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I am amazed that Auckland airport is even in! The tiny airport is ok until you wanna connect to a local flight!
Say you arrived from KL and going to Wellington, after the LONG wait at customs you were told at the local counter that they CANNOT re-check in your bags because you did not make the ONE HOUR time frame!
To your horror you now have to lug your luggage on the transfer bus to the local terminal to check in again!
These are no big deal if you are young and dandy but think of the thousands of tourists from USA with MORE than one bag and older tourists!
On our last trip back we were refused the recheck in and I told the airport people that TWENTY FIVE years ago we had the same problem and 25 years later, still the same!
And they give you a TEN place? Give me a freaking break!!!

KL Airport Management should change their assumptions on what KLIA should be.

KLIA simply doesn't have the traffic. This means management should move away from trying to make money out of its tenants which are suffering. KLIA is neither here nor there and one is surprised the management are not doing anything about this.

a. lower the rent, and make sure existing tenants lower their pricings;

b. open more lots to others so that there be more interesting mixes and matches; don't play the race game even here;

c. open more food lots including non-halal's, and they don't have to be high-class, just cheap, good, varied and value for money; don't play tenant favoritism;

d. open more internet access points so that people don't have to queue up for such a simple basic thing;

e. open more smokers'rooms; make sure the coin-operated drinks dispensers and air filters really work, and keep the place clean and well-furnished;

f. send in the govt authorities to check on the tobacco companies scamming passengers by selling duty-free cigarettes that are substandard but using the same brand and packing; they are not selling par quality for duty-free price;

g. check the quality of drinking water from those spouts (causes sore throat), don't put the spouts just outside the washrooms; and make sure the water is really cold, not luke-cool;

h. make sure pushcarts are outside every arrival exits all the time;

i. get businesses to give promotional freebies - WSJ, IHT, ice-cream, free drinks, hot pies etc.

j. don't leave unclaimed luggage lying outside the holding room;

k. get some arrows to show which direction the luggage carousel will turn;

l. don't create noise pollution by announcing directions you won't expect first-timers to know where they are, especially if where they stand there won't be any signs to make sense of those announcements;

m. don't announce aerotrain arriving; people got eyes and they don't want to be reminded they have to take a jerky train after decanting from a jittery flight through turbulence.

n. put in some spa's; not just for feet.

o. make the whole place more lively; something for children, something for old still thinking they are young and feeling released from cage...

p. don't let the cops disturb cars waiting in the third lane; people don't turn up in that place unless they have someone to pick up;

q. put some airblowers outside Doors 3 and 4 where people come out and puff while queuing for the taxi.

r. make big and clear sign to show where to take the train to the city;

s. open more forex counters to compete better on rates;

t. open free exhibition space for all sorts of cheerful things

The bottomline is this:

stop thinking you must maintain some starchy standard and then slide to the bottom; let go and loosen up; make KLIA a worthwhile and memorable experience - cheap, good, quality, lots of variety, very colorful, intelligent, efficient and ultra-smooth, extremely customer-oriented.

If you don't, KLIA will soon displace Auckland.

Compare Singapore vs Malaysia

3. Singapore Changi Airport
vs
7. , Malaysia

Malaysia spends RM10 billions to build KLIA. 1 hugely subsidised ERL, that cost RM2.4 billion.
vs
Changi spends S$300 mils to promote it status in 2006. new Terminal 3 cost them S$1.75 billion, open on 2008.

Changi expansion just spend a small fraction of it and the passenger movement : 37 millions (2008)

KLIA passenger movement : 25 millions (2008)

Now lets compare No.1
Incheon International Airport passenger movement : 30 millions (2008)

Still, KLIA 1st world infrastructure lost out to Dae Jang Geum power.