Return in Virgin America First Class JFK-SFO
Aug 12, 2007, 11:57 pm
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Oct 1999
Location: New York
Posts: 7,347
Return in Virgin America First Class JFK-SFO
Follow up report on Virgin America First Class return on August 9, 2007:
Photo link:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/w...8QbNHDNy5bqIF4
Hi folks,
As promised, here is my return report on Virgin America First Class. Indeed ironically, I am right now sitting on American Airlines’ flight 16, bird number N335AA, my return flight back to JFK. Of course, I am still not up in the air, as JFK continues to be plowed by storms. I am sitting next to R/W1R and 1L, but no plane-spotting because the F/As have asked everyone to lower the window blinds so they can showed the movie, Spider Man 3. To give them credits, they are passing out headsets for free. But the darkened cabin possibly won’t help much in enhancing the quality of pictures on these tattered Boeing 767-200ERs, who need a major touchup sooner or later. I am sitting in Business Class and even as of this moment, no one has bothered with more beverages, even though we have an hour (and god knows, how much longer) waiting here in the tarmac. Everyday from check-in to boarding, and to the flight, the difference between the latest newcomer Virgin America and a tired US major airline American Airline is dramatically different. In Virgin America, everyone tries to please you and go out of his or her way to make you feel comfortable. They are innovative and promising, and yet on American, from the moment you checked in, you are dealing with a tired and demoralized labor force and for those who thinks that there are too many airlines here, I will say, perhaps there are too many of them, but unfortunately, they are so demoralized that we need new bloods, and a new breed of airlines in order to retire the airlines, which no longer try to be innovative and worst so, to respect their exhausted and frustrated travelers. Enough babbling (sorry folks… when you are stuck in the ground and a dark cabin, you can’t really cheer up much!)
So how did Virgin America’s First class score? It definitely scores well and in terms of seats, I rate it above American’s AFS (American Flagship) Business Class, the so called new generation sliding business class seats (NGBC), United’s premium service business class, and not to mention Alaska’s, Delta’s, Northwest, US Airways’ and other major or minors domestic first class cabin. In terms of food, it is pretty innovative. There are no printed menus or fancy amenity kits, but for the price you paid, it is worthwhile. Of course, we need to remember that Virgin America is a low cost airline and its first class product has aspects of LCCs, but they are just trying to make a worthy first class cabin without overpricing them like most US major airlines. Should AA and UA be very concerned with the future of their premium cabins or transcontinental markets? I definitely think so! As of this point, the only saving grace for them are their frequent schedules (AA has a better advantage with their hourly flights from LA), their frequency flyer programs, and their corporate contracts.
However, Virgin America also has some issues that they need to deal with – reliability especially flying in and out of two major trouble spots in the nation as my flight tonight suffered a two hours ground delays at JFK, ironing out initial glitches with various ground and onboard facilities, and my main concern, how to maintain the high morale of the employees in the years to come and maintain that luster and not get tired, like Jetblue after expanding so much and the major US airlines, which seem to pass their glorious times except Continental perhaps. In another word, how to become the future “Southwest” of the US airline industry? Profitable and customer-friendly! First class can use some improvements too and I will address it at the end.
August 9, 2007
VX 234 JFK-SFO Lv1835 Arr2215 Airbus A320-200 N622VA “California Dreaming”
Check-in:
I arrived at JFK around 4:30pm, and all the Air Train and signage at JFK have already been updated. Virgin America this time is located next to Virgin Atlantic, and that will hopefully create less confusion. During the SFO inaugural, I have seen numerous passengers mistaken Virgin America as Virgin Atlantic… (I cannot imagine the problem at LAX, since VS is at T2 and VX is at T6.) The check in aisle number is 2 and there are two lines: First Class & Web Bag Drop, and Main Cabin & Kiosks. The counters are fully staffed and this time I decided to check in with a real person and no one barked at me and forced me to return to the kiosk. The agent was very friendly and asking where I was heading and all the friendly chats. Unfortunately, my hope of getting a “real” VX boarding pass has failed because only regular white stocks were printed out because the JFK system still does not accept VX’s own boarding pass stocks… should have stuck with the kiosk. I was pretty early, so things were pretty quiet at the check-in areas, where the staffs were still getting used to the computers, machines, and various procedures. The whole check-in took three minutes and I was directed towards the gate, which was B20 today. Then I headed down the general shopping and eating area downstairs, and got a bite from McDonald, as you never know when you will get dinner because the usual hour long evening rush. Then I checked the arrival screen and the flight was shown delayed to 6pm, and the new departure time for my flight was 6:55pm. I logged on line then and tried to track the flight, which was actually on time, but then as I walked out the entrance of terminal four of the departure level. (You can spot the plane at B20 all the way towards the east side/right side of the terminal). You can also see the landing activities at R/W13L and take off activity at R/W13R. The inbound plane indeed landed at 5:29pm, but the Sun County Boeing 737-800 at Gate B20 was running late due to the weather, and the poor VX plane had to wait thirty minutes for parking space. That is the problem that Virgin America will face and continue to face, and that will definitely affect their on-time records, and that reliability issue is too easy to look past it.
