Never Stansted

Ha, JER style - you get sent into two different rooms at the gate (group 1-3 room and group 4-9 room). The 1-3 room is inevitably the busier of the two…

abligh

On SH Group 1 early boarding often gives you the luxury of being able to stand on the too cold / too hot jetway for longer (ZRH being a particular sinner here)

testycal

When I achieve gold shortly god willing, I will purposefully board last as I often do anyways so that when asked why not boarding earlier, I can respond why would I when multiple groups are called. I travel longhaul so usually enough room for my small backpack.

zen100

If they do that, I wonder how they will differentiate it. With AA, they explicitly call out Concierge Key on the PA system.

But for BA, if they announce "Gold Guest List", then half the Golds will think it means them. Most Golds don't even know that GGL exists.

Or juggle around the group numbers on the boarding passes.

polinka

Sounds like the good ol' days of Southwest. A group laugh always sets a nice tone, I think.

golfmad

Or make GGL its own tier in the program equivalent to AA's CK. Can't see that happening though.

lorcancoyle

and then bringing both onboard anyway because nobody bothers to actually take them off them�

lorcancoyle

that would be a reason to keep GGL status!

BillyBleach

I detect the issue most times is the inconsistency between boarding order on long haul versus short haul.

I tend never to find boarding chaotic on the long haul flights I take. They typically are managed and enforced well (from T5 at least). Normally I have experienced BA boarding staff patrolling the Group 1-3 channel and filtering by group as they announced. I typically like to board early, and I am normally on board pretty seamlessly in group 1.

Short haul however is a lottery. The issue here is lack of enforcement to the boarding rules I think. In my experience the demands of departing on time outweighs the desire to enforce group boarding, benefitting those chancing their arm to board early.

I do think though it is a staff training and corporate culture issue. Domestic US (with same time pressures for departure) manage to enforce boarding rules fine.

Greenpen

About a six months ago I flew quite a few times on domestic Aerolineas Argentinas and group boarding was always enforced. Well, enforced is the wrong word as all the passengers seemed to know the procedure. Once, confused, I asked the passenger in front of me in the queue if I was in the right place; he glanced at my boarding pass and told me to go to the front to embark immediately. I�m not sure why I was in a higher group as I was in Y but I was.

Others can get this right so why not BA?

chipster

I used to always board last when group row1-3.. with this ridiculous amount of carry on bags that would never fit in a sizer and with nobody thinking they should have to put soft bags under their seats it can be a nightmare esp in row 1. Even when they call by individual group numbers more often than not anybody seems to go through. Maybe they don’t speak English and the gate team CBA. Two simple solutions; enforce carry on bag policy; second, board your best customers first before the hand baggage checker-ins. I remember when it was strictly small hand luggage only due to a security risk and it was delightful. Oh and actually check group numbers. Maybe the gates can be set to reject if you’ve not been called. Oh and then just jam everyone one a bus for a remote stand making it all pointless. Separate bus for business etc. most other decent airlines do it and having a lot of unfamiliar airlines recently I’ve been consistently impressed by premium service and consequently look back at ba service in business as, frankly, rubbish

Always Somewhere Else

Agree about potential confusion but this could be fixed by either a) introducing a Group 0 on boarding passes or b) simply announcing �Guest List passengers� on the boarding call. That approach would follow the same convention used on the GGL phone line whose automated messages welcomes callers to the �Guest List Priority Line� presumably to get around the same problem.

Personally I would be delighted if this were to be implemented and it does seem an easy no cost/ low cost win for BA.

BillyBleach

Problam being (at least often for short haul flights) is the basic 1-3 group boarding is not enforced. I'm skeptical a GGL (group 0) would even be noticed.

The key for me is a employee training issue and fundamentally a clear strategic objective to enforce a priority boarding system.
The latter in my view is lacking from short haul flights, LHR and LGW alike.

FlyingScientist

To be fair, it works better than Brexit...

sunshinebob

Groups 1 to 3 might be 50 or 60 people, its hardly priority or exclusive.... Pointless seeking recognition on the basis of "speedy boarding".