Trip Reports - BA World Traveller Plus - (NCL-)LHR-SIN

It was supposed to be a regular thing. London to Brisbane and back on average once a month, sometimes twice a month. In Economy.

However, the wet weather in Australia, in particular, Queensland, has suspended many projects and put my travels on hold.

Unit now.

Tickets booked via a travel agency in Australia. Initially a QF booking showed up on ba.com – all the flights from Newcastle to Brisbane via London and Singapore was QF coded with BA segments for the domestic UK and LHR-SIN sectors. The last leg, SIN-BNE on QF metal. Then a duplicate booking appeared on my profile, this time, all BA-coded except the last QF sector.

I hope against hope that it is a BA booking, so I can earn more miles. QF are a bit tight in that regards.

The booking is all in Y. As it is a travel agency booking, I cannot upgrade any sectors online.

CHECK-IN

The morning of the flight day, I drove to NCL airport, on the way to some shops. No queues at either the priority check-in or the plebs check-in. Wonderful!

I checked in my luggage, asked for an upgrade if there are any offers. Much typing to be had, a couple of phone calls, then over to the BA/Swissport service desk, where much more typing to be had. It seemed incredibly inefficient from this side of the desk. Eventually my credit card was melted to the tune of £189 and back to the check-in desk with a receipt to get my seat allocation and boarding pass. Cue more typing and telephoning.

I had another seven hours before I’m due to fly, so got some shopping done, park the car up, disconnect the battery (damned electrical leak), soak in a bath, and finally the taxi arrived.

The route to NCL, favoured by taxi drivers, takes us the "back way". Bumpy country roads. Single track roads. And then the view of the whole airfield from the back end. Soon I will be sitting in the lounge sipping something. I haven’t decided what yet – I don’t plan things in that much detail.

NCL Security

Straight to security, it has all changed. They changed the layout of security, to allow more security lanes. Yet just two lanes were open, but sharing one metal detector. Priority passengers/crew/staff shared the same metal detector. Just about every bloke before me has set off the bleeper, and patted down manually by a lone male security officer. The pile up of males behind the detector was building up and I was at the head of that pile up.

The petite security lady looked flustered while the lone male officer took his sweet old time patting down an old man and gestured us through. I pointed to my ear, and said I have a medical implant. She told me to stand to the side and the blokes behind me went through the detector.

Beep. Great, another patting down candidate.

Another bloke goes through. Beep.

Another bloke goes through. Beep.

Now there’s three more people in front of me who needs patting by that lone male officer and I looked at her and told her I need to be patted aswell and pointed to the increasing queue of people waiting to be felt up.

She looked sheepish and shrugged her shoulders in embarrassment.

Another bloke goes through. Beep.

I unintentionally let out a really loud audible sigh. She then stopped everyone at this point. And finally asked me to go round and wait with the four blokes waiting to be touched.

Despite the male officer taking an absolute age with each patting down, his was probably the least thorough in the UK. Not even my waistband was checked.

I need that drink in the lounge, and the sooner I get it, the better. Whew!

Grabbed my stuff, made out of the pseudo-security area and head straight to the BA lounge.

Looking forward to a nice quiet drink. I fancied beer.

LOUNGE AND BOARDING:

Entered the lounge. By jolly gosh! It’s the busiest I have ever seen NCL lounge! So much for peace and quiet, and seeking calming serenity after the frustrating "security" process. I took a beer, and sat right by the TV, airing Sky News.

Seat 1F was my allocation for the domestic sector. This means I will try to beat most people for boarding so I can stow my luggage above my seat, not somewhere in rows 23-25.

I figured that I’ll leave the lounge ten minutes early to beat the lounge rush for the plane. That plan worked.

However, I haven’t factored in the non-lounge people at the gate. One can hardly move for the people in the gate! I jumped and skipped over toes, legs and bags to take a seat near the doors to the air bridge.