This flight was pretty full, and there were numbers of standbys, as some employees were trying to get back to SFO after the inaugural flight from JFK. Boarding began at 6:46pm because the cleaning took a bit longer than expected (and yes they hired cleaning crew) and of course, the catering staffs were still getting used to galley setups. The staffs were apologetic and JFK staffs were working on the boarding screen, which was broken after I took that photo (I hope I did not jinx it), and only one of the boarding pass machines could work (despite two were setup, which slowed down the process. The paper work was taking longer than normal, which was very understandable, but hopefully VX would get the whole process down soon. For an airport like JFK, even being late for one minute could have serious consequence, and in our case, we were already twenty minutes late, and then door was not closed till 7:33pm. 47 minutes boarding time was not stellar, which we hit the heavy traffic time further… Well first class was 100% full and the white leather seat was well padded and comfortable. The first impression was great and the two purple transparent walls tried to create a secluded first class environment by circumventing the FAA rules regarding curtains and clear vision access to the whole cabin. On each seat, a red polyester blanket, as well as a pillow and a bottle of water, were there, and the F/A immediately took a pre-takeoff beverage order. Some passengers asked about coat closets, which were not available. I guess if VX is looking to attract a business crowd, a coat closet will be necessary especially winters are coming with the thick coats.
We finally pushed back at 7:40pm, and headed towards various holding points, before finally moving towards the long queue at 8:02pm. After exactly 18 aircraft, we took our turn at R/W13R at 8:44pm. I guess due to the lack of experiences, the pilots really underestimated the waiting time and I felt that the F/As should take a little more initiatives by passing out bottled water but once the F/As got used to the JFK routines, they could be a bit more active, but one thing that definitely need to be addressed is the personal television being in the armrest for first class folks, and maybe VX should allow first class passengers to pull out the armrest PTV for viewing during those long waiting times, especially when ATC had issued a definitely holding pattern, as well as weather issues, and since the pilots had to warn the F/As about the takeoff and maybe at that time, F class folks can store their PTVs for takeoff. That seems to be pretty manageable. Anyway, flying time was five hours and forty-four minutes this evening, and we climbed initially to 32,000feet, and then 34,000feet, and then 36,000feet.
The first class seat was wonderful, and the legroom was very generous at 55” (especially I flew back on AA J). I actually will recommend row one over row two, as there was no one reclining onto you, but there is no overhead storage at 1A and 1B due to storage of various emergency equipments. The message function was nice, as well as the availability to adjust the lumbar support, and the seats were well lighted. So the seats were definitely up to par, if not better, than the current American Airlines’ Business Class seats on the 767-200ERs (as well as the NGBC seats if you ask me), and United Airlines’ premium service business class seats (except exit rows of course…). Also want to apologize for the lack of pictures on a full recline position because my neighbor actually did not leave the seat even for one minute during the flight. She slept after the meal and all the way till landing. But trust me, it was good.
