787fan

I'm in the same boat. 744 upperdeck feels like a small intimate private jet. Knowing that most 744s will retire soon (and 748 choices are limited), I'm booking 744 upperdeck as frequently as my wallet permits.

787fan

I think each AA 772 has 16 F's, not 12. So the total number of seats they're yanking out is even more drastic. And by the time theey're done allocating the 77Ws to LHR/GRU/EZE, very few left for any other destination.

UA currently (and will continue to) serve 3-class INTL F to far more places.

golfingboy

You are right it is 16 not 12

Agree with the last statement, even though most of the flights the F cabin will operate at a loss.

787fan

If UA can smartly design F as "J oversold" inventory, then you'll still be filling them with rev pax and at worse break even (compared to pure SWU+awards)

CX was smart to limit their 77W F cabin to only 6 seats - to ensure minimum floor space wasted in case zero gets sold while maintaining a world-class image.

eponymous_coward

This is what I don't get about the "UA IPTE F is a valuable product for UA, and it's stupid that CO is introducing more planes that don't have F into those markets" crowd: if there's such an awesome market for longhaul F, why are AA, BA, CX, LH, QF all removing F seats from various portions of their fleet? Is anyone going to seriously argue that UA F had a dramatically better F experience than all of those airlines, even in, say, 2009, before the eeeeevil $mi$sek came in ran over every UA partisan's dog with his pickup truck with a globe on it?

It's very obvious what the industry trend on longhaul premium classes is: fill more seats with paying customers, instead of selling million dollar glasses of lemonade ("hey, I only need to sell ONE!"). I see no evidence that UA has some dramatically superior product that is going to allow them to resist industry trends- if CX isn't willing to buck a trend, and SQ doesn't fly F all over their longhaul route network, why should UA?

That being said, IPTE has some shelf life, and if UA can figure out which routes F makes sense on, I could see them keeping some on when they get to needing new cabins come A350 delivery time. But AA's got all of 13 77Ws on order. That's 104 F seats, plus their AFS A321s (which are actually the C longhaul seats). That's way down.

If anything, if I was going to be an evil b*****d running an airline, I'd introduce actual premium economy like they are on CX, BA and QF, wider seats with E+ pitch, slightly upgraded soft product... and change the rules that upgrades need to go from Y+->C, that otherwise it's Y->Y+, though maybe if the Y fare was really expensive you'd get the Y->C upgrade. FWIW, Y+ is often the most profitable cabin on a plane (in terms of revenue/square meter), because it consistently sells well- which is why airlines are introducing it- in some cases removing F for Y+.

PotNoodle

I see there has been speculation of where the slots are coming from, but are the any facts.

I know before the BD deal that LH transferred quite a few Bmi slots to their own portfolio, and they are slot sitting with excessive capacity at LHR so maybe from there.

It has nothing to do with the slot redemption process from the IAG/BD, these are mainly domestic slots and DME/RUH/NCE, no transatlantic services. Not to mention they have not yet being allocated.

The 757's concern me on LHR simply because BA has something like 11 daily flights to New York mainly on 747's, and CO operate 5 flights mainly 757. Are they really struggling to fill them? UA does well against BA on many routes like ORD/IAD-LHR so why couldn't CO? I respect they were newish to the route and short of longhaul aircraft though so hopefully some larger aircraft will be put on the route simply because I see it as a waste of slots. The whole frequency argument is pretty invalid considering the low frequency UA have from NY/NJ to LHR compared to BA/AA/VS.

halls120

But United doesn't put Y seats on the UD of a 747, so I'm not sure what your point is.

As TWA Fan 1 noted, as currently configured, the UD of a UA 747 is quite spacious. I'd take it over BF on a 757 - or on a 777 for that matter - in a heartbeat.

^^ to true PE - and don't forget the AF offering. It is quite nice.

Indelaware

Let us lay aside the 757 debate and look only at why CO didn't have as large a penatration into the London market as UA. There are perhaps several reasons, let me offer just five.

First, CO only recently received LHR access previously having served LGW. UA had been at LHR longer and over years grew into the market. While LGW is great when one is headed to points in southern England, most travellers over the pond want LHR service.

Second, Being new to *A, COs service to LON was nearly fully dependent upon O&D at LON for most of their history there. While UA had a nice share of this market ex-ORD, they also benefited, perhaps more than any other *A carrier, from interline traffic with BD particularly to/from the Middle East and Central Asia. My office alone purchased about two dozen BD/UA tickets each month; only after CO switched from SkyTeam to Star Alliance did we purchase BD/CO tickets.

Third, many CO customers disliked AF and CDG. As a result, CO customers preferred CO's own nonstop service to European destinations. For those of us who were used to flying a 757 to LIS, CPH, HAM, etc. flying one to LHR was no big deal and they did provide more frequency than CO was able to give to LON passengers when they served the route only with WB aircraft.

Fourth, some CO traffic which would otherwise be on CO metal flew aboard VS metal owing to the CO/VS relationship.

Fifth, CO's service to the UK was fragmented. pmUA only served LHR. CO served six cities in the UK (LON, BHM, GLA, EDI, BFS) not to mention two cities in Ireland and that for a time, CO served both LGW and LHR.

Passmethesickbag

For Eastbound travellers, I guess. A lot of us on this side of the pond are weeping over the fact that transatlantic service on ST has disappeared from LGW entirely, and *A service has been reduced to LGW-CLT.

TWA Fan 1

Your post only demonstrates that the same seating configuration would take up the same width on the upper deck of the 744 vs the 757....

And, of course, that's right. Then again, that would apply to any aircraft with a cabin wide enough to accommodate a 3-3 seating configuration.

But it doesn't change the interior dimensions of the cabin itself.

And while the upper deck of the 744 is considerably wider than the 757, it is not as high.

Indelaware

Don't forget TP. LGW-LIS-EWR is shorter than LGW-CLT-EWR. I've not done the Lisbon swing, but have thought about it. And before I get flamed for not flying nonstop EWR-LHR, I'd rather head down to CLT and end up at Gatwick when I am headed to Sussex than taking the extra time for ground transit from Heathrow.

rkkwan

The cabins are about equal in width at shoulder level. The 744 is your quoted "30% wider" only at the foot. That's my problem with your post. Anyways, that's all I have on this topic.

TWA Fan 1

Agreed...it's a very minor OT dead end, but the fact that they are 30% wider at the foot makes the cabin feel less claustrophobic, even if it has about the same width at the shoulder and the ceiling is lower than the 757.

Also, the fact that it is considerably wider at the foot means that the cabin is considerably more spacious while sitting, which is, after all, what one mainly does on a plane.

zrs70

The flight is bookable now. But the booking only seems to allow Y class and below? (The seating chart show a PMCO 747: 2-1-2 in C).

st530

Contrary to what people seemed to think initially, alll 3 Houston-London flights will be on 3-class pmUA 763s, not reconfigured 2-class 763s. Or at least this is what UA.com shows on the reservations page post-March 29. This is a nice surprise (although if you read the initial press release carefully, it never specificed 2-class vs 3-class 763s; it just said 763s with "flat-bed premium" seating). GRU is also showing 3-class pmUA 763s.

Does this mean we will soon see a separate GF Lounge at E? Maybe create a lounge-within-a-lounge on the 3rd floor of the United Club, a la NRT? That would be a nice GS perk for the many 2-class BF flights out of IAH.