Ninety minute connection in a huge hub with assistance booked, is that actually enough time or am I dreaming?

Looking at a fare that's a fair bit cheaper than the direct, but it means changing planes in one of the enormous hubs with 1 hour 35 between landing and the next departure. On paper the airport's own minimum connection time is under an hour so the booking site is perfectly happy with it.

What the booking site does not know is that I'm a manual chair user and I'll be sat waiting for someone to come and get me off the plane after everyone else has gone. Which in my experience is the bit that eats the time. Twice now I've been last off and waited a good while at the door with the cleaners looking at me.

So is 1 hour 35 fine, or is that the kind of thing that looks fine right up until it isn't and I'm sleeping in a terminal? Genuinely can't tell if I'm being sensible or paranoid here.

Paranoid is the wrong word. Realistic. The published minimum connection time is worked out for someone who can leg it, and none of us are that person.

I'd add the bit that caught me out: my assistance was booked for the departure airport and the arrival airport and nobody had put anything against the transfer in the middle. So I landed, got helped off, and then was essentially a passenger nobody was expecting. Sorted eventually but the sorting took most of the buffer.

One practical thing from doing these with my wife. Ask whether the two flights are on one ticket. If they are, and you miss the connection because the assistance was slow, that's the airline's problem to fix and they rebook you. If you've bought two separate tickets to save money, the second airline owes you nothing at all and you buy a new seat.

That difference is worth more than the fare saving, honestly. We stopped doing separate tickets after one very expensive lesson in Amsterdam.

Derek C. said:

is that the kind of thing that looks fine right up until it isn't

Derek, short answer: 1 hour 35 in a very large hub is doable but it has no slack in it, and I would not book it without doing three specific things first. I have made worse connections comfortably and missed easier ones, and the difference was never luck, it was whether the transfer had been logged properly.

First, the timing that actually matters to you is not the published minimum connection time, it is that you are boarded first and off last. Assume you are still on the aircraft 15 to 20 minutes after the doors open, longer if the ground crew are stretched or the aircraft is parked on a remote stand and you need a lift vehicle rather than a jetty. That is the chunk the booking engine knows nothing about.

Second, and this is Sue's point and it is the big one, assistance is arranged per airport, not per journey. You want it logged at departure, at the transfer airport, and at arrival, and the transfer entry is the one that goes missing. When you ring the airline, ask them to confirm assistance is loaded against all three, and ask what code they have put on your booking. The industry uses WCHR for someone who can walk short distances but needs a chair to the gate, WCHS for someone who cannot manage steps, and WCHC for someone who needs help right to the aircraft seat. If they have you down as WCHR and you actually need WCHC, the wrong sort of help turns up and you lose your buffer arguing about it. Request all of it at least 48 hours ahead, which is the standard notice period, and reconfirm at check in.

Third, decide what happens to your own chair at the transfer. On a connection you normally want your chair brought to the aircraft door at every stop rather than checked all the way through to the final destination, otherwise you spend the whole layover in an airport chair being pushed by a stranger. Say this explicitly at check in, because through-checking equipment is the default at some airlines. How that works, and why it matters for the chair itself, is in flying with a wheelchair, and the booking side of the assistance is in airport special assistance.

Neil is right about the single ticket and I would treat it as non negotiable on a tight connection. If it is one ticket and the transfer is properly logged, I would take 1 hour 35. If it is two tickets, or nobody will confirm the middle airport, I would pay for the direct and sleep at night.

Coming at this from the dog end rather than the chair end but the principle is identical and the middle airport is still the weak link. The extra thing I have to solve on a connection is a relief area, which not every terminal has airside, and if it is landside then leaving to use it means going back through security. On a 95 minute connection that is not happening.

So I ring the transfer airport directly, not the airline, and ask two questions. Do you have an airside relief area, and where. Airlines never know the answer. Airports usually do.

Right, update. Rang the airline, and it turns out you were all correct, the assistance had gone on for the first and last airports only. She added the transfer and read the code back to me, and I got an email confirming all three, which I have printed and will be waving at people.

It is one ticket, so I've booked it. Also asked for the chair at the door at every stop and that's noted. Still slightly nervous but at least I'm nervous about the right things now rather than just vaguely dreading it. Flying in six weeks, will say how it went.

Promised an update so here it is. Outbound was fine, off the plane in about 12 minutes, someone waiting at the door, and I was at the next gate with over half an hour spare, which felt luxurious.

Coming back was less fine. Nobody at the door, waited about 25 minutes, and then a fairly brisk push across the terminal. Made it with 10 minutes to spare and my heart going. So: the same connection, same airline, same codes on the booking, and two completely different experiences. Which I suppose is the honest answer to my own question. Book the buffer, log everything, and accept it can still go either way.