After takeoff, F/As asked for our names and how we want to be addressed, as well the first beverage service, and the entrée order. Our table was then individually setup with a paper mat (like Delta and no real linen), one wine glass and drinking glass (real glasses here), and a red napkin wrapped plastic utensils. Then beverages were served, and then the first course, where were a selection of appetizers served in a very stylish triangular plastic cups and you are more than welcome to have once each and the F/As did a second round. The selection this evening include cantaloupe wrapped in parma ham, shrimp cocktail, and a cherry tomato and mozzarella cheese tapas and for entrées, our choices were a Thai lemongrass chicken or a Shrimps with garlic and tomato sauce, accompanied by saffron rice, and green beans almondine. The entrée was served in real china plate (pre-plated, but not casserole dishes), and then there was a trio of dessert service and you can have one each and was served in the same triangular plastic cups. (For both appetizers and desserts, the F/As served the tapas using a white paper tray with eight of each items on the tray. You can pick and choose according to what you see. Our choices include a heavenly chocolate mousse with candied orange peel, a cream puff in chocolate sauce and a mini raspberry jelly cup. The food is pretty good for a low cost first class product, and it is way better than Delta, and better than AA’s J class breakfast and lunch, but not quite match up with AA’s dinner as well as UA meal services. But for a LCC, it is very creative, and I think a mixed nuts or crackers or pretzels to go with the first beverage service would be nice, and hot bread rolls were offered (a rosemary roll and a sourdough roll) with hot entrees. Full bottled wines were offered but no sparkling wines (which should be considered in the future). I also will like the option to buy snacks too, especially you feel a bit hungry towards the end of a six hours flight.
Entertainment system was the same as main cabin, except we don’t have the beverage and snack order options, and all the movies and premium television shows were available for free.
For the rest of the flight, the flight attendants were quite attentive and we were encouraged to use the call buttons at anytime during the flight. The main cabin F/As were also a bit less stressed on the return, as not too many people ordered beverages and meals towards the end of the flight.
Descent soon began at 11:06pm San Francisco local time, and we passed over San Jose and making a straight in approach towards R/W28R, and it was a beautiful night in the Bay area, and we touched down at 11:28pm and parked at gate A10 eleven minutes later.
For $400, it was a very good deal, and I felt Virgin America seems to strive for an affordable premium seat market and if it keeps its fare in this level $400-500, the product is really reasonable, and I have a feeling that it will force AA and UA to really re-examine their business class products and kept them in reasonable shapes. I also think the loading is pretty strong and Virgin may want to add one more row of F seats on the A320s in the future. Of course, there are areas to improve – lounge access especially to the Virgin Club House at JFK and SFO will be nice, even if we paid an additional fee (reasonable of course), and priority baggage handling is almost a must, but so far, the baggage situation was okay at JFK (have not tried them at SFO and LAX yet). The meals can be improved with a bit more substance on the entrée, and the beverage accompaniments.
Compared to AA Business Class and UA Business class on the current transcontinental flights, Virgin definitely scores well, if not slightly above them, especially in terms of the whole ground experiences (really great staffs), very personal F/As service and a good F/A: passenger ratio, excellent sleeper seats, and high tech entertainment system. I flew AA the next day, which was an okay flight, but the F/As were rushing through meals, did not do any beverage rounds or checks in passengers (they basically saw the J cabin as mostly upgrades, so they don’t really care), the really dated seats (yes AA seats has slight less legroom and recline), and a poor meal (sandwich is just not proper for a business class cabin and I hope Virgin should force AA to review the meals). Delta is just so out of league right now, and AA really needs to speed up the supposedly 762 improvement projects, and UA really needs to treat Virgin as a serious competitor. But for AA and UA’s first class on those three class planes, VX is not shooting towards that market, so they don’t need to worry and VX First class never claims to be at that level. Folks, please remember VX is still a LCC and the price it is charging is not bad at all… so be realistic! But VX remembers to be realistic with the fare levels too.
The advantage of Virgin in general is the really high employee morale and excellent service, which can also easily wore out in long term. Another major problem is the on time and reliability issues – the turnaround time is just too long and you need to be realistic even if you need to pad your schedule further. DL actually pads its JFK to LAX flight up to seven hours in the winter. I know it is ridiculous, but JFK and SFO are not getting better and we should be thankful if it did not get worst. The fall is coming soon and the fog issues at SFO will haunt VX, and the terminal availability at JFK will also be tight, so be realistic especially in the beginning months, when VX works out teething problems. The 6:35pm JFK-SFO flight perhaps suffers long-term reliability issue and I don’t think it has yet to be able to takeoff on time yet since August 9. That will definitely be my number one concern for now. My second concern is its really complicated fare schemes right now and for a LCC, it is unacceptable, and for a LCC, the less fares you need to juggle with, the better it is… it is also a disappointment that VX has not reveal all its fare categories when you buy a ticket through its own website. Southwest shows you all the fares and I think that is the way to go especially a LCC, which claims to be different. Even Jetblue does not reveal all its fares, which is actually a major problem I have.
