Nimrod1965

Not quite, ATC staff on standby are probably the "lowest of the low".

Not used my Staff travel concessions much in years as it's not that cheap really, cheaper and easier these days with LCC's around.

headingwest

I always thought that staff travel was just like BAEC redemption flights but without paying any Avios - i.e. to the USA for a couple of hundred pounds anyway. I have a friend who works for Qantas, and he's always whizzing around the world, but I don't think he gets it very cheap compared to some of the bookings available (error fares?!).

Nimrod1965

Staff travel used to be good value before APD and taxes. Last time I used BA Staff travel by the time APD and taxes were added, the ticket cost was more expensive than if I'd bought an economy fare online. The only advantage was that with a standby ticket, it can be used for any flight to that destination, you're not necessarily tied to a particular flight. It's like having a fully-flexible economy ticket but with the downside of being offloaded if the flight is full.

headingwest

Does that mean any airline in the oneworld alliance, or does it have to be with BA?

Flexible preferences

Out of interest, which airlines pay more? And is it more than BA LGW crew now, or before the recent changes?

I think I heard Ryanair charge their crew for their own training. It is a very competitive job. Many young people would love to be cabin crew for a very low salary, even minimum wage. The opportunity to travel the world and the perceived excitement of such a role is irresistible. The fact is the airlines don't need to pay much to attract good enough staff.

I'm not saying that what BA did at LGW was right or wrong, I'm just saying that is the backdrop to cabin crew pay. At the end of the day there is huge demand for the job, and that's why BA could implement MF (and something similar at LGW) and pay much less because they always knew they'll have no problem recruiting at much lower pay levels, and is good people like you who are at the rough end of this situation.

Nimrod1965

It's with BA but if a flight is full, the check in agent might suggest an alternative routing with another airline that they have an interline agreement with.

In my opinion, Standby Staff travel is really not worth the hassle these days, back in the 1990's before LCC's and taxes it was a great way of getting around Europe and I went to the USA a couple of times on KLM and Air New Zealand. BA was more expensive at that time than some of the other airlines, I never went to the Far East or Australia either as reports were that it was difficult on BA due to high load factors.

Now that I am older and with more disposable income I would rather have a confirmed seat on a flight than having to wait until the last minute to see if I was on a flight. I once had a difficult time getting back to the UK from Stockholm with SAS where it took nearly all day waiting for a seat to be available and watching about 8 flights push back and depart. The following day was a bank holiday in Sweden and every flight was full. The gate agent was trying her best to get me home and eventually I got the flight deck jumpseat on the last flight back to Heathrow. Im not sure that I would be prepared to tolerate so much disruption and uncertainty these days just to save money. In fact, scratch that, I know I wouldn't want to put myself through that these days when I can just pay full fare and know that I have a confirmed seat.

DYKWIA

That's all well and good. However, forcing long serving people on other contracts to take a lower paid job, or be made redundant, is the issue here.

PETER01

Thank you for your valuable contributions here Yesitsme, especially on Ask the Staffer thread and very best wishes in your future ventures.

I do hope you will continue to post as well as other BA Staff, past and present, which are enjoyed by the masses.

Flexible preferences

It is interesting that BA chose to force a decision on their cabin crew at LGW. I assume what they did wasn't unlawful, but nonetheless it does seem very harsh.

That said, what I said regarding the industry backdrop brings context to the situation and adds value.

From my own personal experience, the service I received in CW from LGW has never been as good as from LHR. On my last outbound flight the service was haughty, unfriendly and very much 'going through the motions'. On the return I had another indifferent crew, wine spilt all over me by the crew (OK accidents happen) and then the one time I used my call bell (I was going to ask if the temperature in the cabin could be turned down) it was simply ignored.

I'm an occasional leisure flyer who has probably only flown CW from LGW 8 times or so in the last few years, so my data point if you like is very limited, but nonetheless that is my experience of LGW crew. From LHR I think every flight I've taken in CW has been better.

Yesitsme

It's a race to the bottom, simple as that. Sure, people still think being cabin crew is glamorous and exciting. Until people realise the reality of the job nothing will change.

