Club Europe cabin crew eating & chatting on a 2-hour flight?
 

Happy to be called out or corrected on this one, but is it right for Club Europe cabin crew to spend their time eating and chatting only an hour or so into a two-hour flight. In particular, IBZ to LHR last Friday.

Took off, warm towels, menus delivered. We were asked what meal we wanted and served a drink with meal. After this though, it became a huge challenge to get a drink top-up. Every time I looked up, the crew had the curtain drawn and were clearly chatting and eating. When I did get their attention, asked for a top-up, they then went off for ages, again engaged in a chat. But what perplexed me was the need to eat just after serving up. Surely they need to remain attentive for a while?

I never quite understand BA and it's ever-changing serving style. I flew out from LCY and they gave us as much drink as we wanted, whilst serving. But also served up nuts before the meal. Didn't happen on the flight to LHR.

Also, they don't proactively ask you if you want a post-meal hot drink any more? They used to always ask if you wanted tea or coffee. Not any more?

How did Club Europe become a service where you constantly have to try and get their attention to get anything more than served a tray of food?

Perhaps the crew were on a longer trip than just your IBZ to LHR flight, which means they need to eat at some point during their working day?

This does not excuse poor service whatsoever (that is a separate issue), but crew are entitled as anyone to eat during their working hours.

No, that hasn't changed, at least it was firmly in place yesterday, tea or coffee is proactively offered - normally - at the end end of the meal even on the shortest routes.

As ever, the advice in this situation is to press the call bell, in line with the announcement made on departure. Crew do need to eat, and it's probably best if the curtain is drawn for this, but they can also multi-task quite well. There is luckily a very simple solution to keep everyone happy - just press the button.

Was the call button not working?

Totally understand that - it was the last flight of the day to be fair.

The thing that got me though was the time it took to a) catch their attention and b) deliver a drink top-up. I mentioned this on another forum discussion, but they were pouring the champagne, holding the glasses on their tray and then would finish their important chat....whilst the champagne went flat. Hilarious 'first world problem' I know, but even so, come on guys, don't pour something like champagne and then spend time finishing the chat - deliver it, come back, then finish the chat!

I imagine the OP never eats or talks whilst at work.

Never ever use this - I know people in the industry and they tell me the thing that they hate most of all is people pressing that button for a drink top-up.

We shouldn't have to either? I don't care they chat or go off for a while, but you shouldn't have to press a call button to get a drink top-up during service.

Helpful. You get silly replies like this on this forum and it's hugely disappointing.

At work you have windows where you eat and most other people eat at the same time (ie. 1-2pm). And you work whilst chatting. You don't go off for a chat. Or maybe you do and it's your norm.

Ok - fair. Service was ace then. Make you feel better?

Well I fail to see why BA goes out of their way to make an announcement saying that you should use the call bell, when they mean the opposite. Certainly the crew members who are active in this forum frequently say that this quite acceptable to do this, and in my experience it is exactly what I would do. If someone pings every 5 minutes then that may get tiresome but that is presumably a long way from your position. The curtain allows the crew some privacy, and that's a two thing incidentally, the call bell indicates that you want a top up, in Club Europe it is part of the product.

Not great that the CC poured the Champers but took 10 minutes to bring it to you.

I sometimes use the call bell button in whatever cabin I am in if I need to. More so in Y at a window seat though but that's not applicable here. I don't do this often but my experiences over the years doing this have always generally been warm and passengers shouldn't hesitate to use them whether that's for a drinks issue or anything else that they deem may be important.

OT but as an example I was down the back in Y on an A380 and the passenger next to me was sleeping and I needed something out of my rucksack so I utilised it for this as I didn't want to disturb the passenger and the crew were passing back and forth anyhow and all done with a quiet smile.

In fairness to the OP if the CC are not seen in the cabin for extended periods, and you could do with a top up, but they seem to be chatting in the galley, that can be a source of irritation. In fairness to the CC, they cannot be expected to be at a passenger's beck and call the whole time and be expected to constantly pace up and down asking if you need anything else. Those crew that get the balance just right are the best crew in my experience. My own personal experience of CE is that most BA crew working that cabin work very hard, in often large cabins.

as it was a flight returning to london its likely the crew had flown in from london and had a short turn around.

in that case its not unusual for them to use some time on the return flight to eat

Saying press the call bell is all well and good, but in my experience it's often ignored. I was on a CE flight recently, pressed the call bell as we wanted a top up and there was no sign of any cabin crew. After a while, someone emerged, took no notice of my call bell and headed to the back of the CE cabin to offer the people there more drinks - we managed to flag her down to get some too, but there was still no acknowledgement of the call bell.

Just to provide a little perspective to the conversation, my most recent flight was in Club Europe returning from Athens. I happened to use the toilet during the crew meal time, and when I was finished the purser stopped me in the galley to have a brief conversation and ask if I needed anything - I had to tell her to finish her lunch before she brought me anything!

Unfortunately humans are quite variable and I can imagine at the end of a day flying back and forth with little time to rest it can get a little tiring, but I'm sure they weren't completely ignoring you. On short trips, I can imagine it's quite difficult for them to fit in time to eat and presumably it's rostered in to their schedules at the times when BA believes it should be least impactful.

There's no harm in (politely!) popping into the galley and asking if you might have another drink, if it really is causing a problem. You might not even have to wait for them to bring it to you that way...

You can also (though shouldn't have to) somewhat insure yourself against this by asking for double servings ... "could I get another couple of bottles of the sauv blanc please?"