Royal Air Maroc review by Vicki

I flew two legs of an open jaw ticket to Europe with Royal Air Maroc (Marrakech-Casablanca and Casablanca to Dohar) on 1 Nov 2018, with the majority of my flights being on Qatar. RAM is a Qatar program partner, and the airline combination produced a great price on Skyscanner. Well, folks, you get what you pay for - and I didn't read the reviews of RAM prior to booking. Flight AT402 from Marrakech to Casablanca was fine. At only 50 minutes, the plane went up, flew at cruising altitude for about 15 minutes, then landed. All fine there, apart from having to walk across the tarmac and up a flight of steps to board. Same deal landing in Casablanca in reverse. Then the nightmare started. Separating of passengers connecting to international flights and those terminating in Casablanca was done outside the rear entry doors to the arrivals terminal. Passengers were jammed up against the side of the building standing in puddles of water (as it had been raining) waiting to have their passport and ticket examined by one of two officials who told them to go through either the international connections door or the domestic arrivals door. It actually started to rain lightly while I was waiting which wasn't much fun. Then another bus of disembarking passengers pulled up and there was no room for them to get off the bus and stand safely out of danger from passing airport vehicles. It was slow-moving mayhem, and I'd imagine that people with tight connections missed their flights. I had a 3-hour layover, so once inside the arrivals terminal, I settled down and waited for AT216 to Doha. Luckily I checked the departure gate several times as it was changed without notice or announcement shortly before boarding opened (from Level 1 to the ground level). Again we had to walk across the tarmac and climb stairs to board. Everything seemed fine as we taxied down the runway... then sat for about 20 minutes. Eventually an announcement was made that we were going back to the terminal, and we taxied back. A hoist/lift was wheeled out to the right-hand wing and several mechanics peered at a central flap which was elevated (the other flaps were all lying flush with the edge of the wing), and made calls on their mobile phones. So we sat... and sat... and sat... for 3 hours 45 minutes! No announcements were made, no refreshments were given, nothing! Eventually I went to the galley to get some water and asked one of the male flight attendants what was happening, and was told there was a "technical services" problem, but that we should be leaving within 15 minutes. Well, that never happened. By that stage, people were getting tired and irritable. The two very small children in front of me were going beserk, screaming, jumping up and down, crying, running up and down the aisles, etc - understandable, as they were bored witless (as were we all). Luckily it wasn't a hot day as the plane's air conditioning wasn't running, but it got really stuffy and uncomfortable. People started sleeping across three seats if they had a row to themselves. Eventually we were told to prepare for takeoff. The flight attendants who had been sitting in the galley for most of the previous 3 hours 45 minutes appeared and made a cursory check of the cabin. The man behind me was still sleeping across three seats as we started taxiing down the runway, not strapped in or anything! I was about to draw the attention of one of the bored flight attendants to this when he spotted him, shook him awake and told him to sit up and buckle up. No safety briefing was given as we were just about to take off.- unbelievable! As we took off, I had a clear view out the window of the wing - and the flap WHICH WAS STILL ELEVATED! Nothing had changed. I just crossed my fingers and hoped for the best, reassured somewhat that several people had been taking photos with their mobile phones which I thought would at least be found if we crashed. So it was a nerve wracking 6-hour flight to Doha. We made up about 45 minutes in the air, but I still had to run through Doha airport to make my QR900 connection to Perth as boarding had commenced at the same time as the RAM flight landed. I would never fly RAM again. They're disorganised, don't apparently maintain their aircraft adequately and pay scant regard to safety. I felt less than confident on a 6-hour flight with them as the "technical services" issue did not appear to have been rectified. In addition, we were not kept informed as to what the problem with the aircraft was, nor given refreshments on board while we waited for the problem to be fixed. On the plus side, however, my luggage magically appeared at Perth airport, despite the extremely short connection time in Doha. However, I suspect that was Qatar's efficient service, not RAM's.