I’m not sure that this will impact me particularly, as I rarely fly domestically and Loganair are quite expensive. But I like that I can in theory now earn BA tier points and get Avios by flying from Norwich Airport. What with the BA aircraft that I think are still at the airport, albeit in storage, Norwich has never had such close associations with the airline.
Pinched from the BA press release:
“The expansion to 18 new routes will now give British Airways’ customers access to 38 of Loganair’s UK routes, meaning that customers can book onward connections from destinations across the airline’s route network, or point to point travel in the UK more easily through British Airways’ website. Customers who book onto these selected routes operated by Loganair through ba.com can also earn Avios and Tier points as part of British Airways’ Executive Club programme.
Routes now available to book include:
Aberdeen to Belfast City, Birmingham, Bristol, Manchester, and Southampton City of Derry to London and Liverpool Cornwall Airport Newquay to Manchester Exeter to Edinburgh, Glasgow and Newcastle Isle of Man to Birmingham, Edinburgh and Manchester Inverness to Birmingham Norwich to Aberdeen and Edinburgh Teesside to Southampton
British Airways’ customers travelling from Aberdeen or the Isle of Man to Manchester will also now be able to connect onto British Airways’ code share flights on other carriers, including oneworld partners, from the north-west hub. Destinations include New York, Barbados and Orlando, allowing customers to book a single ticket with assured connections.
The news of a codeshare expansion between the two carriers comes as Loganair celebrates its 60th birthday, making it the oldest UK airline still operating under its original name.”
A little bit of a niche post, but I’m pleased to see that British Airways have extended the reduced tier point requirement from June 2022 until the end of December 2022. That will make it considerably easier for me to maintain silver status and potentially gain gold status.
If I might get political just briefly, there’s a wider point here though about rail. Whilst British Airways are improving facilities, offering enhanced loyalty schemes and comfortable experiences, the even more uncomfortable rail network seems to be falling apart. I’m not able to get any railcard to reduce the fares, which are being increased by the highest amount in a decade, let alone any kind of comparable loyalty scheme. I very rarely take domestic flights as they’re something of an environmental disaster, but with their fares falling due to cuts in Air Passenger Duty, it’s making an already uncompetitive rail network slip further behind.
Anyway, politics aside, the text of the e-mail announcement from British Airways is below:
“We couldn’t have made it through this year without you. You make us fly (literally), so we wanted to say thank you for your loyalty and support with some good news.
We’ve been in touch previously to let you know about the steps we have taken to protect your status and well-earned benefits. For example, we have automatically renewed the Tier status of Members who were not able to do so through flying, and reduced the Tier Point thresholds by 25% until June 2022.
We’re now taking this one step further and extending the 25% reduced Tier Point thresholds until December 2022. This means, it will be much easier to retain your current status for one more year, or upgrade to the next Tier, and enjoy the benefits you deserve.
You can find out more about all the ways we are supporting you and your membership at ba.com.
With our best wishes for the festive season and the New Year,
After a few weeks in Poland, it was unfortunately time to come back with a feeling of uncertainty of how the PCR test thing was going to work out in Heathrow. I left the Mercure Airport hotel at 08:45 to catch my flight at 12:45, expecting to get to the lounge at 10:00 sort of time (which is for me cutting it very fine). Everything went right with the train to the airport, there was no wait at the security area (indeed, there were no other passengers which felt really odd) and the customs check didn’t take long, so I was at the Bolero Lounge by 09:30. But more about that bit of today in another post.
There it is, the BA847 service from Warsaw to London Heathrow T5 which was departing a little late due to being held up on the outbound flight to Poland.
Arriving at the gate shortly before boarding commenting, I heard the gate staff call Groups 1 to 3 and I was the second person to board. Well, I should have been the second to board, but the staff member refused me boarding saying that my mask wasn’t sufficient for British Airways. To cut a long story short, this led to a rush to find a member of the airport staff to help me find a shop selling them, as the member of gate staff was absolutely hopeless in offering assistance.
What actually happened here, which became apparent after I spoke to a member of LOT Polish airlines at the airport is that the staff member had got the rules wrong, as British Airways and LOT Polish (who have their hub at Warsaw Chopin Airport) have different mask policies. However, if I had gone to discuss that point I was in serious danger of missing the flight and likely being off-loaded for being unhelpful. I have no intention of being uncooperative at an airport, there are too many downsides…. Fortunately, the airport staff member and a member of shop staff managed to sell me the required mask. I was able to board, but only just and it wasn’t an ideal situation.
