Thrifty Scotsman

As per title, is there Fast Track at BHD for those with eligible status?

vindaloo

Yes there is. It doesn't have a dedicated scanner and security lane, but feeds into the front of the main queue.

The BHD lounge is currently being refurbished and is embarrassingly bad. After ten minutes in there, you might feel that you'd have been better off spending longer in a security queue!

JD1905

Yeah it's really bad - I had a flight cancelled recently and decided to bail after spending an hour in there.

DXB2745

Indeed - as soon as I saw 2L bottles of Coca Cola available to self pour my heart sunk! Don’t bother getting to the airport early to use the lounge

jerry a. laska

See also:
https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/brit...pletely-2.html
And from the lounge website:
https://www.executivelounges.com/air...-aspire-lounge

BearX220

It is not "the perfect place to relax" with incessant construction noise from the adjacent space plus no alcohol. Better to stay out in the departures hall.

JD1905

Agreed. Whilst BHD still obviously is far better than the alternative, £3 Drop Off charges for taxis, no decent lounge offering, only 1/2 Restaurants usually being available along with the fact the place is now very busy, makes me feel its certainly not as good as it was!

Of course I appreciate the lounge is being refurbished which cant be helped, but I just feel like standards have slipped elsewhere.

GuyWMD

Interestingly, the fridge closest to the entrance had cans on my last visit. The 2l bottles were still present further down with the rest of the drinks!

I assume the AC/HVAC isn't working. Last Monday (8th) I was in there before the last Heathrow flight around 18:30. It was unbearably warm. In fact 2 people left the lounge not long after I'd arrived, telling the staff they couldn't stay any longer due to the heat.

Plus, the closest male bathroom was out of action, so it was a long trek to the others behind the 'restaurant' past the bar.

GuyWMD

Also, the long stay drop off hasn't been thought through at all! No where for drivers to actually park, you'd think marking up a handful of bays for drop off purposes would be an idea. Zero signage from the terminal coming out as a passenger.

vindaloo

I never have any difficulty with this. You drive in, do a hard U-turn to the right, and there's a spot to the left of the exit barriers. Once you've dropped off / picked up, you can drive straight out. There's only one space admittedly, so if it's occupied then you have to hover and get in everyone's way or go and find a proper parking spot, but in my experience not many people have cottoned on to the fact that you can save yourself £3 if you don't mind walking for a few minutes.

GuyWMD

Maybe I've been coming & going at different times, but it's been a complete car crash (it's going to happen if they're not careful).

One, one... space that's not even officially marked as a drop off bay, there's been ZERO effort behind this. Asides from the obvious £££ generation by pulling it from the drop off lanes.

vindaloo

I usually arrive on the last BA flight of the day and it's very quiet. My wife swings by the Long Stay and stops for a few seconds in the single spot by the barriers while I jump in. Clearly it would be chaos if it were busier and it sounds from what you say as though it often is at other times.

Also completely agree with you about the signage from the terminal. Even if you know that you're being picked up from the Long Stay, there are various signs to different zones and no indication of where the official pick-up / drop-off point is. Which of course is probably because there isn't an official pick-up / drop-off point because, as you say, zero thought or effort has been put into it.

And while we're at it, can I have a rant about the boarding process for flights from BHD to LCY? Honestly, I've been on Ryanair flights where this has been better organised. Even if you abandon what's left of your alcohol-free Carlsberg and leave the lounge the second they announce that the flight is about to board, by the time you get to the gate there are 100 people in front of you and there isn't even a pretence at boarding by group number. Has it always been like this? Perhaps I've just never noticed because until recently I always flew to LHR.