[Inquisitive]

This news item is circulating widely, not sure if there is some vested interest.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ba-business-class-is-like-ryanair-with-free-food-say-passengers-sjlw97282

[MartynSinclair]

“One passenger questioned in the study compared BA’s business class cabin to “Ryanair but with free food” and another said the airline’s premium economy seats provided a “no-frills experience with a premium price”.

A bit Daily Mail (ish).. This from the Times, really…………

[Swissdiver]

“Ryanair but with free food” is rubbish. Flying is more than just a seat (never tried Ryanair but guess the seat must be similar, without the recline). It is the space, and all the other services (lounge, fast track, …). More importantly, it is customer services. BA is arguably very good at rebooking passengers when a flight is late or cancelled. I guess some people believe they are witty by saying that kind of nonsense.

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ASK1945, TiredOldHack2, ImissConcorde, Flagflier, mkcol74, Montysaurus, GivingupBA, AFlyingDutchman

[trainvsplane]

All a bit unfair – BA is of course not the best airline in the world but their Club/Business Class service is still OK. Economy class on the other hand is indeed becoming more and more like the service offered by the cheap airlines whch seem to spring up everywhere.

[canucklad]

IMO, it would be more accurate to describe the degradation of BA’s inflight service as a linear shift from back to front.

Old full service “Y” becomes LCC pay as you go
PE transforms into the old Y offering
Club service feels more like
And “F” is closer to others business class than their First offering.

In summary, it’s unfair to compare BA with their competitors, better to compare like for like Year on Year .

[SimonS1]

[quote quote=953109]IMO, it would be more accurate to describe the degradation of BA’s inflight service as a linear shift from back to front.

Old full service “Y” becomes LCC pay as you go

PE transforms into the old Y offering

Club service feels more like

And “F” is closer to others business class than their First offering.

In summary, it’s unfair to compare BA with their competitors, better to compare like for like Year on Year .[/quote]

Indeed, stand back as BA rolls out the new J Class at a glacial pace to save money. That will ensure a good 2/3 years of ‘have I got the old or new J’ just like we had with the new F some years ago. On the other hand are any of the European carriers really much different?

[rferguson]

[quote quote=953127]

canucklad wrote:

IMO, it would be more accurate to describe the degradation of BA’s inflight service as a linear shift from back to front.

Old full service “Y” becomes LCC pay as you go

PE transforms into the old Y offering

Club service feels more like

And “F” is closer to others business class than their First offering.

In summary, it’s unfair to compare BA with their competitors, better to compare like for like Year on Year .

Indeed, stand back as BA rolls out the new J Class at a glacial pace to save money. That will ensure a good 2/3 years of ‘have I got the old or new J’ just like we had with the new F some years ago. On the other hand are any of the European carriers really much different?[/quote]

I think two to three years would be a reasonable amount of time.

I believe less than 50% of QR’s aircraft they intend to retrofit with Q-suites have been completed.

And United and Polaris – for the first YEAR they had a sum total of TWO aircraft out of hundreds fitted with the new seat. In fact at a staff forum I attended a couple years ago before the seat was revealed (yet had been chosen by BA) Alex Cruz said he was determined ‘to not fall into the polaris trap’. In other words, launch media hype about a product that even a year later virtually no one had seen.

BA has a big fleet and it will indeed take time. The aircraft have to be off-lined so the retrofit will usually take place when they have heavy maitainence. It won’t just be a case of removing old seats and putting in new seats. Galleys and toilets will also likely be moved about.

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ImissConcorde, Flagflier

[Swissdiver]

Well D-checks take place every 6-8 years… They might also do it during C-checks, possibly expended ones.

1 user thanked author for this post.

rferguson

[SimonS1]

[quote quote=953137]

SimonS1 wrote:

canucklad wrote:

IMO, it would be more accurate to describe the degradation of BA’s inflight service as a linear shift from back to front.

Old full service “Y” becomes LCC pay as you go

PE transforms into the old Y offering

Club service feels more like

And “F” is closer to others business class than their First offering.

In summary, it’s unfair to compare BA with their competitors, better to compare like for like Year on Year .

Indeed, stand back as BA rolls out the new J Class at a glacial pace to save money. That will ensure a good 2/3 years of ‘have I got the old or new J’ just like we had with the new F some years ago. On the other hand are any of the European carriers really much different?

I think two to three years would be a reasonable amount of time.

I believe less than 50% of QR’s aircraft they intend to retrofit with Q-suites have been completed.

And United and Polaris – for the first YEAR they had a sum total of TWO aircraft out of hundreds fitted with the new seat. In fact at a staff forum I attended a couple years ago before the seat was revealed (yet had been chosen by BA) Alex Cruz said he was determined ‘to not fall into the polaris trap’. In other words, launch media hype about a product that even a year later virtually no one had seen.

BA has a big fleet and it will indeed take time. The aircraft have to be off-lined so the retrofit will usually take place when they have heavy maitainence. It won’t just be a case of removing old seats and putting in new seats. Galleys and toilets will also likely be moved about.[/quote]

Well the new seat was announced in mid March, and by the end of the year (so 9.5 months later) they will have retro fitted …..drum roll …..2 x 777s.

What Alex says, and what Alex does, eh.

[rferguson]

[quote quote=953139]

rferguson wrote:

SimonS1 wrote:

canucklad wrote:

IMO, it would be more accurate to describe the degradation of BA’s inflight service as a linear shift from back to front.

