Let’s call a plane a plane.

Flying Kulula often feels like taking a ride in a mini-bus air taxi.

It’s cramped, and there’s always that one brave soul who stocks up on the beer and Doritos mid-flight, which is a scent that lingers.

Kulula is one of South Africa’s more affordable airlines, which means that it’s an inevitable choice for domestic travel if, like most people, you can’t afford Business Class.

To make the experience more pleasant, you might be tempted to splash out on one of those seats with a touch more legroom.

MyBroadband journalists travelling to George and Durban respectively, found out, however, that you don’t always get what you pay for.

First, from the Kulula website:

Kulula explains on its website: “Whether it’s some extra legroom, or simply a view of the clouds you’re looking for, you can select your favourite spot for a small fee.”

They even provide an infographic to drive the point home:

So that’s what they were promised. Let’s see what they got:

On the George flight, the seats that were sold as “emergency exit row” seats with extra legroom turned out to be normal seats.

On the Durban flight, the “Front Exit Row” (row A) seats that promised extra legroom at an additional fee had no extra legroom.

In fact, because it was not possible to put your feet underneath the seat in front of you, the experience was worse than sitting in a normal seat.

This is a change from previous flights, where both rows A and B offered passengers extra legroom.

Visual proof…

Standard extra-legroom seats:

New extra-legroom seats:

Not great.

The takeaway here is that you might want to save that extra R130 for Doritos and beer to get you through the pain of flying in a forced foetal position.

[source:mybroadband]