Summary of Virgin First Class:
- Priority Check in
- Priority Boarding
- Pre-takeoff Beverage and Bottled Water
- 55” of legroom with adjustable headrest, lumbar support, message functions, footrest, and recline
- Electronic controls
- Overhead light, as well as the additional adjustable snake arm light
- Complimentary alcohol and non-alcoholic beverages served in “real” glasses and cups – full bottled wines
- Full hot three course meal with warmed rolls on transcontinental flights
- Complimentary movies and premium televisions for first class passengers, in additional the wide range of multilingual televisions, regular televisions, music videos, games and chats
Feel free to ask more questions, and I will have trips on Virgin America in October and will do a follow-up then and see if there are improvements or continuous problems.
Carfield
Photo link:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/w...8QbNHDNy5bqIF4
Hi folks,
As promised, here is my return report on Virgin America First Class. Indeed ironically, I am right now sitting on American Airlines’ flight 16, bird number N335AA, my return flight back to JFK. Of course, I am still not up in the air, as JFK continues to be plowed by storms. I am sitting next to R/W1R and 1L, but no plane-spotting because the F/As have asked everyone to lower the window blinds so they can showed the movie, Spider Man 3. To give them credits, they are passing out headsets for free. But the darkened cabin possibly won’t help much in enhancing the quality of pictures on these tattered Boeing 767-200ERs, who need a major touchup sooner or later. I am sitting in Business Class and even as of this moment, no one has bothered with more beverages, even though we have an hour (and god knows, how much longer) waiting here in the tarmac. Everyday from check-in to boarding, and to the flight, the difference between the latest newcomer Virgin America and a tired US major airline American Airline is dramatically different. In Virgin America, everyone tries to please you and go out of his or her way to make you feel comfortable. They are innovative and promising, and yet on American, from the moment you checked in, you are dealing with a tired and demoralized labor force and for those who thinks that there are too many airlines here, I will say, perhaps there are too many of them, but unfortunately, they are so demoralized that we need new bloods, and a new breed of airlines in order to retire the airlines, which no longer try to be innovative and worst so, to respect their exhausted and frustrated travelers. Enough babbling (sorry folks… when you are stuck in the ground and a dark cabin, you can’t really cheer up much!)
So how did Virgin America’s First class score? It definitely scores well and in terms of seats, I rate it above American’s AFS (American Flagship) Business Class, the so called new generation sliding business class seats (NGBC), United’s premium service business class, and not to mention Alaska’s, Delta’s, Northwest, US Airways’ and other major or minors domestic first class cabin. In terms of food, it is pretty innovative. There are no printed menus or fancy amenity kits, but for the price you paid, it is worthwhile. Of course, we need to remember that Virgin America is a low cost airline and its first class product has aspects of LCCs, but they are just trying to make a worthy first class cabin without overpricing them like most US major airlines. Should AA and UA be very concerned with the future of their premium cabins or transcontinental markets? I definitely think so! As of this point, the only saving grace for them are their frequent schedules (AA has a better advantage with their hourly flights from LA), their frequency flyer programs, and their corporate contracts.
However, Virgin America also has some issues that they need to deal with – reliability especially flying in and out of two major trouble spots in the nation as my flight tonight suffered a two hours ground delays at JFK, ironing out initial glitches with various ground and onboard facilities, and my main concern, how to maintain the high morale of the employees in the years to come and maintain that luster and not get tired, like Jetblue after expanding so much and the major US airlines, which seem to pass their glorious times except Continental perhaps. In another word, how to become the future “Southwest” of the US airline industry? Profitable and customer-friendly! First class can use some improvements too and I will address it at the end.