Old full service “Y” becomes LCC pay as you go

PE transforms into the old Y offering

Club service feels more like

And “F” is closer to others business class than their First offering.

In summary, it’s unfair to compare BA with their competitors, better to compare like for like Year on Year .

Indeed, stand back as BA rolls out the new J Class at a glacial pace to save money. That will ensure a good 2/3 years of ‘have I got the old or new J’ just like we had with the new F some years ago. On the other hand are any of the European carriers really much different?

I think two to three years would be a reasonable amount of time.

I believe less than 50% of QR’s aircraft they intend to retrofit with Q-suites have been completed.

And United and Polaris – for the first YEAR they had a sum total of TWO aircraft out of hundreds fitted with the new seat. In fact at a staff forum I attended a couple years ago before the seat was revealed (yet had been chosen by BA) Alex Cruz said he was determined ‘to not fall into the polaris trap’. In other words, launch media hype about a product that even a year later virtually no one had seen.

BA has a big fleet and it will indeed take time. The aircraft have to be off-lined so the retrofit will usually take place when they have heavy maitainence. It won’t just be a case of removing old seats and putting in new seats. Galleys and toilets will also likely be moved about.

Well the new seat was announced in mid March, and by the end of the year (so 9.5 months later) they will have retro fitted …..drum roll …..2 x 777s.

What Alex says, and what Alex does, eh.[/quote]

I think from the first A350 launch a couple of weeks ago until the end of the year there will be six aircraft in service with the new seats. The retrofit program isn’t even starting until Oct.

Compare this with Lufthansa. Earlier this year they ‘revealed’ their new business class. Which is for an aircraft the FIRST of which will arrive in 2020!!!! So I don’t think the delay between seat announcement and launch was by any means a big gap in BA’s case! And six aircraft with the new seats in six months is reasonable. If that was Brussels Airlines it would be almost half the airlines fleet. It would be a respectable six into Virgins fleet of 46 aircraft. But yes a dent in BA’s fleet of 134 aircraft.

But in fairness to BA….they haven’t gone on a marketing blitz of the new Club seat. There has been no advertising campaign which is wise given how unlikely it is to have your buttocks sat in one of the ‘suites’ for the rest of this year.

I was around at BA during the previous retro-fit from the club cradle seat to the current flat bed. As each aircraft when in for retrofit the pace quickened up as the engineers became for adept to the work.

The delays in rolling the product out fully in a timely manner (as for ‘new’ F) was the chopping and changing of which aircraft would be in the fleet for the forseeable future and were worthy of the investment not the actual physical time it was taking to install the seats. A swathe of 747’s were going then they were staying. They 767’s were being retired in 2007 and ended up in the fleet until last year!

Hopefully the powers that be have a better long term idea of what the fleet will look like in five to ten years but time will tell.

[SimonS1]

I suppose there is so much pressure on the fleet that it isn’t possible to go faster. Let’s be honest, the roll out of wifi has been quite pedestrian for the same reason.

[canucklad]

As the discussion moves on to chatting about BA’s hard product in its premium cabins, it made me reflect on what For me , is the key word in the article . And that’s perception ……

Perception is a state of mind, and normally in a service orientated industry is impacted both negatively and positively by the soft product rather than the hard product.

A restaurant is memorable for its service and food more than its chairs and tables. And unfortunately this is where BA continually let themselves down. You can sit on a Kings Throne watching a UHD screen but if the food and service is inconsistent and lacking you’re going to feel cheated.

BA has continued to market itself as if it was still in the glory days of flying Concorde across the Atlantic. What surprises me is the fact that BA management are constantly surprised when negative feedback occurs when customers experience the realty rather than the marketing perception.

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FaroFlyer, Montysaurus, openfly, DerekVH, tomwjsimpson

[CathayLoyalist2]

I recall an occasion where a former BA Commercial Director, his name I cannot remember, stated that he had not received one letter of complaint about the CW seating layout. Extraordinary to say the least but it supports Canucklad view about BA Management at their surprise about receiving negative feedback. Out of touch springs to mind!.

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Montysaurus, cwoodward

[rferguson]

[quote quote=953220]I recall an occasion where a former BA Commercial Director, his name I cannot remember, stated that he had not received one letter of complaint about the CW seating layout. Extraordinary to say the least but it supports Canucklad view about BA Management at their surprise about receiving negative feedback. Out of touch springs to mind!.[/quote]

Oh yes. We (cabin crew) heard the same about the ‘new’ (now old) Club World trolley service when we complained to BA that passengers onboard were complaining to us about how long a meal service was taking. ‘Oh we’ve not had any complaints about that’. Six months later, trolley thrown in the bin and millions in new equipment written off as it’s decided the service is taking too long.

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Montysaurus, Jacob, StephenLondon, CathayLoyalist2, DerekVH

[Swissdiver]

[quote quote=953242]
Oh yes. We (cabin crew) heard the same about the ‘new’ (now old) Club World trolley service when we complained to BA that passengers onboard were complaining to us about how long a meal service was taking. ‘Oh we’ve not had any complaints about that’. Six months later, trolley thrown in the bin and millions in new equipment written off as it’s decided the service is taking too long.[/quote]

This is the problem when managers take decisions from their office without involving the client facing staff. We witness this not only in the air, but also on the ground, irrespective of the industry. Appalling, especially since every educated manager knows about it. But it continues…

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Jacob

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