British Airways

[seikopath]

Quite often the 'best' is the one whose time of departure/ arrival is the most convenient.


Disclaimer: I have no idea if that is the case here.

Virgin to Delhi has a good arrival time. 11am iirc.

[Tokyo Tokei]

Pro picture of BA business class:



2-4-2 configuration. You can clearly see that the facing passenger has to climb over the opposite passenger's feet once he has lowered his foot stool. A foot stool you have to manually lower and raise, but cannot be reached when belted into your seat. Also note the silly foldaway table with nail-breaking release, and folding monitor that cannot be used during takeoff nor landing. The aisle seat blocks FA access to the window seat, so food is constantly passed over you to that passenger. He is facing backwards, staring right at you as this pantomine is performed regularly throughout the flight. Neither of you has much room. Whether aisle or window, you are either leaping over someone or being lept over. Aisle denizens also get no privacy at all and are forever being bashed by passengers and trolleys traversing the narrow ribbon between you and the adjacent seat.

Compare with my amateur pic of Air Canada:



No neighbour at all. 1-2-1 so everyone has an aisle. Twice as much space as BA. Here I'm checking the flight progress on the capacitive touch screen remote, while the film plays on the main monitor:



And some seat adjustments for mattress firmness, lumbar and neck support, and massage option via its own separate touch screen:





It's not the gadgets though. It's the feeling from BA that everything is cost minimized, passengers per square foot maximized, discomfort be damned. That they persist in calling this brazen insult a "Club" as though it offers some calm oasis for the more discerning is an absurd affectation.

[Plake]

That BA design appears to have been created by somebody with the express intention of winding up British people.

[Carlton-Browne]

as though it offers some calm oasis for the more discerning is an absurd affectation.

I think if you want an absurd affectation then the sight of their CFO donning a hi-vis vest to stand in the middle of an open-plan office takes the biscuit.

Comments are disabled for this video.

Ha, bloody ha.

[Peck]

Pro picture of BA business class:

2-4-2 configuration. You can clearly see that the facing passenger has to climb over the opposite passenger's feet once he has lowered his foot stool. A foot stool you have to manually lower and raise, but cannot be reached when belted into your seat. Also note the silly foldaway table with nail-breaking release, and folding monitor that cannot be used during takeoff nor landing. The aisle seat blocks FA access to the window seat, so food is constantly passed over you to that passenger. He is facing backwards, staring right at you as this pantomine is performed regularly throughout the flight. Neither of you has much room. Whether aisle or window, you are either leaping over someone or being lept over. Aisle denizens also get no privacy at all and are forever being bashed by passengers and trolleys traversing the narrow ribbon between you and the adjacent seat.

Compare with my amateur pic of Air Canada:

No neighbour at all. 1-2-1 so everyone has an aisle. Twice as much space as BA. Here I'm checking the flight progress on the capacitive touch screen remote, while the film plays on the main monitor:

And some seat adjustments for mattress firmness, lumbar and neck support, and massage option via its own separate touch screen:

It's not the gadgets though. It's the feeling from BA that everything is cost minimized, passengers per square foot maximized, discomfort be damned. That they persist in calling this brazen insult a "Club" as though it offers some calm oasis for the more discerning is an absurd affectation.

Whilst I don't disagree with your post Tokyo, it's probably worth mentioning that the CW seat is undoubtedly the most successful and cost effective flat bed in the history of aviation. BA introduced it to their whole fleet decades ago, and it has made them enormous amounts of money and they are trying to squeeze every last penny out of it. As a business product, it works fine - I dread to think how many miles I have covered in these seats over the years and slept well pretty much every time. The flights are almost always rammed.

However, time moves on and BA have not. You are correct, there are now many better products out there and I suspect BA will regret their decision not to adapt and innovate sooner. They may even end up as a dreaded HBS case study...

[classics]

Whilst I don't disagree with your post Tokyo, it's probably worth mentioning that the CW seat is undoubtedly the most successful and cost effective flat bed in the history of aviation. BA introduced it to their whole fleet decades ago, and it has made them enormous amounts of money and they are trying to squeeze every last penny out of it. As a business product, it works fine - I dread to think how many miles I have covered in these seats over the years and slept well pretty much every time. The flights are almost always rammed.

However, time moves on and BA have not. You are correct, there are now many better products out there and I suspect BA will regret their decision not to adapt and innovate sooner. They may even end up as a dreaded HBS case study...

Absolutely agree with you, I took my elderly mother to Hong Kong last year with BA in CW, the outbound was on Boeing 777 and inbound Airbus 380, both flights was full. Although my mother like it I was thinking what IF she had a window seat and needed to go to the toilet during "lights out" period, she would probably fall over the aisle passenger legs next to her.

Earlier this year we went to visit my sister in Brisbane with Cathay Pacific (B777), on the night they cancelled/delayed the flight which meant we missed our connecting flight from Hong Kong (also with Cathay), no major problem Cathay transferred us on a Qantas (A330) from Hong Kong to Brisbane. That's how I would thought the One World Alliance works but obviously BA did not want to that for their passengers for whatever reason.

Cathay & Qantas seating/flat bed, layout, service and food was far superior to BA, I don't know what the price difference was/is but if I had the choice again I would pick Cathay & Qantas over BA.

[guinea]

They are the best in that they have overnight, direct flights to most places I need to get to and daytime flights back.

Other than Calcutta they fly everywhere I need to get to at useful times.

I do fly Emirates and Etihad often, but there is always a stop over for a few hours in the middle of the night so you lose a lot of sleeping time.

BA's beds aren't perfect, but neither are anyone else's. All I need from Business Class is a lounge to wait in, a drink and a flat bed to sleep in. BA ticks those boxes just fine.

[reecie]

A guy at work told me an ex-colleague of his who now works at BA thinks that everything will be outsourced apart from the pilots and air crew. Seems a mistake to me. The other interesting snippet, that may or may not be true, is that there are mountains of bags in trucks at the airport (Heathrow?) still. None of which has labels as BA took the bags in with the baggage system down. Again this seems daft to me. But as they can't, or it is not cost effective maybe, to sort and send them back they will just be burnt and compensation given. Seems a PR nightmare idea but if it is true it is not the sort of thing that won't come out.

The latest news that someone turned the data centre UPS off during maintenance then it got flipped back without the correct procedures which damaged servers also sounds weird.

[Griswold]

BA. The only company to loose my luggage............. 3 TIMES!


'​World's Favourite Airline' My @rse!

[guinea]

BA sent me an apology today although my flight was only slightly delayed on the weekend.

They also extended my gold tier status until the end of 2020.

This is without any prompting.

Good job really. They must be worried.

[Chris_in_the_UK]

BA sent me an apology today although my flight was only slightly delayed on the weekend.

They also extended my gold tier status until the end of 2020.

This is without any prompting.

Good job really. They must be worried.

This has not cost them anything - and you seem to be impressed.

The fall out from the 'event' less so....

[Plake]

Almost a week now and still nobody picking up the phone in BA customer services.

[guinea]

Of course I'm impressed. My flight which cost £17 was delayed by 40 minutes and I get two years of gold status for nothing.

Gold gives double points, extra luggage, no queues, free seat election whenever you book, extra availability for reward flights and of course access to lounge for me and those travelling with me. I think that's worth 40 minutes of any regular traveller's time.

[reecie]

Popped up on my youtube suggestions and thought of this thread

https://youtu.be/LGCkoapvXT8

[reecie]

But then this Etihad Residence flight popped up!!

https://youtu.be/1R2sOr6vZqo

I think only a shower with Leanne your on board butler would top off the rest of it....