August 9, 2007
VX 234 JFK-SFO Lv1835 Arr2215 Airbus A320-200 N622VA “California Dreaming”
Check-in:
I arrived at JFK around 4:30pm, and all the Air Train and signage at JFK have already been updated. Virgin America this time is located next to Virgin Atlantic, and that will hopefully create less confusion. During the SFO inaugural, I have seen numerous passengers mistaken Virgin America as Virgin Atlantic… (I cannot imagine the problem at LAX, since VS is at T2 and VX is at T6.) The check in aisle number is 2 and there are two lines: First Class & Web Bag Drop, and Main Cabin & Kiosks. The counters are fully staffed and this time I decided to check in with a real person and no one barked at me and forced me to return to the kiosk. The agent was very friendly and asking where I was heading and all the friendly chats. Unfortunately, my hope of getting a “real” VX boarding pass has failed because only regular white stocks were printed out because the JFK system still does not accept VX’s own boarding pass stocks… should have stuck with the kiosk. I was pretty early, so things were pretty quiet at the check-in areas, where the staffs were still getting used to the computers, machines, and various procedures. The whole check-in took three minutes and I was directed towards the gate, which was B20 today. Then I headed down the general shopping and eating area downstairs, and got a bite from McDonald, as you never know when you will get dinner because the usual hour long evening rush. Then I checked the arrival screen and the flight was shown delayed to 6pm, and the new departure time for my flight was 6:55pm. I logged on line then and tried to track the flight, which was actually on time, but then as I walked out the entrance of terminal four of the departure level. (You can spot the plane at B20 all the way towards the east side/right side of the terminal). You can also see the landing activities at R/W13L and take off activity at R/W13R. The inbound plane indeed landed at 5:29pm, but the Sun County Boeing 737-800 at Gate B20 was running late due to the weather, and the poor VX plane had to wait thirty minutes for parking space. That is the problem that Virgin America will face and continue to face, and that will definitely affect their on-time records, and that reliability issue is too easy to look past it.
This flight was pretty full, and there were numbers of standbys, as some employees were trying to get back to SFO after the inaugural flight from JFK. Boarding began at 6:46pm because the cleaning took a bit longer than expected (and yes they hired cleaning crew) and of course, the catering staffs were still getting used to galley setups. The staffs were apologetic and JFK staffs were working on the boarding screen, which was broken after I took that photo (I hope I did not jinx it), and only one of the boarding pass machines could work (despite two were setup, which slowed down the process. The paper work was taking longer than normal, which was very understandable, but hopefully VX would get the whole process down soon. For an airport like JFK, even being late for one minute could have serious consequence, and in our case, we were already twenty minutes late, and then door was not closed till 7:33pm. 47 minutes boarding time was not stellar, which we hit the heavy traffic time further… Well first class was 100% full and the white leather seat was well padded and comfortable. The first impression was great and the two purple transparent walls tried to create a secluded first class environment by circumventing the FAA rules regarding curtains and clear vision access to the whole cabin. On each seat, a red polyester blanket, as well as a pillow and a bottle of water, were there, and the F/A immediately took a pre-takeoff beverage order. Some passengers asked about coat closets, which were not available. I guess if VX is looking to attract a business crowd, a coat closet will be necessary especially winters are coming with the thick coats.
We finally pushed back at 7:40pm, and headed towards various holding points, before finally moving towards the long queue at 8:02pm. After exactly 18 aircraft, we took our turn at R/W13R at 8:44pm. I guess due to the lack of experiences, the pilots really underestimated the waiting time and I felt that the F/As should take a little more initiatives by passing out bottled water but once the F/As got used to the JFK routines, they could be a bit more active, but one thing that definitely need to be addressed is the personal television being in the armrest for first class folks, and maybe VX should allow first class passengers to pull out the armrest PTV for viewing during those long waiting times, especially when ATC had issued a definitely holding pattern, as well as weather issues, and since the pilots had to warn the F/As about the takeoff and maybe at that time, F class folks can store their PTVs for takeoff. That seems to be pretty manageable. Anyway, flying time was five hours and forty-four minutes this evening, and we climbed initially to 32,000feet, and then 34,000feet, and then 36,000feet.