After boarding, the crew member confirmed that my mask met the requirements of British Airways, but they handed out masks anyway on boarding to anyone who didn’t have one. I’ve spoken to British Airways who have apologised for the gate staff. It doesn’t much matter now as these are challenging times for all staff at airports, but I would have been quite annoyed if I had missed the flight. I assume if I had returned to the gate without the mask that some other airlines I wasn’t flying with required then someone might have spoken to the crew to check the situation, but it’s not really worth risking that.
I shall drink one extra beer in the British Airways lounge next time I’m in it to compensate for the situation as I’m petty like that. But it wasn’t British Airways staff who were unhelpful here, so they’re still my favourite airline. And LOT Polish Airlines, who I suspect the gate staff are usually working for, are part of Star Alliance anyway and I’ve only got eyes for Oneworld airlines.
This was the British Airways aircraft I was struggling to board and its livery is certainly distinctive. It’s aircraft G-TTNA, A320neo which was delivered to BA in April 2018. It was repainted a couple of months ago as it was used in the COP26 talks in Scotland, showing the contribution of the airline industry to tackle the climate crisis.
An Airbus spokesperson said at the time:
“We’re delighted to be partnering with BA on this journey and feel proud BA has chosen one of our A320neos to highlight the importance of sustainability for the future of the industry.
The aircraft has 20% less fuel burn & CO2 emissions compared to A320ceo and 50% less noise so it’s a great choice and I am looking forward to seeing the new livery in the sky. BA is committed to a sustainable future and contributing positively to climate change mitigation and adaptation. We will achieve the ambition of a net zero carbon emissions industry by 2050 through cooperation and collaboration and this initiative is a clear example of that.”
It’s a nice concept, although it’s very hard to identify it as a British Airways aircraft at a distance and it puzzled me for a little while (not that that really takes much).
I deliberately moved out of my exit row seat the day before the flight, as I find it more faff trying to fit my bag into the overhead lockers above those seats. That would have been especially true on this flight due to boardinggate, so I was pleased that I had put myself in an aisle seat near to the rear of the aircraft. I had forgotten how little leg room there is, but it’s fine for a short distance flight and there was no-one in the middle seat. Everything was I expected, other than the USB power at my seat wasn’t working, although I could have used one on a different seat if I had needed to.
The free snack and water (I took the photo later, I didn’t have a pillow on board) which was offered. The crew were engaging, efficient and pro-active, another near perfect service from British Airways staff. The pilot, a bastion of professionalism (as they nearly always are) made appropriate and useful announcements, including telling us that we were arriving in Heathrow having made up most of the lost time. The aircraft was clean and the crew were handing out disinfectant wipes from a basket on boarding (the same basket that the masks were in).
Anyway, another excellent flight from British Airways only impacted by the airport’s gate staff, but maybe that’s what Star Alliance customers are used to flying from the airport so that’s fair enough.
Incidentally, I know some people have experienced long delays at the border at Heathrow T5, but I was through in under one minute, just ready to go and take a PCR test. After I managed to board, the flight and arrivals process was effortless, so all rather lovely.
For the first time in just over a year, I’ve been able to get the chance to return to Poland, something which I’m more than pleased with. That meant a journey from London’s Heathrow T5 into Warsaw Chopin airport with the hope that I had collected together the correct documents.
I’ve written about the BA T5 Galleries South Lounge before and so won’t repeat that, as not much has changed recently in terms of its operation. Drinks are still self-service, but food needs to be ordered via a QR code and is brought over by staff. The food delights in the morning included the breakfast option of a bacon roll with hash brown, alongside a fruit salad. The lunch-time options included Vietnamese vegetable curry, chicken jalfrezi with lime & coriander rice, beef keema with rice, mixed leaf salad, five bean salad with feta and a black rice, Quinoa & Edamame salad. I went for the jalfrezi and five bean salad, with the former being excellent and the latter being OK but a little short on feta. I’m always content with the quality of the food, but some people inevitably moan about BA’s offering.
