Good morning all,
Firstly may I say a big thank you to you all, for the continual support and understanding for crew community. It's is a very difficult transition for us all given the issues and many problems we have had to deal with this week.
Let me update you on what has been happening so far and what we as crew have found with BOB. As BOB ends its 1st week online with BA there is still a lot of issues and they vary from flight to flight. Below are the main factors :
POS not working (i.e. Failed transactions, crashing, not set for flight, dead)
F&B loading (stock incorrectly or not loaded, or low stock loaded)
Sales, Route & Flight time (uptake of product vastly varies on different routes)
Human factor (crew their experience, speed of service, consumer interaction)
POS : This system is pretty awful even when it works well. As I mentioned before it takes 7 steps for one item sale add a step for each additional item. We still have POS loaded that don't work at all and some with continual crashing, when they crash you need to re log into the POS which takes time. Also a common issue is the card reader not connecting to the POS software. When this happens the sale shows up the customer puts the card in, enters pin, card reader says approved, but the POS software has not registered the sale i.e. No payment taken. This is very unsettling for a customer as they have seen the green tick and the word approved.
F&B: The issues with this are starting to settle down I must say. The company are looking at the requirements for individual routes and aircraft types ( especially the 767. ) and loading accordingly. The 767 is most problematic but this is been worked on so hopefully the food issue will be ironed out asap. But this will be the easiest issue to sort out. We still will always have a issue with being unable to sell any product food or drink if the POS is not working AND we have NO credit card slips. If you consider 200 customers on a 767 each way that's has the max potential of 400 sales i.e. ( not that everyone will buy of course) but then are only loading 20/50 slips per flight. So that's a max of 50 sales for both sectors.
Sales, Route & Flight time: Given that the above 2 points are in order, working POS and F&B loaded correctly. This factor has an impact on delivery of service and if customers will even get served. If we have a high sales uptake (1 in 6) that's approx one customer per row (aircraft dependent). The service will fail, the only way we would manage to complete this service is with 4 cc at the rear of the cabin. 2 cc on each bar, this would mean adding 2 cc to a 319, 1 cc to a 320 and 3 cc to a 767. This will leave 1 cc one the Airbus to work CE and 2 on the 767. This will never happen BA will NOT increase the crew Matrix, they would be taking a backward step and reinstating cc they took off resulting in the 2010 strike. (I can dream though) .
Human Factor: This to me is a difficult one, I am very tech savvy ( otherwise I would not have the guts to post any of this
) But not everyone is, in fairness some cc have been doing with out tech in this lives for years. So some are finding it difficult to get to grips with a badly designed interface. Please understand that the POS sw is badly designed and not iPad friendly as you might expect. If fact BA must be the only company to take such a simple easy to use device and turn it on it head. But we now have road shows in our report canter, and talk of a training video so this will all go to help crew.
Another part of the human factor is quite worrying to me and I have found it very noticeable its interaction. I like to talk, it's what I do, I enjoy the interaction with our customer, banter, chitchat, listening and as we say as BA 'Being There' . Well that's come to an end this week . While delivering the service up to now I interacted with most customers. From giving a simple glass of water to topping up the 4th glass of wine
and with that come interaction. Now with BOB I walk through the cabin asking if anyone would like food or beverage purchases. On a flight this is not busy ( no sales ) 95 % of customers don't even make eye contact, customers that do either smile and shake their head or make a purchase and thats it. As for me I need to move on to the next row as quickly as possible as I don't know how busy I will be (again all depends on flight time, sales and route).
CE has changed slightly too, I find that depending how the BOB is going in ET will add the issue of being left alone in CE and once again pressure on getting a full service completed. Before I would have had the back up of cc from the rear coming up to help as soon as they finished the free pass service which was always completed. So again interaction is reduced in CE to an extent.
All in all the service is getting better the company is working on getting it right, but I feel the bigger picture is not the fact of BOB. It's going to change the whole feeling of that interaction our customers have had with the crew on BA for years. BA have been told for years by you that it's the staff that make the journey, it's our customer service and presence that is a factor in booking with us.
Now in times of delays, disruption we can still offer our knowledge and experience and have that interaction. But will not be able to offer a service or complimentary drink to help. During a normal service we have to concentrate on getting to all customers in the available flight time as such reducing that very important interaction.
After my 1st week of BOB I feel drained, tired, devalued and saddened by what I have seen. So many disappointed customers, some very angry, some upset and others being rude to cc. I have seen cc pay for some customers, heard stores of cc spending there own hard earned money to make a difference, and stores of cc being rude and inflexible as well i.e. With tank water.
I hope you have all had a very much more enjoyable week then I have had.
Safe flying
Ps. Sorry I cannot respond to any PM but thank you to all that have PM me, I am sure you can totally understand this.
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me is not original I have used in memory of poster somewhere else who was a true hero to many at BA .
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The information posted here are my views and opinion . They do not reflect the official view or opinion or any other individual or company
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