southsquare

Today's BA1426 LHR/BHD was as chaotic a flight as I've seen since the early days of my career, 30 years ago, in south east Asia. Very late gate change from A to B44, at which screens showed "flight closing" a good 30 minutes before much delayed boarding had even begun (thus forcing anyone waiting in a lounge to belt to the gate and then stand there, adding to the chaotic queue, for 30 + mins). Jetty broken so walk downstairs, onto buses, bussed the short distance to the plane which was on B44 because not permitted to walk across [across what exactly?]. Sat on tarmac for some considerable time while a despatcher tried to sort out some error with multiple people being given the same seat and others having none. 6F and someone else upgraded to 2A and 2C shortly before the last bus reached the plane, and two from the bus then sat in 6A and the other now spare seat - so presumably at least two people had boarding cards for 6A). Captain apologised for "farcical boarding" and the delay. CSD appeared flustered/worn out throughout. CSD assisted by a new cabin crew member for whom it appeared to be a training flight: no wings yet and a sparkling new uniform. (Trainee, older than many new crew, will do fine and was calm and beautifully presented throughout.) After take-off, CSD (female) served 1F, 1D, 1C and 1A in that order (why? note that 1F and 1D were male and 1A and 1C were female). Mr 1D asked for a G & slimline tonic and was given two. Ms 1A then asked for the same and no slimline tonics remained: only 2 slimline tonics had been loaded for the entire cabin and both had already been given to 1D. Next CSD brought out a tray with a full size bottle of champagne, which she gave to 2C. He opened it himself and drank it. Was it his own? Or does BA now provide full size bottles of champagne to certain passengers (in full view of others) on 55 minute domestic flights? "Meal" (smoked salmon or mozeralla) served by CSD. Bread basket on the trolley but not offered to anyone. When the meal was almost over, trainee cam around with bread basket apologising they'd forgotten to offer it with the meal. Ms 1A asked for service recover but no sign of the ipad. CSD then brought out a stack of plastic glasses on a tray and invited club europe passengers to pour their own drinks into plastic glasses so that crew could finish clearing. (instead of discreetly doing the plastic glass thing for passengers in the galley, shortly before landing). Chaos. Reminds me why over the last few months, on any occasion that I can I've flown in/our of BHX to/from BHD instead of LHR/BHD on the little ATRs operated by Emerald Airlines for EI, in order to avoid the now almost routine BA chaos. There were only 4 rows of Club Europe today: yet serving what now passes as a "meal" at a business class level of standard seemed throw the team into chaos (I've no idea what was happening down the back and shudder, as it may have been worse than the front), notwithstanding that 25 years ago, BA crews routinely served a hotel meal to the whole plane on the domestic super shuttle service.

mikeyfly

I’m not a “regular” CE flyer like others around here, but I’ve often seen 1DF get served before 1AC. Never thought anything of it. Wonder what the service standard states?

Confus

Officially it’s supposed to go A-C-F-D, but really it’s nitpicking to the extreme to get angry about one side being served before the other. Personally if it were me I’d alternate it left, right, and so on.

And handing out plastic cups is perfectly ok in my book. The cabin might be 30 people deep, and the crew have far more important things to be doing at this point of the flight than taking everyone’s glass back individually to decant discreetly behind a curtain. If they need to do that, they’d have to start 10 mins earlier (which is a no thanks from me, I like it being as late as possible as it is now).

EsherFlyer

On my short domestic flight this week it was a bit frustrating to see IFM / CSD ingratiating himself to row 1 and asking crew that had made it as far as row 5 on initial food / drink service to pass top-up drinks back - delaying overall service and also potentially depriving customers of their first choice of beverage (only two Punk IPAs loaded on my outbound - I missed out ). Similar to above he asked a crew member to pass an unopened bottle of Monople to 1F. Less of a problem on the return to LHR, but makes me wonder if doing same ex-LHR is why inbound sometimes seem to be short supplied.

EsherFlyer

Is there standard for how to work backwards as well. I ask because on a couple of 4 row CE flights I've found that 1+3 get served then 2+4. If IFM is on the 4 side of trolley and they send junior crew on 2 side back to galley a few times on errands then row 2 ends up with "left overs". I now tactically aim for an odd numbered row if there are 4, or front half if 5 or more. Is there a better plan based on official service order?

binman

I don’t actually care what the service standard states on ShortHaul the crew should always serve ladies first. It’s simple manners.

