HK Express

If you are flying to Japan from Hong Kong… take Peach airlines. They are world’s better than HK Express. I’d only fly with HK Express again if I had no other choice.
Good:
Arrived 20 minutes early to KIX.
More leg room than other airlines.
Bad:
No boarding call announcement for our flight. I only knew because I happened to see the boarding sign at the gate and I got there way early.
Can’t bring food or drink onto the plane. No I’m not joking.
Staff was rude. They gave everyone on the flight attitude. Seriously they made the guys at Hong Kong passport control look like a friendly bunch of fellows.
Every 10 minutes the crew was pushing yet another cart of crap up and down the aisles trying to sell you something.

I had a horrible experience with HKexpress. I am very comfortable with budget airlines. I don’t mind paying more for checked bags, food, assigned seats. I actually appreciate the transparency in this business model. My issue was that we didn’t discover until my family arrived to check in that my husbands passport is due for renewal with a little less than 6 months. At this point, the agent checking us in told us we could not use our tickets, could not get a full refund, and could not transfer the reservation to another day. The only thing we could do is to request a refund of the airport taxes we paid. This is a fraction of the money we spent on these tickets especially because we purchased baggage, food, assigned seats, and paid extra for a lap child.
So to be clear we paid 2,306 HKD which is about 300 USD. I had to call them on the phone twice, and send multiple emails just to file this complaint, and now In order to request a refund for the airport fees, I must fill out a form and submit it to them. They have done absolutely nothing to win my business, or to encourage me to fly with them in the future. If you choose to fly with HKexpress, I hope everything goes smoothly, because if there is even one tiny hiccup they with take your money and deny you service.

HK Express (formally known as Hong Kong Express) is Hong Kong’s first and only low cost carrier. It was previously a full-​service airline that last year began operations as a LCC and is quickly adding new routes around Asia. From the hub in Hong Kong, it currently flies to 13 destinations in 6 countries.
For my recent trip to Hong Kong, I traveled to Penang, Malaysia on HK Express as a side trip while visiting Asia. Only HK Express and Dragonair fly this route and there is a huge price disparity between the two carriers. Depending on if a sale is going on, the price difference can be 2 – 3 times higher on Dragonair.
To get the lowest fares, you have to book your flight on the HK Express website. I have seen another site show airfare prices for HK Express at a higher price. So stick with buying it direct for the lowest pricing. There are occasional website problems when booking, especially when there is a sale due to high web traffic. So be patient if you encounter this. Still the website could use an upgrade since this seems to be a recurring issue.
Do know when you are booking that you are paying for everything. The base fare price is low, but you will need to pay extra for food and drinks on-​board as well as checked baggage. The latter rises in price if you decide to pay for this when checking in rather than when paying for the flight online.
There are no first class seats on-​board, though there are a few seats with more legroom. You can upgrade to them anytime including paying for the upgrade while the flight is up in the sky! You also have the option to pay to select your seat if you are concerned about getting the dreaded middle seat. If not, you will learn your seat assignment at check-​in.
Check-​in at HKIA was a breeze. Though HK Express is located in Terminal 2 so you will need to trek back to Terminal 1 to board. On the flight to and from Penang, the terminal location was in the North Satellite Concourse. I would imagine this is the same for the other flights. This is burdensome since you need to take a bus to get to this terminal. The return trip is problematic because the bus is filled to the brim with arriving passengers.
The flights were fine. Both flights left a little late. The seat I had going to Penang was near the front of the cabin and was much more comfortable than the one coming back which had very little legroom. I had to squeeze my backpack into the compartment below. The flights were uneventful other than a little turbulence. There is no entertainment on-​board so bring a book or sit near a salacious gossiper.
The flight times and gates that HK Express use at HKIA are not the most ideal for passengers. Those are the two reasons that would have me looking at other options. My return trip flight did arrive back to HKIA at midnight though so I couldn’t take a public bus back to Ma On Shan where I was staying. Taxis are the only option unless you have someone already picking you up at that time of night.
I would fly on HK Express again given their airfares are so low, even after adding on extras like checked baggage and food. But they need to be careful about trade-​offs as there is only so much customers are willing to take before they look at other options.