The first class seat was wonderful, and the legroom was very generous at 55” (especially I flew back on AA J). I actually will recommend row one over row two, as there was no one reclining onto you, but there is no overhead storage at 1A and 1B due to storage of various emergency equipments. The message function was nice, as well as the availability to adjust the lumbar support, and the seats were well lighted. So the seats were definitely up to par, if not better, than the current American Airlines’ Business Class seats on the 767-200ERs (as well as the NGBC seats if you ask me), and United Airlines’ premium service business class seats (except exit rows of course…). Also want to apologize for the lack of pictures on a full recline position because my neighbor actually did not leave the seat even for one minute during the flight. She slept after the meal and all the way till landing. But trust me, it was good.
After takeoff, F/As asked for our names and how we want to be addressed, as well the first beverage service, and the entrée order. Our table was then individually setup with a paper mat (like Delta and no real linen), one wine glass and drinking glass (real glasses here), and a red napkin wrapped plastic utensils. Then beverages were served, and then the first course, where were a selection of appetizers served in a very stylish triangular plastic cups and you are more than welcome to have once each and the F/As did a second round. The selection this evening include cantaloupe wrapped in parma ham, shrimp cocktail, and a cherry tomato and mozzarella cheese tapas and for entrées, our choices were a Thai lemongrass chicken or a Shrimps with garlic and tomato sauce, accompanied by saffron rice, and green beans almondine. The entrée was served in real china plate (pre-plated, but not casserole dishes), and then there was a trio of dessert service and you can have one each and was served in the same triangular plastic cups. (For both appetizers and desserts, the F/As served the tapas using a white paper tray with eight of each items on the tray. You can pick and choose according to what you see. Our choices include a heavenly chocolate mousse with candied orange peel, a cream puff in chocolate sauce and a mini raspberry jelly cup. The food is pretty good for a low cost first class product, and it is way better than Delta, and better than AA’s J class breakfast and lunch, but not quite match up with AA’s dinner as well as UA meal services. But for a LCC, it is very creative, and I think a mixed nuts or crackers or pretzels to go with the first beverage service would be nice, and hot bread rolls were offered (a rosemary roll and a sourdough roll) with hot entrees. Full bottled wines were offered but no sparkling wines (which should be considered in the future). I also will like the option to buy snacks too, especially you feel a bit hungry towards the end of a six hours flight.
Entertainment system was the same as main cabin, except we don’t have the beverage and snack order options, and all the movies and premium television shows were available for free.
For the rest of the flight, the flight attendants were quite attentive and we were encouraged to use the call buttons at anytime during the flight. The main cabin F/As were also a bit less stressed on the return, as not too many people ordered beverages and meals towards the end of the flight.
Descent soon began at 11:06pm San Francisco local time, and we passed over San Jose and making a straight in approach towards R/W28R, and it was a beautiful night in the Bay area, and we touched down at 11:28pm and parked at gate A10 eleven minutes later.
For $400, it was a very good deal, and I felt Virgin America seems to strive for an affordable premium seat market and if it keeps its fare in this level $400-500, the product is really reasonable, and I have a feeling that it will force AA and UA to really re-examine their business class products and kept them in reasonable shapes. I also think the loading is pretty strong and Virgin may want to add one more row of F seats on the A320s in the future. Of course, there are areas to improve – lounge access especially to the Virgin Club House at JFK and SFO will be nice, even if we paid an additional fee (reasonable of course), and priority baggage handling is almost a must, but so far, the baggage situation was okay at JFK (have not tried them at SFO and LAX yet). The meals can be improved with a bit more substance on the entrée, and the beverage accompaniments.
Compared to AA Business Class and UA Business class on the current transcontinental flights, Virgin definitely scores well, if not slightly above them, especially in terms of the whole ground experiences (really great staffs), very personal F/As service and a good F/A: passenger ratio, excellent sleeper seats, and high tech entertainment system. I flew AA the next day, which was an okay flight, but the F/As were rushing through meals, did not do any beverage rounds or checks in passengers (they basically saw the J cabin as mostly upgrades, so they don’t really care), the really dated seats (yes AA seats has slight less legroom and recline), and a poor meal (sandwich is just not proper for a business class cabin and I hope Virgin should force AA to review the meals). Delta is just so out of league right now, and AA really needs to speed up the supposedly 762 improvement projects, and UA really needs to treat Virgin as a serious competitor. But for AA and UA’s first class on those three class planes, VX is not shooting towards that market, so they don’t need to worry and VX First class never claims to be at that level. Folks, please remember VX is still a LCC and the price it is charging is not bad at all… so be realistic! But VX remembers to be realistic with the fare levels too.