Boarding began, and everyone rushed to the boarding area. Luckily for me, only one of the girls was processing the tickets at first, so everyone shifted to the left side, leaving a clear space to the right side, where I walked up to the desk and a second girl began processing tickets. Bingo! One of the first 10 people to board, and got my bag in a refreshingly empty row 1 overhead bin.

The domestic sector flight was nothing to write home about. That means everything went as it should, service was normal. It was an A321, G-EUXJ. I noticed seats A-C in row 1 do not have available storage bins above them, as they were taken up with aircraft equipment.

Pulled up at stand A3 at LHR T5, which means a long schlep to the airside transfer busses.

http://i.imgur.com/B8Odvl.jpg

Eventually arrived at the transfer area, and I see a whole bunch of people waiting at the T3 transfer.


http://i.imgur.com/IHXHGl.jpg


The electronic sign said that the bus is "due". With another bus in "8 mins".

The second hand on my watch moved by 13 minutes by the time the bus arrived. My relatively tight connection was getting ever tighter. It takes roughly seven minutes to reach T3 from T5.

A dash to security, used fast track, and it was efficient. Made a dash to the airline services desk to see if I can upgrade the QF sector to business class. Five people in the QF queue. Nobody queuing at the BA desks.

Eventually approached the QF desk, and the lady took one look at my boarding card and said no, that’s BA. You need to see them. I said it’s a QF booking, on QF metal and I wanted to upgrade the QF sector only.

"No, it is BA. Look, you see British Airways on the ticket!"

I sighed, I am not going to get anywhere fast with this smart cookie and went over to the BA desk in an exercise of futility. The very smart guy took one look at my ticket and said that's QF, you need to see QF, and he acknowledged that I just came over from QF desk. With a puzzled look on his face, he had a go on the computer.

I advised that if it is not a special offer, ie, a full re-ticket, I don’t want to waste his time as I don’t have a four-figure sum of pounds burning a hole in my pocket.

I said I had to go, my plane is boarding and gate 34 is a heck of a long way. He apologised and hoped I can get it sorted at Singapore. I skipped the lounge at T3, there's simply no time.

At the gate, nobody is boarding even though it is only five minutes to gate closing time.

I turned left after boarding.

To World Traveller Plus. The business plebs turn right along with the economy passengers.



After some time, it transpired the cabin is going to be almost empty. Just 11 passengers. The CSD came to see me, armed with his iPad, and greeted me by name, inquired where I am going (I suspect he already knew from his iPad but was making conversation), asked if I wanted anything, and anything else during the flight; to feel free to press the call button. He went back to the galley without seeing anyone else in the cabin.



THE WORLD TRAVELLER PLUS CABIN:

The view of the cabin from the back… there's plenty of space between the last row and the wall when the seats are not reclined.


http://i.imgur.com/EEcncl.jpg


The mandatory shot of my knees and shoes. I need new shoes as these ones are getting on a bit (five years) and becoming very squeaky on polished floors. And the useless footrest.


http://i.imgur.com/CczVFl.jpg



The IFE boxes of tricks that jostle for foot space. You can see that the aisle seat has a bigger box.


http://i.imgur.com/zo30bl.jpg


No chance of resting your head on the side walls with a cushion. :(

http://i.imgur.com/GOz9ul.jpg

The glimpse of new First with its 'Ritzy' lights.

http://i.imgur.com/qDDhTl.jpg



Looking towards the back of the cabin and seats.

http://i.imgur.com/C0HFnl.jpg



..and for those who likes close-up of fabrics.

http://i.imgur.com/0rPiHl.jpg



The gap between the seats where people like to wedge their foot through and poke my elbows on previous WT+ flights:

http://i.imgur.com/c1lnfl.jpg



Floor view of the cabin. And the unmovable armrests. No lying down on the seats to be had here.


http://i.imgur.com/Xj1l3l.jpg



Armrest detail and buttons:


http://i.imgur.com/nR88ql.jpg



The small screen IFE. I watched The Vows, as this was the only subtitled movie out of three that was new. All the other subtitled movies has been on the IFE in February, March and April. :td:

http://i.imgur.com/nHpZhl.jpg

The airside operations during boarding.

