amaroo

Not a TR - just an observation.

Flights
SYD-BKK-LHR F (OF)
LHR-MAD CE
CDG-LHR CE
LHR-BKK F (NF)
BKK-SYD F (OF)

Lounges
CCR
T3 Flounge

As ftdashboard predicted we had a 33% chance of getting NF and thats exactly how it turned out^

Flying BA has always been a pleasure and this trip was no different.

Out of the 45 odd hours in the air with BA we didn't have a bad one. All the crews were delight to meet, very helpful, polite, happy & professional. Yes, we had the odd dodgy meal, warm Champagne however, that falls within our acceptable tolerance for living a happy stress free life.

IMO, BA are hard to beat in the air - on the ground, it's another story.

Having flown BA many times (SYD-BKK or SIN) in F & CW we were very much looking forward to our first BA home lounge experience. In summary, the service level fails to match the standard set in the air or other OW partners.

I don't know if it's the staff, the management or just the over the top strict rules!

Our CCR visit has been well documented.....in another thread.

T3 F, the procedure to gain access to the dining room is silly.

Great trip, flown by a great airline.......just don't get too excited about the lounges. I understand that it's a waiting room but if you are going to spend that many millions of pounds you might as well get it right!

matthandy

Glad to hear that overall you had a good trip amaroo.

What didn't you like about the lounges? Are you comparing them to the QF home lounges? If you are comparing T3 F to the QF F Syd lounge then I don't think you'll get anybody disagreeing with your viewpoint

What procedure is that? I remember being given a pre-flight dining card and then I simply had to present it the attendant at the entrance to the dining room.

amaroo

When we entered the T3 Flounge our BP's were taken, reviewed and then handed back - we then entered the lounge. No questions asking if we required an invitation to enter the dining room. As we were unfamiliar with the rules we didn't ask for one either.

When we approached the dining room the attendant asks for our invitations.

I explained that we didn't have any but all 5 of us are traveling F with BA to BKK and handed him our BP's. He refused entry & told me to go back to the front desk to get the invitations.

Standing their with wife, mum & two kids with hands full holding carry on...I struggled to understand the logic but did exactly what he told me to do.

After waiting in line at the front desk I asked the lady for an invitation....had to go through the BP process again and wait for her to write out all 5 of them.

Go back to the dining room and he greats us like he has never seen us before - welcomes us in with a big smile & kind words.

We then have a little drama on where 5 people can sit in the room that appears to be fitted out for parties of one....but that's another story

matthandy

That is very silly! You should have gone back to the front desk to make your comments known. I'd have been very unimpressed to say the least.

There are some tables for four, but yes, a lot of tables for 1's and 2's, but I would think that would fit with the majority of customers. You are just weird

BA5E

As you were not given dining cards, the person in the dining room having asked you for the invitation, and you told him you had not been given any, he should certainly have not made you go back to the front desk and ask for one, he should have done it himself, and at least asked you to go and sit in the dining room whilst he got the cards. We had a similar situation in T5 arrivals, no invitation card was given to us, we just went into the dining room sat down, the person asked us for our invitation, told him we did not have one, we showed him our BP, and he went off and got the invitation, no questions asked.

RB211

Yup - it's all about customer service. Some have it, some don't. If they don't they should be retrained or employed elsewhere. BA needs to get that!

rb211.

henkybaby

Funny. I would see it exactly opposite. BA's lounges are pretty good but inflight a lot of other F/J products run rings around BA.

747_not_777

Is this a "new" thing - back in October 2010 I flew F out of T3 to SYD, and we weren't asked for any invites - just showed our boarding card and got seated for din-dins...

Greenpen

Ditto for an August 2010 flight. But food on board was better.

David_Doyle

Pretty unbelievable use of petty bureaucracy, I fail to see how this process does anything but inconvenience the passenger. If your class is shown on the boarding pass what benefit does an extra bit of paper give?

Do sleeper services from the east coast require a dining voucher also? I did this last year but can't remember....

For VS's arrival lounge at Heathrow I recall occasionally receiving an 'invite to the lounge' when checking in for the inbound flight, but just showing the inbound boarding pass was enough as they already had a list of all eligible passengers and just tick you off when you arrive.

Is this something to do with offloading the dining staff from having to check / assess the boarding pass, leaving this step to be done at entry only?

duncas

Ditto Feb 2011.

amaroo

Not sure when the procedure kicked in......our flight was Sunday 8th Jan 2012.

HilFly

They do at BOS. I was told that the vouchers are required because the company which provides the catering are paid on the number of passengers who dine. Some staff members are more aggressive than others on voucher collection. They all separate you from the voucher but some use more common sense than others. I witnessed a similar situation to amaroo's. Mum & Dad and 4 small kids had managed to arrive in the dining room without vouchers. Instead of the dining room lady going to the desk, or leaving Mum & kids sitting at the table while Dad went back, the whole family had to go back to the desk. Even more silly given the proximity of the desk to the dining room at BOS. The lounge lady could probably have heard the discussion from where she was sitting at the desk!

Of course, if I'd realized what disruption the kids were going to cause, both in the lounge and later on the UD, I'd have come up with a different solution!

Paralytic

Just a small (OT) comment; many reading this won't know what thread you're referring to (I don't, though I might well have read it), so including a link to it would help paint the overall picture of your experience.

amaroo

My wife laughed out loud when she read this