The advantage of Virgin in general is the really high employee morale and excellent service, which can also easily wore out in long term. Another major problem is the on time and reliability issues – the turnaround time is just too long and you need to be realistic even if you need to pad your schedule further. DL actually pads its JFK to LAX flight up to seven hours in the winter. I know it is ridiculous, but JFK and SFO are not getting better and we should be thankful if it did not get worst. The fall is coming soon and the fog issues at SFO will haunt VX, and the terminal availability at JFK will also be tight, so be realistic especially in the beginning months, when VX works out teething problems. The 6:35pm JFK-SFO flight perhaps suffers long-term reliability issue and I don’t think it has yet to be able to takeoff on time yet since August 9. That will definitely be my number one concern for now. My second concern is its really complicated fare schemes right now and for a LCC, it is unacceptable, and for a LCC, the less fares you need to juggle with, the better it is… it is also a disappointment that VX has not reveal all its fare categories when you buy a ticket through its own website. Southwest shows you all the fares and I think that is the way to go especially a LCC, which claims to be different. Even Jetblue does not reveal all its fares, which is actually a major problem I have.
Summary of Virgin First Class:
- Priority Check in
- Priority Boarding
- Pre-takeoff Beverage and Bottled Water
- 55” of legroom with adjustable headrest, lumbar support, message functions, footrest, and recline
- Electronic controls
- Overhead light, as well as the additional adjustable snake arm light
- Complimentary alcohol and non-alcoholic beverages served in “real” glasses and cups – full bottled wines
- Full hot three course meal with warmed rolls on transcontinental flights
- Complimentary movies and premium televisions for first class passengers, in additional the wide range of multilingual televisions, regular televisions, music videos, games and chats
Feel free to ask more questions, and I will have trips on Virgin America in October and will do a follow-up then and see if there are improvements or continuous problems.
Carfield
Aug 13, 2007, 12:23 am
#3
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Dec 2004
Posts: 23,999
Aug 13, 2007, 1:03 am
#5
Join Date: May 2001
Location: BKK/YVR/EWR
Programs: SQ TPP, LH Senator, TG Gold, AA Platinum
Posts: 454
Hi Carfield..thank you for the great detail of the Virgin America flights. My question, forgive me if I have overlooked it, what about inter-line baggage? Is it possibe to interline from Virgin America to Singapore, or other carriers. Or, is this one of the benefits lost with the low cost carriers? Other than the 'semi' sleeper seats offered by UA and AA..I see no downside with VX(other than the baggage issue)....I will gladly pocket the USD2000+ for each flight sector and stay at a nice hotel.
Last edited by yvrguy; Aug 13, 2007 at 1:14 am
Aug 13, 2007, 9:15 am
#7
Original Poster
Join Date: Oct 1999
Location: New York
Posts: 7,347
Thanks
Thanks folks!
No interline bags for now... and I am not sure if they pursue that options, as they are a LCC. But who knows? I think VX does not really need to pursue interlining with other US airlines, but pursuing interline bag transfers with international airlines may be a more useful thing and a good chance to get more international traffic. The most valuable aspect of the Virgin brand is the international recognition...
Well yes, VX really offers a product that can compete with AA and UA for a bit of the J market, but of course, on the LAX market, they still can't compete with AA and UA head to head because of the lower frequency, but for SFO, they may have a chance.
But AA seems to have the vision to make sure no loss of business traffic by matching VX F fares with an AA 14 days "I" Business fares... although change fee applies (VX is non-refundable on the cheapest J fares, but no change fee) and the 14 days thing... UA is not matching at all and I actually think UA will lose much traffic to VX on the SFO routes especially VX's F and Y products are really league ahead of UA p.s. J and Y. I think if VX can focus on SFO-JFK and add a few more flights, it can seriously pose a threat to AA and UA. But of course, the problem is with JFK itself - a really bad airport with low on time reliability. The flights these days seem to be good with being on time are the mid morning, noon, and early afternoon from jFK, and the early morning and redeye flights from the West Coast.
