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Breakfast at 830 AM, lunch at 530 PM — why?

Breakfast at 830 AM, lunch at 530 PM — why?

Old Dec 9, 2018, 7:20 am
  #16  
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Originally Posted by 2035
Same issue HND-LHR. Flight was at 0950 or so. Served breakfast 30 minutes in - then no more food until 1:30 before landing, ie around 2030 'body clock'. This was in WTP. I was in starving. Raided the (Y) galley and found a few tiny chocolate bars and pretzels.
When I took that flight, there was an ice-cream run in the middle, and a full bar service with the meal. Has that changed?

At least with HND—LHR, BA has the excuse that they're serving an early lunch by UK standards, and their passengers' body clocks are (or are about to be) in various stages of disarray. What's fairly unique about JNB is that, although it's more 11 hours in the air, you're only moving across one or two time zones, in both of which lunch is eaten whilst the aircraft is still traversing Africa.
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 7:43 am
  #17  
 
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Any LH flight departing before 9.30am will have breakfast catered as standard. No bar round is offered as its considered to early., however a full bar service is normally offered during the flight or sometimes before the start of the 2nd meal service. There should have been at least one tuck box in the galley after the service was completed. The standard for the 2nd service is tea/coffee/juice or water, however some crews do place soft drinks on the carts, and officially other drinks are on request. In some destinations bar paperwork is required for customs purposes, however it is normal practice to leave at least one bar open for ad-hoc drink requests.

Crew breaks are nice however on some flights they need to be a certain length of time otherwise the crew could not legally operate the route. This particular JNB rotation is an interesting one, as sometimes the crew operate to DUR then fly down to JNB with Comair to avoid longer layovers. The flight time is 11hrs 35 mins and the duty is 13hrs 15 mins, with the maximum duty you can do is 13 hours if the crew were acclimatised to JNB time, however since they only probably had 1 night in JNB they would still be acclimatised to UK time and therefore the max duty is reduced and as such crew rest is needed to ensure the flight could operate.

Depending on how long it took to deliver the first meal, the amount of time to achieve the rest required could have been reduced however 1hr 20 mins seems a bit tight for a 2nd hot service, maybe for a cold 2nd meal like a sandwich etc but personally I like to see at least 1hr 45mins so we are not rushed. We can tailor the service onboard on the day to ensure crew get enough rest to operate the flight for example if we are delayed, it may be the case that no bar round is completed before the main meal or that the meal is delivered with less crew.
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 7:44 am
  #18  
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Originally Posted by Egoldstein
I think they should shift the main meal to the first meal, and make it a brunch/lunch rather than breakfast. This would have a full drinks run prior to the meal, meal, tea and coffee service; then have a small snack box mid-flight; and then serve the small meal/hot breakfast before landing. I also dislike the compressed time for the small meal on BA long haul. Even if it is a light meal/breakfast, I feel it is rushed and they run out of time for coffee/tea and proper clearing of trays.
The flight lands at 1910 JNB time and 1710 LHR time, so serving breakfast before landing doesn't make sense. BA is operating the day flight for a few hours a week during our winter. As (unlike most passengers) I was able to have a nice breakfast in the lounge, I would personally have preferred your concept, but that's neither here nor there. I'm perfectly OK with them not developing a different menu for the occcasional little 787 shuttling 214 people and using the same one as they've already got organised for the 938 passengers travelling every night on A380s. I just don't want them to pretend it's night and we need to sleep, when it's day, and passengers are neither sleep deprived nor jet lagged.

Last edited by Passmethesickbag; Dec 9, 2018 at 7:56 am
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 7:55 am
  #19  
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Originally Posted by bhdcommuter
Any LH flight departing before 9.30am will have breakfast catered as standard. No bar round is offered as its considered to early., however a full bar service is normally offered during the flight or sometimes before the start of the 2nd meal service. There should have been at least one tuck box in the galley after the service was completed. The standard for the 2nd service is tea/coffee/juice or water, however some crews do place soft drinks on the carts, and officially other drinks are on request. In some destinations bar paperwork is required for customs purposes, however it is normal practice to leave at least one bar open for ad-hoc drink requests.

