Silly19

Took a recent trip to LHR from SFO on a 787-9. As I settled down and loaded my items into the various storage compartments I found freshly used chewing gum inside the tech/power bucket.

After fishing this out with my boarding pass and the crew apologizing I went back to settling into my seat only to find a pair of amenity socks rolled up underneath the left-side armrest. I had to double-check my kit making sure I hadn't gone mad!

Poked my head into the galley to ask the crew to help me dispose of the socks. They were very sorry, again. The in-flight manager came over to say sorry, etc., and that they would give me their business card to follow up after. They did after I reminded them later into the flight they hadn't when they walked past and said "please follow up".

Went into the toilet before the plane pulled back to take as many sanitizer wipes as I could sensibly be seen with and wiped down the seat, etc as I had assumed it would have been by the ground crew.

The best part was my Twitter feed inflight being full of the latest BA ad showing how clean their flights were. All in all the flight experience felt very disingenuous. I say that because the return leg on a 20 year old 777-200 was one of the best crew and experiences I've had in recent years with BA. All the little things of Mr. Sill... vs Sir, sir, sir showing they chose to take the time of day to speak with me rather than at me.

With a flight of 90 passengers on the outbound and 40 on the inbound what areas are being cleaned instead of the previously used seats?

Post-email BA has deposited 10,000 avios with an (as expected) pretty generic response. Not sure what I expected in truth. Chalk this one up as an F and the return as an A.

13901

One of my first office jobs was in Cabin appearance, conducting audits, and I delivered a project in Engineering with what was then called the Cabin Excellence Team as the main customer, so I've learned a little bit about the nature of the beast.

The obvious preamble is that passengers are animals. Not all of them, but you can't see what I've seen and not come to that conclusion. Besides generic wanton vandalism (magic marker on the walls, holes punched through the IFE, crayons in First) I've seen - plenty of times - things like these and, if you're squeamish, don't read: hypodermic needles for insuline left, point up, in seat pockets; faeces smeared on toilet walls; sinks used as loos; blood, urine and vomit left in the emergency exits after a particularly wild Las Vegas flight, half a First Class duvet crammed so hard in a toilet that the team had to replace 20 metres of piping and the whole system was raining stuff on them ... and so on. The gentleman/lady who smeared chewing gum in a F class seat belongs to this category.

However, the undeniable truth is that BA isn't one of the airlines that pays maximum attention to cabin maintenance and cleaning. In my mind BA isn't in the same league as JAL, KE, ANA or Lufthansa when it comes to this. BA always considered cleaning and maintenance as a cost centre. When designing a seat, when allocating resources, on the day to day operation. When I worked in cabin appearance we tried to convince the airline that a specific panel they wanted to put in First was uncleanable. It got on, and then the team spent time being b*llocked because it never was clean. Throughout my time in BA the cleaning contract changed 3 times as each supplier ended its run, and each time the cleaning budget was cut. And as for Engineering... well, there was a mix of lack of spares, lack of downtime and sometimes lack of willingness, especially at LHR.

It's a total shame because the cost to the airline are big.

RB211

SFO? 789? 1A? They must have been mine.

Just kidding, mine would have been in 1K!

I think 13901 summed up the situation quite accurately. Cleanliness is not a top priority for BA. It is seen as a cost center, rather than a customer touch point and a significant part of the service.

rb211.

Betteronacamel

Let's not forget that whilst AC and WW were in charge, cost-cutting was 'in the DNA of BA'.

I guess it will take a while for this to wash out, but in the current climate it is surprising that seats aren't cleaned to a higher degree than previously.

My last BA flight on BA pre-pandemic, the seat was atrocious (F ex DXB) and there were boarding passes from an ex SEA flight in the magazine slot. So they must have been there at least 2 sectors prior to mine. Not a great look.

I do worry though that with so much Low Cost background in the top management at IAG that AC's legacy will continue to haunt us long into the future. Anyone willing to take bets on, for example, how long it will be before catering in CW returns to 'normal' with choices for starters/puddings?

KeaneJohn

Whilst this is true, we are told that each aircraft is receiving a deep clean daily for our protection in the pandemic and it’s clearly not.

1Aturnleft

Do you believe everything you're told?
BA has come up with so much hyperbole in the name of the pandemic. All of which have been spun as safety measures but which were in reality cost saving measures. Catering and cleaning are the two which immediately spring to mind.

AndyFlyer

Lots of rubbish from a previous flight under the seat divider in CE on Saturday’s LHR-EDI just as the crew were announcing the assurance the aircraft had been deep cleaned. Hmmmmm.

