Byould30

I flew back from Punta Cana last night in J and waited patiently near the priority boarding line at the gate.

They in fact boarded every family that was on the flight before they opened the priority boarding line.

I dont fly Club World that much but should I have expected the line to be opened as soon as boarding commenced?

MPH1980

The boarding order for BA is (supposed to be) this:

Pre-boarding - those who need assistance or familys with "young" children (although BA don't define young).
First/Club/Gold
Silver
Bronze
By row number in WT and WTP

In reality you get some combination of that and 'all priority together' and then 'everyone else'.

TyneTraveller

Pre-boards and the priority boarding are two different things, in the order outlined above.

It is the interpretation of who gains pre boarding that appears to be the problem in this case. Anyone who requires assistance should and normally is dealt with first, followed by family's with small children. It doesn't appear to be defined clearly, but should only be extended to those travelling with infants in my eyes. If not, on family heavy routes you find that half the aircraft will pre-board as what seems to have happened here. Imagine the stampede on the MCO route during the holiday season for instance if it is not policed correctly!!

Hands Mensing

<quote>It is the interpretation of who gains pre boarding that appears to be the problem in this case. Anyone who requires assistance should and normally is dealt with first, followed by family's with small children. It doesn't appear to be defined clearly, but should only be extended to those travelling with infants in my eyes. If not, on family heavy routes you find that half the aircraft will pre-board as what seems to have happened here. Imagine the stampede on the MCO route during the holiday season for instance if it is not policed correctly!!</quote>

The key to it is the policing of it. We have 2 boys with asd like issues which prompted us when we flew LH a few years ago with them to request pre boarding. Everything went smoothly at LHR & were pre boarded - even before the young families. Return was different. We were told by the check in agent to ask at the gate - gate agent turned out to be our check in agent, so we asked again and just got told to line with the families. So we did. My boys have always been big for their age, I could hear the tuts going round the lounge when we stood up to join the line and saw at least one group with a 10 + yr old and join the same line and weren't policed. Made me feel very uncomfortable.

Incidentally, the boys have got much better at coping with all sorts of change and crowds so we'd probably be fine next time around. As with most gate /boarding / hand luggage issues it all comes down to the policing and management by staff.

(ps had two very pro active domestic crews on Saturday, policing luggage, emergency exit and other safety issues.)

Phorbas

There's a long-running thread about the boarding process:

New Boarding Process- has anyone noticed an improvement?

HIDDY

There are those who qualify for priority boarding who assume they can just turn up after general boarding has started and the throng in front of them will part like the Red Sea in order to let them through.

My experience has been you have to be at the gate before boarding starts to take advantage of it....even then it seems there is further priority boarding amongst those who qualify for priority boarding.

flyingbee

From my experience of pre-boarding with infants and small children it would help and be nice, if they have the time, to give just a couple of minutes between the pre-board and general boarding to allow time to get settled with some space. Usually we pre-board but are juggling children, coats and bags with the next boarding group pushing past. I certainly appreciate pre-boarding but it would be even better with just a little bit more time.

orbitmic

True, although in my experience, some gate agents take it upon themselves to correct BA's vagueness and rephrase that, mostly in one of three ways:

Version 1: "We would now like to invite families travelling with infants"... : the most restrictive and arguably the most logical as they are the people who need to fold strollers at the plane door which becomes very awkward if there are people walking around at the same time.

Version 2: "We would now like to invite families travelling with children under the age of 5"... : the middle ground theory I guess. I suppose that the criterion becomes families where the parents are likely to have their hands full because they hold everyone's luggage plus kids' hands, etc.

Version 3: "We would now like to invite families travelling with children"... : the broadest description, sure to bring a few family quarrels between "come now dear" and "I'm NOT a child Mum!" 16 year old Lucy or Samantha or whatever her name is on the day. In that case, I'm not entirely sure what the logical criterion becomes. Not even giving them a chance to argue as couples do manage on their own, as do single travellers with a mobile phone.

I understand the OP's frustration that when version 3 is implemented either implicitly or explicitly, but more importantly, I would observe that by definition, if you allow versions 2 or 3, the original idea to make it easier for people with infants to settle down deal with stroller etc is immediately lost as it becomes virtually as difficult for them when 20 families are pushing behind as 200 passengers.

ReadystEDIgo

The recorded boarding messages at EDI are now version 1. Does the fact this is a recording suggest that "infants" may well be official policy?

tuff

I agree with this. For the last four months I have been on crutches and I have always ensured that I am at the gate early enough to be asked for pre-boarding. There never seems to have been any priority amongst the pre-boarders, be they "needing assistance" or with children. Interestingly on our day trip to HNL at Christmas American Airlines just let the "priorities" board with the normal priority group so it didn't make much difference to me.

orbitmic

Good to know, thanks! I'd suspect that it means that it is the policy of the station manager rather than the airline's overall policy.

Incidentally, I forgot a fourth permutation, which is actually quite frequent at NCE and in fact at LHR: one of the gate agents just looks at the gate area and directly approaches whoever they think should be eligible and make them wait in a given area and go and fetch them individually rather than make the announcement.

TyneTraveller

I would second that given my recent experiences, involving travel both with and without infants. I would also suggest that station managers might give gate agents the power to make an informed descision if that wish to adapt according to differing situations and flight loadings.

puddinhead

Florida has a lot of miracle flights - especially to NYC. Dozens of passengers in wheelchairs at the gate for early boarding. When the flight lands these same passengers push everyone out of their way to run off the plane.

Other pet peeve is people who board early with their adult children - over 30…

shefgab

I flew LHR-DFW last week, and the gate agent was very clear in accouncements about pre-boarding being for families with "children under three". That being said, she happily welcomed familes with children that looked to be at least 6.

lorcancoyle

Announcement at T3 today (think it was PHX, I was at adjacent gate) was "infants", then F and Gold / Emerald. I liked the liberal use of the word "strictly" in the announcements!