[George]

I’m flying Edinburgh-London-Athens shortly. What can I expect on the Edinburgh – London sector? I’m not building up my hopes.

[openfly]

30″ seat pitch and a lettuce leaf!

[onajetplane]

I just did BHD – LHR in Club. Was pleasantly surprised. Two glasses of wine, sparkling water and I could have had a sandwich or a cold meats tapas platter – neither of which I took. But the service was exceptional – back to the good old days of what I expect BA to be – albeit I think it was more luck than the norm.

[TominScotland]

Disagree, onajetplane, that your experience was a one-off. I flew a morning leg GLA-LHR on Thursday in Club Europe. Great personalised service – hot towels, hot breakfast choice, hot breads and yoghurt. Range of drink options. For a 55 minute hop, I am not sure you could ask for more – sorry, openfly!!

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=803672]Disagree, onajetplane, that your experience was a one-off. I flew a morning leg GLA-LHR on Thursday in Club Europe. Great personalised service – hot towels, hot breakfast choice, hot breads and yoghurt. Range of drink options. For a 55 minute hop, I am not sure you could ask for more – sorry, openfly!!

[/quote]

For a 55 minute hop, I’ll save the fare difference 🙂

And on a 35 minute hop, even more so, especially as the HBO peeps get the prioiryt boarding CE pax have paid for!

[Nogbad01]

Tried it a couple of weeks ago MAN-LHR.
Very pleasantly surprised. Great service, nice food and all managed within the very tight timescales.
Actually much better than the previous CE experience to Milan a few weeks prior to that.
Also, cost wise, only a few quid more than the standard semi-flex economy (not the HBO).

[N1IslingtonFlyer]

Flew Heathrow to Belfast in Club Europe earlier this week and, I too, was very pleasantly surprised. Loved the feeling of the smaller cabin, and VERY attentive service from crew. Couldn’t really have expected more.

[TominScotland]

I would agree, FDOS if my journey had been terminating in LHR. However, I paid only £53 plus Avios (of which I have plenty) for an upgrade from WT+ to Business for GLA-LHR-DXB. That was excellent value IMHO.

[JonathanCohen09]

I have a quick question for you and it is not meant to be facetious in any way. I just looked at BA domestic CE for flights tomorrow and the cheapest I could find from LGW to GLA tomorrow was £453 with the most expensive coming in at an eye watering £738.

I chose LGW as generally the fares from there are a bit cheaper than from LHR or LCY so my question is why would anyone be prepared to pay such high fares for a flight of 55 minutes.

Forget about flying with another carrier, you can also get flights with BA from LGW to GLA the same day from as little as £83.

Really curious to hear from those who fly in domestic CE how they justify the cost?

[rrakpo]

I agree with JonathanCohan09, you are crazy to pay for the domestic CE, however it aimed for when companies pay for the flight or most importantly, it is part of your long-haul ticket, as for the same on all airlines if you book a business/first class ticket, these portion of your flight doesn’t make much fare difference.

[AMcWhirter]

As rrakpo notes, this domestic business class is really aimed at long-haul transfer passengers booked in one of the premium classes. It’s the make BA’s offering more competitive with the likes of EK/EY/QR/CX/SQ etc.

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=803679]I would agree, FDOS if my journey had been terminating in LHR. However, I paid only £53 plus Avios (of which I have plenty) for an upgrade from WT+ to Business for GLA-LHR-DXB. That was excellent value IMHO.

[/quote]

Fair enough, I’d have taken that deal. Just out of interest, how far ahead did you have to book to get Avios availability?

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=803850]As rrakpo notes, this domestic business class is really aimed at long-haul transfer passengers booked in one of the premium classes. It’s the make BA’s offering more competitive with the likes of EK/EY/QR/CX/SQ etc.

[/quote]

Alex, I’m not sure I agree with your logic. BA was happy not to offer domoestic business for many years and it was only after BoB that it came in.

I’d categorise it as being to try to prevent leakage from pax who paid handsomely for a J/F ticket and then were asked to pay for a sandwich (if any were left).

Once it became a club cabin, then the middle seats are left free.

Thinking about the cost savings on F&B (and considering the income from BoB), the loss of 4-6 seats for sale seems to me to negate quite a few of the financial benefits of going BoB, as domestic flights often provide high loads.

[TominScotland]

Just over a month, FDOS. It was not available for the return on a 777-200 as opposed to a 747 on the outbound. As it happens, I was upgraded in any case. Looked to do the same thing on an up-coming Bahrain trip but no availability.

[FDOS_UK]

Interesting – it’s tough to find availability to DXB, so nice one – I’d have spend the Avios on the upgrade, as CW is a better proposition in the 747s and some of the 777s than WTP, as the old seat is nowhere near as comfy as the newer one.

These days, I fly to AUH, rent a car and drive up – it rarely costs more than taking the DXB flight (and often less) and the 789 has a great WTP cabin, different class with new seats in a 2-3-2 config.

[Author]

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