Aer Lingus opens its new Dublin lounge and delays the launch of its Manchester to US routes

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Aer Lingus has unveiled its refurbished lounge in Terminal 2 at Dublin Airport.

Features include new ‘seating pods’, wireless charging points, contactless food and drink ordering and access to newspapers and magazines via PressReader.

The food and drink service seems poorer than that offered by British Airways at Heathrow. The promo video for the lounge only talks of ‘salads and sandwiches’. Instead of having your food brought to your seat, it must be collected from a pick-up point.

The lounge is open daily from 4.15am to 9pm. You find it by taking the escalator down once you have passed through the shopping area and then turning right.

You can can watch a 1 minute video of the new lounge via this Twitter post. I haven’t embedded it as it would not work for our email readers.

You can find out more on the ‘Lounges’ page of aerlingus.com here.

Can British Airways passengers use the new Aer Lingus Dublin lounge?

Aer Lingus is not in the oneworld alliance, despite being a sister company to British Airways and Iberia. This means that British Airways Executive Club status members do not have a right to use the lounge.

However, British Airways Executive Club Gold and Silver members travelling to Heathrow or Gatwick on Aer Lingus are allowed in. You are not allowed in if you are travelling on any other UK routes.

No official photographs have been released to the media and there have been no media visits. Hopefully we can take a look before too long.

Aer Lingus delays its new routes from Manchester ….. again

Unsurprisingly, but still disappointingly, Aer Lingus has bowed to the inevitable and announced a further delay in the launch of its direct flights from Manchester to North America.

These are non-stop routes and do not go via Ireland. They use aircraft which are currently not required for the reduced Aer Lingus long-haul schedule being operated from Dublin.

The plan was to launch the following from Manchester:

New York, daily from 29th July
Orlando, 5x weekly (Thu-Mon) from 29th July
Barbados, 3x weekly (Wed/Fri/Sun) from 20th October

Boston had also been announced from Summer 2022.

In terms of planned aircraft:

New York is on a single-aisle A321LR
Orlando is on a standard two-aisle A330-300
Barbados is on a standard two-aisle A330-300

The A321LR business class cabin – the A330 is very similar – is decent, especially for solo travellers, and is shown above.

The dates were originally pushed back to September for New York and Orlando, with Barbados remaining on track for 20th October.

Irish news outlet RTE has reported a revised launch plan:

New York will now launch on 1st December
Orlando will now launch on 11th December
Barbados will launch as planned on 20th October
Boston is still planned to launch in Summer 2022

Passengers booked for October / November are being offered a full refund, re-accommodation on an alternative service or the option of an Aer Lingus voucher with an additional 10% bonus added.

Getting airport lounge access for free from a credit card

How to get FREE airport lounge access via UK credit cards (December 2021)

As a reminder, here are the three options to get FREE airport lounge access via a credit or charge card:

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel benefits – for a fee Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with two free Priority Pass cards, one for you and one for a supplementary cardholder. Each card admits two so a family of four gets in free. You get access to all 1,300 lounges in the Priority Pass network – search it here.

You also get access to Plaza Premium, Delta and Eurostar lounges. Our American Express Platinum review is here. You can apply here.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for the first year. It comes with a Priority Pass card loaded with two free visits to any Priority Pass lounge – see the list here.

Additional lounge visits are charged at £20. You get two more free visits for every year you keep the card.

There is no annual fee for Amex Gold in Year 1 and you get a 20,000 points sign-up bonus. Full details are in our American Express Preferred Rewards Gold review here.

HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard

A huge bonus, but only available to HSBC Premier clients Read our full review

HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard gets you get a free LoungeKey card, allowing you access to the LoungeKey network. Guests are charged at £20 although it may be cheaper to pay £60 for a supplementary credit card for your partner.

The card has a fee of £195 and there are strict financial requirements to become a HSBC Premier customer. Full details are in my HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard review.

PS. You can find all of HfP’s UK airport lounge reviews – and we’ve been to most of them – indexed here.

Category

Aer Lingus and AerClub

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

Sandgrounder says:

5 Sep5 September 05:48

Did anyone book a redemption on these routes by calling BA? How much was the cash element?
Dubious says:

5 Sep5 September 07:02

How does one route Manchester to London on Air Lingus? I assume this has to be a direct flight rather than one connecting in Dublin, Cork, Belfast or Limerick?

Or does it merely mean BA Operated flight with an Aer Lingus code?

Or…is it a hint at new UK domestic services operated by Aer Lingus/ Aer Lingus UK?
- Anna says:
  
  5 Sep5 September 07:08
  
  Where is this mentioned?
  - roberto says:
    
    5 Sep5 September 07:54
    
    In the “lounge” part of the article….
    - Stu N says:
      
      5 Sep5 September 10:15
      
      Aer Lingus only fly UK domestic routes from Belfast.
      