The lounge was though the busiest that I’ve seen it and that perhaps suggests some sort of normality is definitely returning. A couple of customers were completely rude in their dealing with the staff and although I wanted to say something, I thought that no good could possibly come from that. I was able to get one of the high seats by the power points and remained in the lounge for three hours or so, all very relaxing.
The gate wasn’t called for ten minutes after it was meant to have been, instead it then switched to ‘please wait’. I guessed that this meant it would be departing from A10, the bus gate.
And here we are, the bus gates. Boarding was well managed and Group 1 and then Groups 1 to 3 were allowed to board first. I’m in Group 2, as I’m not decadent enough to be in Group 1, but that was enough to get on the bus first.
The bus was a little over-filled I thought (I didn’t photograph that), not in terms of it being dangerous, it just wasn’t comfortable for those who boarded last.
And time to board, the aircraft was the A320 G-EUYT, which I’ve never flown on before. And I accept that no-one is really bothered about that, but there we go…. The aircraft was brought into service in February 2014 and it has only been used by British Airways.
I had a seat in the emergency exit row which I like because of the slight extra space, but dislike that my bag has to be in the overhead lockers. For the first time I’ve seen though, a member of cabin crew was guarding the lockers by the emergency exits so that customers could ensure that their bags were placed there and not half way down the plane. Although I boarded early and this didn’t make any difference to me, it did speed up boarding later on.
The flight was full and I’m not sure that there were any empty seats. The customer next to me arrived towards the end of boarding and started to put his bag on the floor. I was standing up as I was in the aisle seat and let him in, thoughtfully asking him if he wanted to put that bag in the overhead locker. He replied “no” and in my very British way I added “are you sure, it might be easier?” to which he replied “no” again so I sat back down. The customer at the window seat, who seemed perfectly friendly, was more direct and said only slightly gruffly “that bag needs to go in the overhead locker”, at which point I had to stand up again as that more direct approach worked.
The aircraft was meant to take off at 15:15 and arrive at 18:50, but we took off late due to a delay in the baggage being loaded. We eventually took off at 15:47, but time was made up en route and we arrived at 18:46 (can I add that I didn’t sit and measure that, I took that information from Flight Radar). As an aside, the crew weren’t handing out wipes for customers to clean their seat area as they’ve done over the last year, I’m not sure whether that’s by omission or whether that has been scrapped.
The on-board catering and I’m happy with this, it annoyed me when they removed it. There’s the option to buy additional items, but I noticed only a handful of people did so. Crisps and water is sufficient for me though, it wasn’t a long flight.
The fare cost me £30 each way, which I have to say continues to offer excellent value for money, especially given that BA funded lounge access for me before the flight. The crew were friendly, the aircraft was spotlessly clean and the pilots were professional with timely announcements. I have nothing really to fault BA on, I thought that this was a well managed service.
For those interested, anyone going to Poland at the moment needs to fill in a locator form and have their Covid pass ready, with both being checked. The Brexit arrangements mean that British travellers are inevitably now sent to a different area which all takes longer and passports are now stamped. Some idiotic British passenger (I admit to be judgemental as she was being rude) was lucky to be allowed in as she was complaining that she was being asked where she was staying and why was only she being asked? The member of the Polish Border Guard was calm and helpful, not mentioning that it was because she hadn’t bothered to fill in a locator form. This whole process only took around five minutes though and with that, I was back in Poland. How very lovely.
This was our flight back to London City Airport from Dublin Airport. It’s a decent terminal in Dublin and the boarding process at the gate was timely, albeit slightly clunky in terms of group boarding which seemed to be Group 1 and then everyone else, but the staff were friendly and helpful. The check-in staff did want to see my passport, which is the first time that I’ve been asked for it on this trip, as it was never needed at Heathrow. We were flying back to City Airport as our flight back to Heathrow was cancelled a few weeks ago, allowing me to change it free of charge to a different airport in the capital.
The aircraft was G-LCYR, an Embraer E190 aircraft which is nine years old and has been with the airline since it was produced. This flight was serviced by BA CityFlyer, a wholly owned subsidiary of British Airways, but they do have different service standards.
There are our two seats, both by the emergency exit giving us extra legroom.
Liam, who I kindly gave the window seat to again.
And me. Cabin crew were all personable, with the announcements made by them and the pilots being appropriate and useful.