Crew breaks are nice however on some flights they need to be a certain length of time otherwise the crew could not legally operate the route. This particular JNB rotation is an interesting one, as sometimes the crew operate to DUR then fly down to JNB with Comair to avoid longer layovers. The flight time is 11hrs 35 mins and the duty is 13hrs 15 mins, with the maximum duty you can do is 13 hours if the crew were acclimatised to JNB time, however since they only probably had 1 night in JNB they would still be acclimatised to UK time and therefore the max duty is reduced and as such crew rest is needed to ensure the flight could operate.

Depending on how long it took to deliver the first meal, the amount of time to achieve the rest required could have been reduced however 1hr 20 mins seems a bit tight for a 2nd hot service, maybe for a cold 2nd meal like a sandwich etc but personally I like to see at least 1hr 45mins so we are not rushed. We can tailor the service onboard on the day to ensure crew get enough rest to operate the flight for example if we are delayed, it may be the case that no bar round is completed before the main meal or that the meal is delivered with less crew.
Thank you very much for your insights. I don't have a big problem with pre-arrival snacks on westbound flights out of LHR being served with tea and coffee only. I guess I'm just asking for a slightly different approach on flights JNB-LHR than on flights LHR-YVR. With the time difference with JNB being the same as with ATH during our winter, and with CDG during our summer, is acclimatising the crew to JNB time really a thing?
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Last edited by Passmethesickbag; Dec 9, 2018 at 8:05 am Reason: Corrected to reflect the fact that it is us Europeans who observe summer time, not the South Africans.
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 8:12 am
  #20  
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Also, whist I'm ranting, what's truly unforgivable is that after starving for nine hours, one discovers that they've replaced the delicious, aromatic chicken curry, a glory of South African cuisine and one of the last surviving culinary experiences in economy class, with a chicken and vegetable dish that was too bland for words.
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 8:14 am
  #21  
 
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JNB is a tricky one with acclimatisation as its only +2 hours from the UK. On average it takes 1 day to acclimatise to a new time zone of within +2 hour according to EASA therefore they will technically become acclimatised to JNB time. Saying that the crew will have operated a long duty down to JNB, even more so if they have operated to DUR then fly to JNB, as I think they have a 3 hour wait at DUR for the flight down to JNB, then the drive to the hotel, its like 18/19 hour duty time from memory. They also only get 1 night in JNB. The maximum duty period starting between 06:00-13:29 is 13 hours when acclimatised so even if they are acclimatised in-flight rest is needed.

Its the first season of this new JNB flight however BA will listen to the feedback of the customers using the service and maybe tweak it. Also it might be surprising to hear but our service standards do change on a monthly basis with slight updates!
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 8:20 am
  #22  
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Originally Posted by bhdcommuter
JNB is a tricky one with acclimatisation as its only +2 hours from the UK. On average it takes 1 day to acclimatise to a new time zone of within +2 hour according to EASA therefore they will technically become acclimatised to JNB time. Saying that the crew will have operated a long duty down to JNB, even more so if they have operated to DUR then fly to JNB, as I think they have a 3 hour wait at DUR for the flight down to JNB, then the drive to the hotel, its like 18/19 hour duty time from memory. They also only get 1 night in JNB. The maximum duty period starting between 06:00-13:29 is 13 hours when acclimatised so even if they are acclimatised in-flight rest is needed.

Its the first season of this new JNB flight however BA will listen to the feedback of the customers using the service and maybe tweak it. Also it might be surprising to hear but our service standards do change on a monthly basis with slight updates!
Thank you again. Although their boilerplate answers are very discouraging, you have inspired me to contact CS. At least this is an issue which could be fixed at a very low cost.

