else – which was much better, but the name of which is now long forgotten.
Further in, there are also a set of juice and water dispensers, along with a novel Carlsberg and Sapporo beer dispenser.
Facing that, a decent set of hot buffet options, along with snacks, and something of a DIY carvery with meat pre-sliced and ready for the taking nearby. Overall, all the food options presented looked high-quality, hot, and regularly tended to as staff seemed to be constantly floating around refreshing, cleaning, or replating food.
It would seem there is a-la-carte dining although quite where this was, or how to avail of it, went over our heads; not that we were particularly in a mood for a drawn-out meal anyway, so the buffet options worked fine.
Further on from there, the lounge extended much further back, with dining tables and chairs throughout – though I was still glad we kept to our plush armchairs further out the front.
The bathrooms, while compact, were clean, tastefully furnished and rain showers were also available for use.
Before long, it was time gulp down the last of the wine, glance at the loud mobile phone group once more, and head off in search of our Oman Air gate for what would turn out to be quite the eventful joiurney home.
Overall, Plaza Premium First KLIA is a real step-up from the standard Plaza Premium lounge – would I pay for that level of indulgence myself? Possibly not, but it’s a great option to know about for when you’re not in the mood to fight off the cardholders and look for a seat in the next door ‘regular’ lounge.
