mario

I flew recently from LIS to LHR and what I witnessed made me very angry at BA. I normally don't do this but I wrote to the CEO and Troy Warfield - director of customer experience. I am still upset with what I experienced and the disrespect and contempt that BA is showing to their hardworking staff.

Below is a copy of the letter I sent.

I am writing directly to you as I've witnessed a customer experience disaster yesterday in a scale that I haven't seen before and I think that this requires your immediate attention and action.

I flew on XX from Lisbon to London Heathrow on flight BA503. The flight is around 2:15 minutes long and had 42 people in Club Europe.

Unfortunately, your recent changes in the service on this flight essentially set up your crew for failure: the new service with starters, main courses delivered by hand, cheese, desert, coffee, drinks and so on simply cannot be delivered to 42 people by two (+1 from EuroTraveller that came to help) cabin crew members in the allocated time.

I was seating in row 1 and could see that your Customer Service Manager and her crew were hard at work and excellently coordinated from take-off all the way to the final descent at Heathrow. Despite their best attempts and their hard work, I saw a number of different passengers in the cabin abusing your crew as the service standards were very poor. There was only one initial round of drinks and some people were left with an empty starter plate, waiting for a main, for almost one hour. I saw people shouting at your crew on a number of occasions and they handled it in the best way they could.

Again, I don't think this is the crew's fault at all - if anything your CSM and the rest of the cabin crew should be praised for putting up with a service routine that looks like was designed by someone who never set foot on an aircraft.

If I were cabin crew, I would have handed over my resignation on arrival at Heathrow as what you are putting your employees through shows that you don't care about their wellbeing and that everything boils down to how much money you can make - this is no way to run a company and I'll think very hard before setting foot an British Airways aircraft again.

You want to sell 42 seats in Club? Easy to fix: put two more cabin crew to help with the service.

obduro

The thread title reads like a bit of a riddle!

I think this is a valid point in all honesty, you are right to say BA have set their CC up for failure in situations like these, even though they appear to be the exception rather than the norm. I would be interested to hear if they come back with something more detailed than the stock response...

ratypus

Seems to be more and more common...with BOB down the back and keen marketing & pricing on some routes for CE, BA really need to re-think service delivery and staffing to deliver anything like a consistent experience in CE.


I did LCY-AGP-LCY the other week in CE - 20 passengers in CE one way and 32 (!) the other way on an ERJ190, with just one crew member to serve them all. No drinks runs to speak of, other than with meal service (you had to walk up to the front for any other drinks) and food service to the back of CE took well over 70 minutes: we were more than hallway to AGP before we had any breakfast on the way out and mercifully bagged Row 3 for the way back as I think the poor sods back in the 8th row of CE only just about got their meal before we started the descent into LCY.


Not the crew's fault at all - she was working really hard - but BA need to re-think some of the knock-on implications of ET now being so unappealing and/or not over-sell CE if they cannot deliver the product on board efficiently.

nobbyclark

On a flight last Saturday from LHR-EDI I was in 'club' and was surprised to hear that there were 5 crew working the plane rather than the usual 4 (on a 320). Three were up front and presumably the other 2 were behind the dividing curtain. Think there were 10 rows of club and the service was efficient and there was enough time for food and drink to be served to all. Even had time for a cheeky second drink.

o0herbie

Flew LHR-LBA-LHR this week in CE - It was £200 vs £160 in the back.

To put it bluntly, the cabin crew did not have the time to prepare the breakfasts. They were expected to create a bacon sandwich for each passenger (7 rows). Each tray came only with a small platter of fruit, and needed a croissant added, a sandwich created, a jam pot placed down. I was offered a coffee, but could see we'd be down in 10 mins so declined.

Obviously the return flight was easier with a standard loop over Bovingdon.

ThatT1Feeling

Yes I have seen the exact same on a couple of recent CE flights. The crew working their socks off but the trolleys aren't configured in anything like the right way for efficient delivery of the service. I understand that sometimes there is also no longer space for a rubbish trolley which makes life even more complicated for the crew.

This was only 5 rows on a 2hour 30min flight - I can't imagine how this would have worked with 12 rows in less time.

scottnothing

I was in Row 2 of the same flight and concur with the OP's recounting of the flight yesterday. I would add a couple of points that made me giggle/cringe:

* Everyone in CE was served a stick of butter (yum yum) but no bread (despite the bread having been loaded - we saw the crew transfer a bag of carbs between galleys)

* Coffee/tea was not "served" but was available on request

* At 40 mins to landing, not all of the cabin had been served their hot main course

It was definitely a flight where you wanted to be seated close to the galley so that you could try to sneak cheeky refills in while dodging daggers from the mob behind you. It made for very awkward travelling upfront though.

Being a frequent lurker on this forum I had braced myself for this experience when I boarded and saw over 10 rows of CE passengers. I was out of earshot but suspect that most of the travellers that bolted up to the galley to deliver their feedback in person were not as familiar with the recent "enhancements" to BA's product, and may have been full-fare paying leisure travellers with service expectations that matched the fare they paid.

In addition to thanking the crew before deplaning for their valiant efforts in avoiding a CE riot, I've also followed-up with comments via the online form and also via a contact at Waterside - praising the crew and querying why BA set themselves up for failure like that. Was definitely one of the most bizarre BA flights I have ever taken.

nobbyclark

A lot of leisure travellers will be experiencing this for the first time since introduction, especially those tied to the school holiday calendar.

FlyerTalker6245

I believe on an EDI once you hit a Club load of 16 on an A320 you increase to 5 crew.

TravellerFrequently

Thanks to the OP for post and passing on this feedback to BA. I hope you get a meaningful response and the company reviews the service based on yours and, I expect, feedback from harassed cabin crew and disgruntled passengers.

Well done to the cabin crew for doing their best in a difficult situation.

JALlover

They definently need to add more crew if CE load was 42, no way can 2 crew provide excellent service with a time constraint of only 2 hours and a bit.

Even on a 777 with 48 seats, you get 4 crew, not only 2

LCY8737

I was on the same flight as mario and scottnothing ​​​​​​- it was an absolute disgrace to see the crew suffering through the flight. Some of them literally had tears in their eyes.

I wrote to GGL and gave them some details of the flight in the hope that this might get escalated to a sufficiently senior management level. I received an email a few hours ago with an apology for not living up to my expectations (hardly the problem here) and a promise to forward my message to a "loyalty team" - whatever that might be.

I also sent a golden ticket to the CSM - truly deserved for what she and her team had to endure on that flight.

BA has turned into an evil company - and while people on this board may complain about many valid shortcomings in the product, it must be a lot worse to have to work for them!

Prospero

A mainline A320 flight on a LIS-LHR with 42 in Club would normally be rostered with 4 crew - 2 taking care of ET and 2 in CE. On this route an additional crew member would normally be rostered when the CE load is 45 or greater.

LCY8737

And for the old service standards that may have been adequate, but with the recent changes it puts the crew in an impossible position...

fransknorge

I do remember some reports of crew just before BOB was launched that they looked forward to it as it meant less work. Between the problems there and the new CE service, it looks as if they have more work. I am not sure how those looking forward are regretting now.