      I assume the “UK routes” refers to other Dublin/ UK flights such as Dublin/Edinburgh, Dublin/Birmingham etc. The Dublin/ Gatwick and Dublin / Heathrow lounge access agreements predate IAG’s acquisition of Aer Lingus -it might actually be a really old BMI/Aer Lingus agreement that has been grandfathered.
      - Save East Coast Rewards says:
        
        5 Sep5 September 11:04
        
        No EI lounge agreement with bmi! The agreement was because BA didn’t fly to Dublin or Belfast so they had codeshares with EI on their flights to London. The fact BA now fly to Dublin and Belfast is the bmi legacy. bmi had their own lounges in Dublin and Belfast
- Blair says:
  
  5 Sep5 September 10:16
  
  “However, British Airways Executive Club Gold and Silver members travelling to Heathrow or Gatwick FROM DUBLIN on Aer Lingus are allowed in. You are not allowed in if you are travelling on any other UK routes FROM DUBLIN.” I added block caps to make it clearer. You may have been reading ambiguity into those 2sentences.
  - Dubious says:
    
    5 Sep5 September 15:41
    
    Thanks Blair for the clarification.
    I see now my reading error – I read the first part about Manchester routes and overlooked the header indicating the change of topic to the lounge in Dublin…opps!
Alan says:

5 Sep5 September 09:00

Updated lounge looks decent, I always quite liked this one. Glad to see wireless charging at every seat, I wish BA had that. Also still wish the non-LHR routes offered lounge access for BAEC!
Paul says:

5 Sep5 September 09:27

Great timing! Am in the Dublin lounge now. Despite all the advertising to the contrary it’s self service until 11. Rob – happy to email a few photos if you’d like. Upstairs “viewing deck” has decent solo pod seating.
- Rob says:
  
  5 Sep5 September 09:47
  
  We’re hoping to get over in the next couple of weeks so no need, but thanks for the offer.
- Dr Benway says:
  
  5 Sep5 September 11:58
  
  Where is the lounge in relation to US preclearance Paul? Thanks
  - Paul says:
    
    5 Sep5 September 13:17
    
    Seemed super close. The escalator Rob mentions in the article takes you down to one of the “piers” with gates, and conveniently it’s that pier which has US pre clearance. There’s further escalators down to that, which I didn’t take but assume it’s just directly the floor below since you could see the US bound planes right there.
    
    From the first escalator you want to follow the signs behind it for the lounge, and walk down a long ish corridor, not being put off that the first lounge you come to is the airport authority closed one!
    
    Limited food selection at breakfast time, and no newspapers because of Covid, but comfy seats, quite empty. Suggest sitting upstairs.
  - Blair says:
    
    5 Sep5 September 13:31
    
    There’s another lounge pre-clearance (better IMO) that is accessible to all US-bound business class ticketholders plus some status holders (AerClub Platinum for instance). Or pay at door for €39ish. Online in advance is €35 and likely worth it if you don’t have status as the US-bound gate area can be a bit of a sea of humanity.
    - Dr Benway says:
      
      5 Sep5 September 14:08
      
      thanks Paul and Blair for the info. seems 51st/preclearance lounge is still not open
Charlie says:

5 Sep5 September 09:31

O/T I applied for the Amex Platinum card under the current 60,000 MR offer and have spent the required £6k. Does anyone know how long it takes for the full 60,000 to show on my account? At the moment it’s only showing the normal spend-related points. As I also hold the Business Gold card I’m keen to make sure I’m eligible for the promotion!
Matt says:

5 Sep5 September 10:11

When is Air Lingus going to join oneworld, it would be great to have an alternative to the DAA lounge.
- Rob says:
  
  5 Sep5 September 10:13
  
  Probably never. HOWEVER once it joins the transatlantic joint venture we may see greater reciprocal privileges between AA, BA, Finnair and Iberia.
  - Matt says:
    
    5 Sep5 September 11:21
    
    You just would of thought it would be cheaper for BA to do an intergroup payment to Air Lingus for lounge arrangements rather than pay DAA.
    - ChrisC says:
      
      5 Sep5 September 15:46
      
      BA use T1 at Dublin so possibly the DAA is the only lounge option for them
  - ChrisC says:
    
    5 Sep5 September 15:52
    
    I think most people would prefer to earn TPs when flying on EI above having accessed to a lounge,
Andrew says:

5 Sep5 September 10:36

Those plastic tombstones behind the seats in the lounge look uncomfortable to knock with the back of your head or catch an ear on if you turn.