Carfield
Carfield
No interline bags for now... and I am not sure if they pursue that options, as they are a LCC. But who knows? I think VX does not really need to pursue interlining with other US airlines, but pursuing interline bag transfers with international airlines may be a more useful thing and a good chance to get more international traffic. The most valuable aspect of the Virgin brand is the international recognition...
Well yes, VX really offers a product that can compete with AA and UA for a bit of the J market, but of course, on the LAX market, they still can't compete with AA and UA head to head because of the lower frequency, but for SFO, they may have a chance.
But AA seems to have the vision to make sure no loss of business traffic by matching VX F fares with an AA 14 days "I" Business fares... although change fee applies (VX is non-refundable on the cheapest J fares, but no change fee) and the 14 days thing... UA is not matching at all and I actually think UA will lose much traffic to VX on the SFO routes especially VX's F and Y products are really league ahead of UA p.s. J and Y. I think if VX can focus on SFO-JFK and add a few more flights, it can seriously pose a threat to AA and UA. But of course, the problem is with JFK itself - a really bad airport with low on time reliability. The flights these days seem to be good with being on time are the mid morning, noon, and early afternoon from jFK, and the early morning and redeye flights from the West Coast.
Carfield
Carfield
Aug 13, 2007, 10:02 am
#8
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: airports: SFO (lots) OAK (when possible); live: Concord, CA
Programs: UA 1K, SPG Platinum, HHonors Diamond
Posts: 221
Entertainment
Apologies if I missed this, but what were the entertainment selections like, e.g., how many and how current movies, and how many and how current TV shows?
Aug 13, 2007, 2:26 pm
#11
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jul 1999
Location: Over the Bay Bridge, CA
Programs: Jumbo mas
Posts: 38,631
Given only 8 premium seats on a plane, and the limited schedule, they cannot make much of a dent into the AA and UA premium market. More seats/frequency, and it is a different story.
Aug 13, 2007, 3:48 pm
#12
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Programs: AS MVP, Elevate, AAdvantage, Mileage Plus
Posts: 1,992
I also wonder whether the $400 ow First Class jfk-sfo is just an introductory fare which will soon transform into something much higher. But, for $400, it does sound like a good value and I would do it in a heart beat if I were a little more flush.
Aug 13, 2007, 8:34 pm
#14
In Memoriam
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: Foster City, California
Programs: CO Gold, DL Gold, AA, AS, VX, Hilton Diamond, Marriot, Hertz #1 Gold, Avis Preferred
Posts: 317
Would Like More Information About VX F Meals
Thank you for your excellent trip report. It is greatly appreciated.
Mrs. and I are flying VX first class SFO-JFK on September 23 and returning on October 3. We are really looking forward to it.
We usually fly in first class for any trip over 3 hours 30 minutes. From SFO or SJC to the East Coast will usually use DL or AA and try to use our miles. Of course, flying VX in first for the $400 is better than paying the price on DL and AA. It is even better than using our DL or AA miles.
I am curious about the meal service. From your information regarding the meal service, I got the impression that the meal might not have been sufficient for the length of the flight. Additionally, you alluded to the fact that a first class PAX cannot buy one of the snacks that were service in coach. I would appreciate any additional comments or thoughts you have about both of the above.
Again, thank you very much for the report.
Mrs. and I are flying VX first class SFO-JFK on September 23 and returning on October 3. We are really looking forward to it.
We usually fly in first class for any trip over 3 hours 30 minutes. From SFO or SJC to the East Coast will usually use DL or AA and try to use our miles. Of course, flying VX in first for the $400 is better than paying the price on DL and AA. It is even better than using our DL or AA miles.
I am curious about the meal service. From your information regarding the meal service, I got the impression that the meal might not have been sufficient for the length of the flight. Additionally, you alluded to the fact that a first class PAX cannot buy one of the snacks that were service in coach. I would appreciate any additional comments or thoughts you have about both of the above.
Again, thank you very much for the report.