It drove my late mother mad when they did this and she’s been gone since 2008!

I have on more than one occasion in the past directed crew to serve my wife first, even in F.

The rest of the OPs tale is now pretty normal.

Lefly

May I disagree? Gender should really be irrelevant.
If there is a standard sequence based on seat position (or status), then that's what crew should follow.

PS I'm female, I don't want to be served first, or allowed into a building before others, etc., just because of that

Ldnn1

Wow. Welcome to the 21st century.

MFCC

The standards say crew should serve window to aisle, and clear aisle to window, irrelevant of the genders of the passengers. This way you’re not leaning over someone who’s already started eating. Obviously, if the window passenger is finished some way before the aisle, they may get cleared first especially if clearing by hand.
In an ideal world you’d serve 1A/C before 1D/F but I feel like this is a bit nit picky. I’ve been guilty of serving the ‘wrong’ way round before I’m sure.
Plastic tumblers are a requirement for landing. Changing the glasses to plastic quickly should be a priority, rather than discreetly doing it in the galley. Often we only have 10 mins to secure, and in a large Club cabin this can be a challenge.

southsquare

Thank you, Binman. Also I agree [hence my preference for Emerald Airlines domestics and Qatar J for anything else] but hope, nonetheless, that I'll have the pleasure of sitting beside you on a flight one day, be it in BA F or a BA domestic. This being the 21st century, I live in constant hope that BA might adhere to its own service standards (whatever they are) but as it seems to have abandoned those some time ago, my default is that safety must come first, after which normal social rules should prevail (i.e. ladies first). So nul points to Mr 1F who strode off BA1426 last night (with the gold tag dangling on his bag) pushing ahead of Ms 1A and Ms 1C, and points to Mr 1D, who stood back to enable those ladies to proceed. Mr 1D (innocent recipient of the only 2 cans of slimline tonic) had the good grace (?) to conceal one empty can in his rolled up napkin when he handed his tray back to the CSD, in order that it might appear to observers that he had received only 1 such can. Nul point or top points?

binman

Perhaps if we hadn’t lost the social graces in our (rightly) pursuit of gender equality, the world might be a better place! You can be both modern and considerate.

You won’t find a man being served first in top class restaurant( or frankly in my local pub) or in the Queens grill of a Cunard ship.

it’s just good manners and carries absolutely no other meaning!

bon mot

LOL, is this a troll?

corporate-wage-slave

I think there is a reasonable halfway house on this one. I would expect it to go A-C-F-D (unless I am in F of course, but depending on Twitter users) but these days it's quite common for there to be an evident and established couple in both pairs of seats. If one of the couple is female, the other male, and of a certain age in particular, then what many crew members do is speak to both people together and the male traveller may well indicate that their partner should be served first. My mother was an activist friend of Simone de Beauvoir but nevertheless my late father would be horrified if he was served before her.

No.

thegreatmrsj

As a lady who typically sits in 1A I often see 1F served first when it is the male of the species. It amuses me rather than bothers me. Typically though if it happens the behaviour of that 1F when they board is the here I am look at me, followed by making no attempt to keep the floor space clear so they then engage again with the crew at that time. Myself, I greet the crew on boarding and then get on with stowing all my items. Maybe I should be less "compliant" if I want serving first (but as I say it doesn't bother me it just amuses me except when IF takes the only bottles/cans loaded of something or as often happens 1F gets two bottles of spirits and mixers I get one.)

The other thing I have seen happen and highlighted on the other thread - DH often travels with me, he is silver. The crew dont fully check their iPads so if it is a long haul flight, 9/10 he is welcomed back as the gold member not me. Again it just amuses us and is a family joke, thats all. (obviously rarely if ever welcomed back on the EDI run)

Saladman

I have no objection to the idea of serving females first, however if that involves leaning over someone (the person in 2C to get to 2A for example) whilst they've got their food and may be eating it, then that's probably worse manners. And then how do the crew differentiate between couples and strangers and then you bring in the whole trans debate...

Then you start to realise that the service standards are probably a good way to go and that may be there are more important things to worry about for BA.