After nearly 2 decades with the company my options were
1) Go back to main crew and lose £4K/year on my basic pay
2) Go for the new CSM role and do pretty much what I already did with more responsibilities and extra work for a £1K/year pay cut.

LGW has effectively been turned into MF but with less pay than MF at LHR. So many "seniors" have left or gone back to main crew that now pretty much anyone who applies to be CSM will get the job, including crew who've been with the company for less than a year and who are not even F trained.

bluemoon68

I've only had one return flight LH out of LGW this year, but the service was very good.

Sorry to hear that good people are leaving, wishing all the best to those off to new jobs.

Lite

Yesitsme good luck with your future endeavours. I have always enjoyed your very level headed and amusing posts on here and to say I've learned more from your posts about what's going on at LGW than from our own internal communications says a lot about life inside BA. Even though you won't be flying for us any more, I hope you'll still drop in and let us know now you're getting on.

Flexible preferences, to give you an idea on how uncompetitive BA's new contracts are at Heathrow and Gatwick, we have seen many people leave easyJet to come here, only to go back within a year because of dreadful rostering and lower pay. In very broad terms, most airlines pay much of a muchness for new contract cabin crew in terms of their basic salary. It's the additions like commission, trip allowances or sector pay, competitive benefits etc. that really separate the airlines and of course the way you are recognised and the union agreed contracts for working conditions. Maybe BA has been caught short in the past which is why these contracts are so uncompetitive, but I think you'll find when BA announce their end of year results and associated bonuses/pay rises in March, you'll see another mass exodus.

Flexible preferences

Thanks for the inside insight Lite ^

In a way though, you illustrate my point. If what you say is true then the people who leave will be easily replaced by the high demand there is to be a member of BA cabin crew. It is this demand by young people who dream of a job travelling the world with what is seen as a 'glamorous' company like BA (which looks great on your CV too) that hopelessly undermines the bargaining strength BA's crew have. You are, sadly, easily replaceable (at least in your employer's eyes).

I get that having a high cabin crew turnover may have repercussions on the service that passengers receive, although there is another side of the story. A new crew can be more enthusiastic and less jaded. Sometimes experienced crew can be sour or unfriendly, as I have experienced myself. So it isn't always a 'good thing' to have experienced crew.

Lite

Ideally though, the best cabin crews have a real mixture of experience. For me, the best I have ever worked with were at charter bases in the regions (Gatwick was always quite hellish really). You used to find most of your crew had been there for years, gelled really well together, knew their stuff inside and out and thrown into the mix you'd have one or two new crew in their first or second season ("summer helpers" as they used to get nicknamed by some of the more frightening number ones - I was never one of them) who were buzzing with enthusiasm and just needed a gentle nudge in the right direction to get things done. They worked really hard, but it paid off with excellent customer scores, great commission and a really nice working environment. I do miss those days very much.

For me this has become a job which I find very sad. Like most of my colleagues, I always go the extra mile onboard and that shows in my "operational dashboard", a set of statistics we get sent with things like on time performance, customer survey scores, Golden Tickets earned etc. I don't however have the same feeling of pride in my work or for the company that I did with previous employers, maybe it was working somewhere much smaller where we felt lol we had a sense of ownership and we were listened to. BA say as long as we've been here 18 months they've made their costs back and are happy for us to leave. It's a sad working environment, when you know that no matter how great a job you do for your customers, unless they write in and you get recognition from that then nobody will ever say thank you or be that bothered that you've gone. Thankfully we get lovely customers who do say thank you, do take the time to have a chat and to write in and say thanks and it still after 27 years makes me really happy to know I've made someone's day. March however will be the time for me to see how feasible this job is to do for another year, and BA know I'm not the only one as they've just just before Christmas opened a massive internal and external recruitment drive for cabin crew and direct entry CSM's - interestingly promising a potential salary I haven't achieved once!

gordon0808

I just returned from a LH trip ex LGW and service was superb with very friendly cabin crew. I have nothing but good things to say about LGW crew ^