chalf

SU and UN both offer a full hot meal service in Y.

bioblot

Last time I did this route was in J with SU and we didn't get any food at all. That was on an IL-86 though.

layz

SU don't fly this route

MrSimonR

It is worth, however, considering why BA upgraded the route to a long-haul service:

1) To retain (and win back) the business-class market, which had long since started moving to SU, UN and BD, as BA was offering (at that time) the worst quality business class service on the dogs of the fleet, the shorthaul 767s.

2) To capture more of the (fast growing) long haul market ex-Moscow, which required (at that time) its long haul passengers to spend the first 4 hours of their trip in misery, compared with shorter time on other European carriers, due to their geographical location.

Now, the A321 return service, the 234, arrives back into LHR at 20:25, so very little connecting traffic. Consequently, BA can be little concerned about whether Y passengers get a meal or a sandwich on the route, where really, the competition is the evening U2 flight.

Littlegirl

Only because a while ago I asked why we would not be round catering and someone told me that we could not round cater on these 321s in the hold, the way we can with other aircraft.

I was under the impression that one of these was offline being containerised at the moment but I could have got that completely wrong.

Like you I cannot understand why this decision has happened and yes when it is a 321 it is definitely a Eurofleet crew. Some 767 flights have been operated by Eurofleet but I believe most are being operated by Worldwide crew but all should be the worldwide service unless subbed to a short-haul 767, which hopefully won't happen too often!

I really am unable to justify any of this and I can promise you that all crew are really having a hard time understanding the rational for the decision for these flights having this offering. I am not aware, obviously, for the reasons why we cannot have catering at Moscow but I presume and hope that this is unavoidable.

chalf

As SU is LHR-SVO, neither does UN (LHR-VKO) or U2 (LGW-DME), if one wants to be literal.

TCX69

And so the aircraft substitution starts! Today's BA234/5 was operated by shorthaul A320 G-EUUB.

thatsthebadger

I flew Transaero once when code shared on a BMI flight. Awful. My seat was broken leaving a very sharp edge just waiting to rip my clothes or arm given the slightest chance, the plane was grubby and tired (bit like the 767s really ) and I swore never again. I reported back to HO (I was working on behalf of a big corporate) with pics of the plane and seat and policy was changed to say BA or Aeroflot only.

The DME route has always been hit and miss in my experience with BA, and to simply be endured.

BA6501

Ah! I didn't know that aircraft were round catered in the hold at all.

Most of the 7 aircraft have now been containerised, I think there are two left.

Behindthecurtain

Hi littlegirl. Nope, was told nothing at all before. Crew were not pleased with service, as they knew they were going to get moaned at providing a service more akin to Band 2 ET than WT..

Behindthecurtain

Cooked meal both directions choice of two with pre ordered specials, free alcohol beer wine and vodka, seats with more legroom than BA MH 321

Behindthecurtain

To be accurately literal, one of the two LHR UN flights is from DME and one from VKO.

Littlegirl

I know that the cabin crew, that have operated these flights, are feeding these issues of passengers not being aware or properly informed about this, back to BA.

Other than apologise, I don't really know what to say about this.

chalf

The 2x daily UN-operated flights to LHR are all now from VKO. Only the U2 code-shares are from DME.

Also, neither UN nor SU offers free beer or alcohol in Y--just [1 glass of] wine. And on SU it comes in a box labeled "Merlot"...UN at least has real bottles of something. SU does offer other wine and beer for sale for cash, though it is not advertised on the LHR routes.

I'll also debate the point about UN having better legroom than BA in Y; I find UN to be quite economical on legroom, though the newer [secondhand] aircraft are fine (the 737-400/500 are a bit tight, particularly in the back).

chalf

I indicated in an earlier post that i recently had a flight LHR-DME on the A321
show in MMB as EuroTraveller, not WorldTraveller. The A321 is back to being WorldTraveller for my next booked travel.

As an aside, it appears that SU may have changed from boxed wine to real bottles. I'm not sure if that impacts the quality, however.