Boarding was well managed other than there were problems again with trying to fit all the bags on board. I write here regularly about the situation where people who bring a small bag are forced to put it by their feet, whereas those who bring their entire spare bedroom in a bag get to put it in the overhead lockers. It was a bit irrelevant for us as we had emergency exit row seats where bags have to go in the lockers, but it’s not an ideal arrangement. Where flights are nearly full, as this one was, there perhaps needs to be a change in emphasis now and maximum bag sizes could be brought down a little.
This being a CityFlyer flight meant that we got free food and drink. The food options weren’t decadent (a small brownie, crisps or corn nuts), but it was perfectly acceptable for an hour long flight. The Brewdog beer was very handy, although given I’d had a Guinness in the airport lounge, I probably didn’t need it. But it was free and so I panicked and ordered it. I decided not to drink any more beer that day…… This is where service standards differ a little from regular British Airways short haul services, as the only free drink offered on those is water.
And here we are back in London, all on time and without any issue. The delight of London City Airport is that it’s a short hop on the DLR back into Stratford, where Liam had parked his car, taking us no more than 25 minutes after landing to be back at the car. After Avios discounts and the like, this flight cost me about £20 (so, £40 return) which I think is excellent value for money and indeed so cheap I’m not sure that BA made any money on this little expedition of mine.
I’m now back from my weekend trip to Dublin with Liam, leaving me with quite a backlog of posts to get through. How my excited audience must be positively radiant with joy and anticipation…… Above is Heathrow Terminal T5, the home of British Airways, where we departed from last Thursday.
The view of the terminal building, which was all a little more exciting this time as Liam spent five years here as part of the construction team who worked on this complex. That the terminal is still there is testament to his competence.
Before the flight, we went to the south lounges at the terminal, which were moderately busy. The ordering process has changed since my last visit to the lounge in August 2021, with food still being ordered by the app, but self-service has returned for all drinks. We noticed a few customers struggling to order via the app, sometimes because they didn’t have a smartphone and sometimes it seems because they were just getting muddled up.
I was delighted to see that British Airways are now offering more than Heineken, which is far as I’m concerned a bland and generic beer with no logical connection to the airline. This is the Jet Stream beer, a perfectly decent option which follows on from the partnership with the brewery which last year delivered Speedbird.
Liam played soup roulette as he didn’t know what it was when he ordered it, but it turned out to be lentil which was apparently all perfectly good. I’m pleased to note that Liam also liked the Brewdog beer, which might be evident from the cans in the photo. I did have a look for the flavoured vodkas that I enjoyed last time, but they seem to have disappeared. We had a little Baileys each instead for some decadence….
I ordered a starter of sandwiches, which are the standard British Airways options of tuna, Coronation chicken and egg,
The main course of chicken tagine with bulgur wheat, the kind of dish that I think British Airways do very well. It is difficult to provide food options that cater to both short haul and long haul passengers which also don’t cost the airline too much.
I ordered carrot cake and I’m not sure that this is carrot cake, but it was rather lovely anyway. I did note that the crisps have disappeared from the lounge over the last year, I hope that they make a return. I accept that there’s more to life than crisps, but nonetheless..
This was another very acceptable visit, with the staff being friendly and polite. The environment was clean and although the food sometimes took a little while to arrive the service was always helpful. Normality seems to be returning quite quickly now to the airport in general and I suspect that the food service will become self-service soon enough.
It was then just a short walk to the bus gates for our flight to Dublin…..
A couple of days ago, my friend Liam and I headed off from Heathrow T5 to the delights of Dublin in the Republic of Ireland. More on the lounge in another visit though, which all went well.
The gate was called relatively late and it wasn’t particularly well organised when we got there. A staff member apologised and said that she was the only one at the check-in desks and that she hadn’t had to do that before without assistance, with everything moving quite slowly as a result. The boarding by groups was also abandoned which caused a fair amount of confusion judging by other customers trying to cut the line without realising that there wasn’t another line to cut into. The situation wasn’t ideal, it all felt a bit more Ryanair than anything else.
And joy of joys, a bus gate…. The aircraft driver (excuse the Inbetweeners reference) later mentioned that this wasn’t ideal, but that it was quicker to use buses than to get the aircraft towed to a gate.
We were on the second of the three coaches which took us not very far away at all in order to board. The journey to the aircraft was short and the coaches weren’t crammed full.