If the airline is willing to be less than honest about cleaning in a time of a pandemic, what else are they holding back on...maintenance, security and safety? It makes one wonder, sadly.

I vaguely remember Keith Williams and his Leadership Team being challenged by customers to clean a plane that had come in from a very long-haul destination like SIN or HKG so they would appreciate how dirty pax can leave a plane and how important it is to customers to rectify this. I believe the invite was declined.

13901

To be honest with you, when I was doing cleaning audits, I remember Frank VdP coming onboard in more than one occasion.

In one instance he was following on from a complaint from a customer who lamented the state of the plane he'd been on (He was quite a notorious character, he'd send pictures of 'filth' in and around his seat and then send 000's of dollars worth of cleaning bills... let's just say he was bending the rules a wee bit). Anyway, FVdP knew said passenger was booked on a specific flight and wanted to check the aircraft before it left, so he came onboard as we were doing our post-clean check too. I'd learned to know a lot of the cleaners and on that particular plane there was a very nice, very hard-working, humorous and splendidly outspoken Brixton Jamaican lady. So in comes FVdP, speaks with everyone, and before he can start doing his checks he's confronted by the Jamaican lady who asks him where he lives. He's a bit surprised and asks why. Without batting an eyelid the lady goes: "Because this plane's so clean you can eat on it. So if you find anything wrong with it I'm gonna come and find you where you sleep!". Cue in massive laugh, pat on the arm and "I'm only joking love, you have a great day".

To his credit, he took it great.

KeaneJohn

There’s things I believe and things I’d like to believe. I’d put this in the latter category. Could potentially be very damning to gain confidence from a nervous public that’s going to be the main bums on seats until/if the corporate world returns.

Duck1981

A very good friend of mine is a cabin crew at EK.

She says the Hadj flights to and from Saudi Arabia are the worst flights you can work on, as a lots of the pax are from South-East Asian villages who are traveling for the first and probably last time in their life away from their home to do the visit to Mecca/ Medina and hence practically miss everything which could be regarded as 'western etiquette'. You can see on these flights attempts to eat on the floor on a regular basis, the complete lack of understanding of a western toilet system, spitting on floors, etc etc.

According to her, some 777 went into enhanced cleaning for several days after the flight. It's worth to note though that these travellers do not do this intentionally, they are simply not used to do it differently (so you cannot/ shouldn't really give them a hard time).

Bohinjska Bistrica

Not saying this applies only to BA, but a lot of this is theatre. Numerous studies have shown that the risk of infection from surfaces is low and that transmission of the virus is airborne.

Saying that, it is poor to be telling people the aircraft is deep cleaned when in reality it means that everything is wiped down with anti-bac.

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GBOAC

If BA are saying there is enhanced cleaning but you found this detritus in your seats, something is very wrong; I would be writing to the UK press as this IS a health hazard (at the best of times), and goes against BA's commitment to cleanliness. A story like this at the very time that BA would like us all to be flying again could be very powerful (I say this as a fan of BA, but also a fan of my own (and other's) health!)
Back in 2020 there was a study showing that viable covid particles existed on surfaces up to 14 days, based on studies on the Diamond Princess. Therefore surfaces ARE a hazard, albeit maybe less of a hazard that airborn particles

londonba2014

Saw on social media on a recent BA JER flight that a woman decided to chuck water all over the place upon landing, whilst also boarding with a can of lager in hand and crisps all over the floor. The water might have helped clean the panels..

PUCCI GALORE

There really is no excuse is there? Over many year I have seen perfectly clean cabins reduced to pigstys by the passengers. What their houses must be like, I dread to think. All that said a promise to Deep Clean was not met - clearly this is something that BA need to take up with the contractors in SFO. Clearly what happened was what my Mum would have called " a whisk and a promise". I am not a Covid paranoid but I am atypical possibly. I am not prepared to sit in filth or squalour either. Whilst that is clearly not the case, chewing gum (which I ban in my house for all sorts of reasons, but mostly due to the disposal. I should state that I nearly sacked the letting agents in Waikiki when I discovered chewing gum under the dining room table) has been in someone's mouth for God's sake. I think that you have been remarkably calm under the circumstances - I would have flipped.

Soft Top

The socks remind me of a flight with another UK carrier back from Las Vegas. We were seated before take when the passenger across the aisle from us sat down and within a minute had opened his amenity kit, removed the socks and proceeded to blow his nose, (loudly), into them!!! As he then took off his own shoes and socks we were rather scared about what might happen next but being a sensible Neanderthal he removed the socks from the amenity kit in the seat next to him and put them on. Luckily, (for many reasons), no-one was in the seat next to him and also luckily for us these were the only obnoxious things he did for the rest of the flight - that we saw!