Bring 5 guests into the lounge
 

Got an email from BA inviting me to bring up to 5 guests into the lounge in SIN tomorrow (1st August) for my return to SYD.

It's a bit of a weird email as it talks about my loved ones and my "holiday" when this is a trip I do pretty regularly with BA (usually with two or three days in Singapore) and so I would have thought they would have identified that this is work?

That aside, the flight is the busiest I've ever seen it with only J1 showing as for sale (in fact when my travel agent booked it they said there was no Business availability so I'm going back in PE). Does it make sense for BA to be extending extra guest privileges before such a busy flight? Or am I crediting them with too much joined up thinking?

This.

I suspect it's just flying in school holidays that triggers the email.

Strange logic at a longhaul outstation

In London it makes sense as the summer means lower overall business travelers and numbers in the lounges (inc status members in economy). But at a longhaul outstation with a full J cabin, local lounge demand will be very similar to any other day.

Maybe, but it's the numbers with lounge access that matter, not the number of flyers. In Heathrow, there will be many more leisure travellers and many fewer busines travellers. With an A380 and a 777 daily, BA has 585 W/Y passengers and 146 passengers who get lounge acess through class of travel.

If 25% of Y/W pax have access through status on a typical business-heavy flight, that's 146 passengers. So the lounge needs to accommodate up to 330 people over the course of the evening. Some of those will have the good sense to wander off to Qantas but let's ignore them for now, as well as the guests that the status pax can bring in, and the passengers who arrive late, focus on shopping, etc!

I suspect that, even on a route like SIN, they will sell proportionately fewer J/F seats during the summer holidays (and upgrade proportionately more). So let's say that the travellers with status in the back drop to 15%. That means that, with a full flight, there are now 81 passengers who can get into the lounge. Many of those are still travelling solo or with a status partner, so no change. Let's pretend that half of the status passengers have brought the family along, and the family don't have status. You have an extra 65 guests for 40 passengers, each of which could have brought one along anyway. So you have 65 extra slots for passengers 3, 4, and 5 - if they even exist - in no more than 40 parties meaning no extra burden on the lounge over usual levels if there is even a 50% take-up rate (which might not sound high but many people won't even have those 4th and 5th people).

So I'd say, if those assumptions hold out, that there is decent scope to accommodate guests even on a full flight. And SIN is probably an extreme example where the burden is concentrated on a status-heavy group of economy passengers with only a very small number of flights.

Very interesting point Cymro, thank you. To be honest, I had basically forgotten it was the summer holidays being somebody who spends most of his time in the Southern Hemisphere!

aren't lounges in SIN pre-security? can you bring people in not flying?

Pre-security but post emigration so in the fly only area

Update: Lounge is mostly empty!

Not quite @KARFA :-)

Whilst we will make every endeavour to accommodate your guests, additional lounge access is subject to capacity and limited to a maximum of five additional guests travelling with you on the same flight(in addition to any partner card access).