SteveF

Once on NGCW between the D/E seats when my wife and I were in E/F (I had to jam a pen in the screen when it hit the top, otherwise it would drop straight back down with an annoying thud) and I had to ask the CC not to press the button every time she served me in case the pen trick stopped working. Twice on the fan screens, although that was either the row in front of mine or the pair across the aisle from me, so although those didn't affect me they certainly affected the other two pairs of passengers (assuming they weren't traveling together of course).

All of these happened in the last eight years, when I've only been doing one CW or F return per year. Is my comment an exaggeration? I don't think so, since one "no-screen" as a solo traveler would be enough to put me off ying-yang for life. Very unlucky? Maybe, but I find it hard to believe that a) it hasn't happened before or since on NGCW and b) that the divider on that flight was fixed before the next flight (I know that mine was at least the second flight with the fault because I found the pen jammed in the screen when I boarded).

Oh and I don't have any problems with ying-yang either. As long as the screen works...

nux

The patent covers both options - aisle seats facing towards the aisle and inwards away from the aisle. Look at the first image here: https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-F...s800/seats.png

KARFA

So to summarise, in 8 years you have had one screen not work and two fans not work. I don't know how many trips you have made in that time span, but I am guessing as a percentage of your trips this is very small. So when you say "If it works. Sometimes they just drop down again." you should have said "Very rarely they don't work". It is a bit bizarre that one problem occuring is enough to put you off a product for life. If you are going to set the bar that high then I would expect you are going to have a life with an ever diminishing and narrow range of products.

SteveF

To summarize what I actual said, I said 1 CW or F return per year, so that's 8 returns. 16 flights. That's a fairly high percentage failure for a luxury product in my opinion. And I didn't say that I had two fans not work, just that I had observed missing fans on adjacent rows on two of those 16 flights.

KARFA

For electric screens in NGCW, which is what we were talking about originally, that is roughly 6% based on your flights. However, as you will appreciate your sample size is very small and therefore statistically even the 6% figure is completely unreliable. Had you not had your one unlucky incident over the last 8 years then you would have been singing the praises of the completely reliable and infallible 100% working screen since you never had another failure.

I can tell you from my own experience with multiple CW trips every year over the last 3 years I haven't had one not work yet - and this also seems to be the experience of others who have posted. This is why I was surprised at your post which almost implied that failure of the screens was almost a regular occurrence.

SteveF

I wasn't implying that. Or even almost implying that. I was just making an observation that it sometimes happens, which it did with that seat on at least two occasions, and that it would cheese people if if they had to face a stranger for 10 hours (and I'm not implying that all CW flights are 10 hours).

I'm pretty sure that a number of valuable (to BA) solo travelers would "never fly BA again" if it happened just the once (especially on 6% of their flights), on the basis that if it happened once then it could happen again.

It's a bit like those who regularly don't get their first choice of meal in CW or F; that's never happened to me or my wife, but I'm not suggesting that other passengers are making it up or that they should just put up with it.

morges1

Absolutely agree, Karfa. over the past 8 years I have flown on average 33.4 BA LH/year. Up until recently that has been mainly in CW and I have never had a problem with the divider. Probably that was 200 flights with a failure rate of 0/200! Certainly, the old fan dividers are very old now but I have only once travelled LH on a 767 in recent years.

daftboy

Just to add some balance to the above, while I don't have the precise statistics KARFA and morges1 have to hand, my experience is that the divider usually works but on more than one occasion I have had to grab it when it gets to the top to stop it slamming back down again.

An infrequent traveller is unlikely to know how to do this; big deal in the wider picture I guess, but still not irrelevant from their perspective.

Perhaps SteveF was insufficiently precise in his comment (as perhaps am I), but the datapoint is not irrelevant.

cosmo74

Regardless of whether they work or not, it is the dividers that I really don't like about the ying/yang configuration. Stepping over someone I can cope with, but having to sit and stare at a stranger for part of the journey, the delicacies of when to put the screen up and the up and down of the screen during service detract from the overall experience. Let's hope these issues are eliminated in the next CW set up - not having to step over someone would be an added bonus.

KARFA

I would agree. If you are not familiar with the workings of the screen then there can be a lot of searching for the button - on teh 787 and A380 they have put a visible button at the bottom of the screen to remedy this. Also the mistake I made a few times on my first few trips was holding down or multiple presses of the button - this causes the screen to go all the way to the top and slam down immediately. I think when you press it the screen doesn't start to move for a second which leads you to try pressing again. However, I think it remembers the second press so when it gets to the top it then comes straight back down. I find one definitive press is what you are supposed to do - and only after several seconds if nothing happens should you try it again.

I might write "A Guide to Working the NGCW Screen" one day

kered

I would have to say that I am becoming less & less inclined to want to fly CW as a solo passenger, due to having to be face to face with a stranger when the screen is down. I would be very uncomfortable indeed if the screen failed for the duration of the flight, which thankfully hasn't happened me yet.

However, that said, on the majority of trips, I'm travelling with "Mrs Kered, so the screen down is no issue at all.

There is one solo trip that I take every so often, that brings me to IAD. The last time I did this trip I was lucky enough to snag a very good deal in First However, I will probably be making that trip again this coming spring & find that I am reluctant to travel CW solo. So if I can't get a similar good deal in F, I will look at VS or EI, as they are introducing IAD direct from DUB next May. Their new J product is going to offer single seats, as well as pairs, so would really be something to consider ^

So all told, if travelling solo, I would now place CW pretty much the bottom of the list.

Wong Jnr

I don't get the issue with having to "face" a stranger for a period of time.
The only time the screen needs to be down is for the safety briefing, which is not even a couple of minutes

How on earth do you all cope when travelling on buses or trains which have seats facing each other with no screen?
Is that's when you all deploy the "newspaper"

LondonElite

I hope all seats will be rear-facing. I find that sleeping with your head slightly higher than your feet (relative not just to the floor of the cabin, but also the ground) is much more pleasant than having to raise the seat a little (from 180 to 175 degrees) when facing forwards.

stevie

So intimate you have a fellow passenger on the other side of a divider and you have to climb over another passenger to get to the aisle. On CX my fellow passenger is on the other side of the aisle or a full seat length behind/in front of me. CX for me.

KARFA

I have mentioned this as well a few times when others have asked if it is weird flyig backwards. Planes cruise slightly nose up and I entirely agree sleeping with head slightly high seems to help - one of the advantages of being in a rear facing seat.