Of little relevance to anything, but this is G-EUYR. the Airbus A320 which I flew on last year to get to Warsaw. There was a friendly welcome from the crew when boarding and every customer was handed a wipe so they could clean their seat area to their heart’s content. Masks were compulsory throughout the entire flight unless eating or drinking, which I didn’t see being enforced (I mean the masks situation, not enforcing the eating), but it was honoured in the main anyway.
I kindly let Liam have the window seat on what transpired to be a full flight. The boarding process was delayed for around fifteen minutes as the crew were struggling to get all of the bags to fit in the overhead lockers. The airline has made huge efforts to reduce the number of customers putting bags in the hold, meaning that the cabin bag capacity is effectively exceeded. We were seated in emergency exit row seats and so couldn’t put bags on the floor under the seats, but the crew were telling those with smaller bags they must move them onto the floor to make way for the bigger bags. This simply means that customers wanting to ensure they have floor space are advised to bring big bags, which isn’t ideal. There was the usual debacle of some customers not entirely understanding that if their bag is bigger than the hole they’re trying to put it in, then it won’t go in. Fortunately, the crew were being pro-active and resolving such little problems quite promptly.
Anyway, bags aside, the crew and pilot announcements were friendly and welcoming, although I understand from the news this week that BA are moving away from the welcome the pilot offered of “welcome ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls”. There’s now a free snack and water provided on the flight, which was perfectly satisfactory for a journey of less than an hour.
The disembarkation process was handled well, with customers asked to remain seated until their row was called by the crew members. That did make for a more peaceful and calm way of leaving the aircraft, although I suspect it’ll be abandoned once this health crisis is out of the way.
The aircraft after landing at Dublin and it’s rare for me to be able to get photos of British Airways aircraft like this as there are usually air bridges to walk across to the main terminal building. The pilot had made up some of the time lost at Heathrow which meant that we landed only around five minutes behind schedule.
Here we are safely in Dublin with no documentation checks for immunisation, although some of that process might have been automated. It took just a few minutes to get from the aircraft to the outside of the terminal building, all very efficient. After Avios adjustments and the like, this single flight cost me around £20, which I think is excellent value given that they also funded my lounge visit as well.
This is a bit geeky I accept, but the A380 is my favourite aircraft and it’s coming back. There were rumours for a while that British Airways would have no future need for this behemoth of an aircraft. As I’m not a journalist and don’t need to embed this into a news article I’ve carefully and lovingly written, I’ll just copy and paste the press release from British Airways (yes, I know that’s lazy….).
PRESS RELEASE – 6 October 2021
British Airways is set to welcome back its first A380 aircraft in November and operate its biggest schedule since March 2020, with additional services to cities across the globe, including the US.
British Airways’ A380 will initially operate to a number of short-haul destinations to allow for crew service familiarisation in November, shortly followed by operating to Miami and Los Angeles in the US, as well as Dubai in December.
News that the airline’s A380 aircraft is re-joining its fleet follows the announcement that vaccinated Brits will be able to travel to the United States from November. The airline is set to fly to 23 US airports this winter* with up to 246 flights a week, more than any other transatlantic carrier.
Across its US network, British Airways will be increasing the number of flights it operates with services to city destinations including New York, which will initially be increasing to five a day, followed by eight in December. The airline will also be operating double-daily services to Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Washington, Dallas, Miami and Toronto, as well as daily services to Philadelphia, Phoenix, Seattle, Atlanta, Denver, Houston and Vancouver
In addition to frequency increases, in October and November British Airways will restart services to Austin, Orlando, Tampa, San Diego, Las Vegas and Baltimore. In December the airline will also start flying to Nashville and New Orleans once again, which both proved to be a hit with customers when they first launched.
Closer to home, British Airways has increased flights to a number of short-haul destinations by adding 13,000 more seats to holiday hot spots for families to get away this October. Popular leisure destinations Marrakech and Dalaman will appear on flight schedules again in time for October half-term, and brand-new services to the Turkish resort of Antalya will also be launching. Looking ahead to the winter, British Airways will be restarting a number of ski destinations including Innsbruck, Grenoble and Salzburg from December.
To help customers get away for some much-needed summer sun this Christmas, British Airways is extending its Caribbean programme with 12 services a week to Barbados and nine each to Antigua and St Lucia, which will be split across Heathrow and Gatwick airports. Flights to popular luxury Indian Ocean destinations, Maldives and Mauritius, will also be increasing to 10 and six per week over the Christmas period.