http://i.imgur.com/ClxEXl.jpg


The mighty RRs with a view of broken nimbostratus down below above London.

http://i.imgur.com/oMppul.jpg

AMENITIES

The headphones looks cheap 'n' nasty to me, and looks similar to QF's J headphones on their 747s. I don't use these so can't comment on its actual use.

http://i.imgur.com/VNlfll.jpg


The goodies bag had an eyemask, sockings, toothbrush and toothpaste, earplugs and a pen. On the whole, it feels very cheap.

http://i.imgur.com/mQoHtl.jpg


The blanket.


http://i.imgur.com/BNuVgl.jpg

The cushion.

http://i.imgur.com/5Am7nl.jpg



DRINKS AND SUPPER:


http://i.imgur.com/HTKi1l.jpg

The menu (http://i.imgur.com/xXlaL.jpg) (links to a full sized jpg).

The drinks came round. G&T was requested. Was offered another drink, but I politely declined. It's still a long way to Brisbane yet.


http://i.imgur.com/GeSNol.jpg

Followed some time later with food and more drinks. The crew member served the opposite side first before coming round to my side.

http://i.imgur.com/lA2vQl.jpg



All revealed…

http://i.imgur.com/DZCCVl.jpg


...in the process of lifting the foil off, I inadvertently grabbed the gravy foil cup underneath, and proceeded to pour the gravy all over my shirt while I crumpled up the covering foil. Argh! :mad:

A call button was pressed and the CSD came along to see the mess. He quickly brought some soda water, blue tissue and a damp flannel.

The steak was well well well done… and of a very generous portion. It took a while to chew through that half a cow. On all my other BA flights, the steak was right, but this one was a let down. The carrots were alright, so were the potatoes, but there needed to be more of it.

http://i.imgur.com/SBBhBl.jpg


The bread was dry as the Saharan sand in summer. Dreadful. The desert was some sort of passion fruit tart/yoghurty thingy. I don't like the flavour and left it after one bite.


BREAKFAST:

http://i.imgur.com/Fc9yll.jpg


The cabin crew served my side of the aisle first. The breakfast was just OK. It filled a hole, I could have done with another sausage and bacon slice. I skipped the rest of the brekkie, including the yoghurt, passion fruit flavoured. Now that seemed familiar...

...I remembered last night's desert was also passion fruit. Hrm. :rolleyes:


The service was very efficient, the meals were cleared as soon as we had finished. The call bells were responded to very quickly. Midnight refreshments were offered several times. A very attentive crew and very pleased with them. The CSD seemed to be very visible - one of the better BA crews I've encountered this year, just a shame they overdid the steak.

And beginning of our descent into Singapore…

http://i.imgur.com/tPNs8l.jpg

Capital TR thanks Stez and I hope there is more coming for the sectors down to Australia and the return! ^:)

Are those cumulus clouds shown in the picture of the descent into SIN?

I find the headphones very comfortable

It would look like, compared to my last flight, the WTP service has been upped a bit on the food front. Looks half decent (potentially) compared to the mere lump of a muffin I was given coming in from MIA last year.

Great TR. Looking forward to the rest.

Really good, looking forward to more!

Great TR so far. ^

Enjoyed your TR very much! Looking forward to some more.

I like the fact that they give out pens, by the way (I know this is a sad comment...).

This is an excellent detailing of the mid-J 744 WTP experience.

Great TR Stez. You'll have to do this each month?? Forget that. I'd refuse, I'm totally serious. The jetlag alone is enough to screw you up.

The one and only time I've been to the lounge at NCL (a couple of weeks ago) it was totally empty, sounds like you picked the wrong flight ;).

Did they not do priority boarding at NCL?
I was actually reasonably impressed with the WTP amenity kit because of the pen and the ear plugs. The blanket and pillow were nice too.

You and I had exactly the same meal and my steak was a bit tough too although luckily I managed to keep the sauce in the tin foil, oops.