Last edited by Passmethesickbag; Dec 9, 2018 at 8:53 am
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 8:42 am
  #23  
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My opinion is that breakfast would have been finished being served 90 to 105 minutes after takeoff, a pre-dinner bar service including pretzels would be offered 2 hours and 15 minutes before landing followed by dinner, wine for dinner should have been offered with the bar service.
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 9:05 am
  #24  
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Originally Posted by Can I help you
My opinion is that breakfast would have been finished being served 90 to 105 minutes after takeoff, a pre-dinner bar service including pretzels would be offered 2 hours and 15 minutes before landing followed by dinner, wine for dinner should have been offered with the bar service.




That would have been an optimal solution to passenger and crew needs, I think. People will easily forget that they were hungry if they have a satisfying meal experience in the end.

Also, if the crew has to sit down right away after clearing the meals, I guess the leftover WTP meals will go to waste.

Last edited by Passmethesickbag; Dec 9, 2018 at 9:11 am
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Old Dec 9, 2018, 12:08 pm
  #25  
 
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Originally Posted by Passmethesickbag
When I took that flight, there was an ice-cream run in the middle, and a full bar service with the meal. Has that changed?

At least with HND—LHR, BA has the excuse that they're serving an early lunch by UK standards, and their passengers' body clocks are (or are about to be) in various stages of disarray. What's fairly unique about JNB is that, although it's more 11 hours in the air, you're only moving across one or two time zones, in both of which lunch is eaten whilst the aircraft is still traversing Africa.
There was a bar service with the first meal, but no ice cream that I saw (though maybe I was asleep when it was served). There was ice cream on the outbound leg.

Meals (albeit kosher) were rather basic also.
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Old Dec 10, 2018, 2:57 am
  #26  
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I wonder whether the answer would be to restore the cabin crew's 2-night stop at JNB?

Although I suspect that JNB may not be the only 1-night stop that is of an equal level of arduousness for them.
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Old Dec 10, 2018, 12:00 pm
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Originally Posted by Globaliser
I wonder whether the answer would be to restore the cabin crew's 2-night stop at JNB?

Although I suspect that JNB may not be the only 1-night stop that is of an equal level of arduousness for them.
So what you're saying is that the crew working the A380s have a day, a night, and a second day to recover, whilst the ones working the 787s have only a day and a night, with a very early start the following morning? Then I am much more sympathetic. I still think they could have started the second service half an hour earlier to give them time to include drinks, though.
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Old Dec 10, 2018, 12:05 pm
  #28  
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Originally Posted by Passmethesickbag
So what you're saying is that the crew working the A380s have a day, a night, and a second day to recover, whilst the ones working the 787s have only a day and a night, with a very early start the following morning? Then I am much more sympathetic.
That's what I understood from bhdcommuter's reference to these crew still only having one night at JNB.

The 380 and 747 crew seem already to have it hard enough with only one night downroute after an overnight flight.
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Old Dec 10, 2018, 1:02 pm
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Sorry for the confusion, never having had the pleasure of operating the 78 trip to JNB, I thought it was the same as the 747/380 trips which have one night down route. To clarify, the 787 crews doing the LHR-DUR-JNB-LHR do indeed get 2 nights down in JNB, however pickup is quite early in the morning so I wouldn't call it a full night's sleep
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Old Dec 10, 2018, 1:12 pm
  #30  
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Originally Posted by bhdcommuter
Sorry for the confusion, never having had the pleasure of operating the 78 trip to JNB, I thought it was the one night like on the 747. To clarify, the 787 crews doing the LHR-DUR-JNB-LHR do indeed get 2 nights down in JNB, however pickup is quite early in the morning so I wouldn't call it a full night's sleep
Right. Thanks. So they get to sleep for the two nights before, and also the night following the flight, which still seems like a much better deal that their A380 colleagues who have to work one night, sleep one, and work the next one again.
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