I loved that passion fruit posset!

Looking forward to more....

I find the headphones very comfortable

Me too, though obviously YMMV.

Very nice to see a WT+ report for a change. Well worth the upgrade fee especially when it's as quiet as that.
Thanks for the words and pictures Stez. ^

I find the headphones very comfortable

Me too, though obviously YMMV.

Thanks for the comments people.

Looks like those headphones are popular after all, I do not use any headphones, they just look a bit tatty to me, purely a visual description.

I like the fact that they give out pens, by the way (I know this is a sad comment...).

If we come across each other at an airport, I'll give you a bunch of WTP pens. :P

Are those cumulus clouds shown in the picture of the descent into SIN?

I think so, well on their way to becoming towering cumulus if I'm not mistaking. I'll have to post those in the Cloud thread on the BA board!

Great TR Stez. You'll have to do this each month?? Forget that. I'd refuse, I'm totally serious. The jetlag alone is enough to screw you up.

The one and only time I've been to the lounge at NCL (a couple of weeks ago) it was totally empty, sounds like you picked the wrong flight ;).

Did they not do priority boarding at NCL?

I was actually reasonably impressed with the WTP amenity kit because of the pen and the ear plugs. The blanket and pillow were nice too.


No priority boarding at NCL, I don't think the third party agents would know where to begin with that type of activity.

I'm ok with once a month hemisphere-jumping, but it's not happening yet, maybe in the Spring (or Autumn to the northern hemisphericals). The amenities bag is ok, but the quality just seem so low, the pen seems to fall apart with anything more serious than writing landing cards - I do grip a pen a little too hard, I have to admit so YMMV! I guess I have been spoiled with the wonders of J and F travels.

I'll save an unwanted passion fruit posset for you matthandy for the next Do. ;)

Thanks for the comments guys. ^

I too like the pens in the goody bag.

Really enjoy your sense of humor in describing the features of the seat (the gap where people poke you in the elbow, etc.).

Nice report, thanks for taking the time to post ^

I thought BA had attempted to improve the WTP catering with CW main courses - but what you were served looks truly awful! I think it's the presentation mainly that's distinctly non-premium.

I mean, would it cost BA anything to remove the foil and plastic covers from everything before serving in WTP? Or to straighten the items on the tray?

I agree that the amenity kit looks very cheap, and not in keeping with the new WTP fabrics.

Thanks for the write up of WT+ as it is a rare find.

The non-moveable arm rests would be a huge disappointment.

The food is non-pleasing at best.

Nice report, thanks for taking the time to post ^

I thought BA had attempted to improve the WTP catering with CW main courses - but what you were served looks truly awful! I think it's the presentation mainly that's distinctly non-premium.

Thanks for the comments.

It is a vast improvement on Y food. For W, it is acceptable (except the overly done steak). It is still a Y+ rather than J- product. QF still wins with their PE product over BA's WT+.


I mean, would it cost BA anything to remove the foil and plastic covers from everything before serving in WTP? Or to straighten the items on the tray?

In hindsight, given how empty the cabin is, I suppose it would have been a valid point to take a few extra seconds per pax to do that. It would have prevented the gravy spilling all over myself for a start! :D

Thanks for the write up of WT+ as it is a rare find.

The non-moveable arm rests would be a huge disappointment.

The food is non-pleasing at best.

Thanks.

Agreed with the non-moveable arm rests. There has been times when W pax would ask to be moved to the back rows of Y to lie down when the load is light. However, this was before the introduction of J-type meals in W.

The food is normally ok to quite good in WT+ since the food upgrade to more J than Y. Just on this particular occasion, it was a bit of a let down with the overdone cow.

Thanks for an entertaining report stez

That steak dinner looks very familiar http://flic.kr/p/ccVfJm

Nice on Stez! ^

The cow you had looks exactly the same as the one on my trip report in WT+ from LHR to SIN last year! Wish they would be a bit more creative with the steak!

Very surprised on the light load as well!

/AE