Neil Chernoff, British Airways’ Director of Network and Alliances, said: “This is an exciting time for British Airways and our customers as we see borders re-opening. With welcome news from the US, we are dramatically increasing flights and bringing home some of our A380s to give our customers as many options as possible. Elsewhere across our network we are also adding additional services to destinations all over the world, to ensure our customers can take advantage of a much-needed holiday.”
Elsewhere across its short-haul network British Airways will be increasing flights year-round to key European cities with 48 weekly services to Amsterdam, 33 to Geneva, 35 to Dublin, 28 to Milan and 21 to Berlin, Paris and Rome.
British Airways’ subsidiary BA City Flyer, is expected to operate a schedule of 43 flights a week to Edinburgh, 33 to Dublin, 25 to Glasgow, 18 to Belfast, 16 to Amsterdam, 15 to Rotterdam, 15 to Berlin, 12 to Frankfurt, 12 to Dusseldorf and 11 to Zurich. The airline is also set to launch a new route from Belfast to Birmingham, as well as new ski destination Salzburg, from London City and Southampton.
To coincide with the increase in services as the world re-opens, the airline’s lounges are also welcoming customers back. In September customers were invited to enjoy British Airways’ Concorde Room in London and New York. Lounges in Chicago, Washington, San Francisco and Houston are expected to open this week.
Customers using exclusive lounges can benefit from exciting new developments, such as the introduction of ‘Your Menu’ – a new initiative developed in the last few months to allow customers to order food and drink directly to their seat by simply scanning a QR code on their mobile device.
This is the return flight, I went from Heathrow T5 to Glasgow last week. To my considerable annoyance, this journey wasn’t available for anywhere near the same price using the rail network, I try to avoid using aircraft for domestic flights.
I started from the Travelodge at Glasgow Airport and was pleased to note that they’ve made it easy to walk to the terminal by providing clear signage.
And the terminal at around 6am.
The list of departures, mine is the 08:15 flight. Note that I arrived only 2 hours 15 minutes before the flight, which was cutting it very fine indeed as far as I was concerned.
There’s already a JD Wetherspoons landside, so it seems that there will soon be one airside as well. It was at this point that I popped into the British Airways lounge.
I liked the artwork here, some interesting Scottish scenes.
And some information about it, a really lovely idea to help promote the work of an airport security officer, Christopher Marr.
The minor problem with air bridges is that I can’t photograph the aircraft, this was the nearest that I could get, but the back of it is pointing out at least. It’s aircraft registration G-EUUI, which I haven’t flown on before (I don’t remember the aircraft I fly on, I have to search my own blog, although that’s good for the access numbers….) but has been in the British Airways fleet since 2002. The aircraft went to Dubrovnik after it landed at Heathrow, I must admit to being slightly jealous of it….
Lots of people in boarding groups 1 to 3, a lot more than my flight to Glasgow last week. The boarding gate staff were helpful and cheerful, which I thought was impressive for an early Tuesday morning. The cabin crew were equally engaging, so first impressions were all very positive again. The pilot sounded chirpy and happy as well with his announcements during the flight, so my general impressions remained positive.
The view from the window, although I was more engaged in watching some customers in the aisle trying to put their bags into the overhead lockers. Children often have a toy where they try and fit a shape through a hole, I suspect some of these customers didn’t have that game when they were younger. They will try and fit a bag that clearly doesn’t go in the space provided and look endlessly surprised.
I had an exit row seat by the window, but the aircraft was full and I didn’t see any empty seats at all on the flight. The aircraft felt very clean, but everyone was handed a cleansing wipe if they wished to do a bit more cleaning.
Flying over Glasgow and what I assume is the River Clyde.
The free food and drink was a bottle of water and a Nutri-Grain bar, entirely sufficient for an hour long flight. The newspaper was free at the airport, I’m not into paying for them.
The aircraft arrived 29 minutes early at the airport, but arrived at the gate one minute later than anticipated, with a half hour wait on the runway for a gate to become available causing that delay. The pilot made regular announcements, so it all felt professionally managed and I wasn’t in a rush anyway. Customers seemed content (no-one was tutting or grumbling anyway) and the disembarkation process was well managed, with five rows being called to leave the aircraft at a time.
And this is where the domestic passengers are tipped out, right down the end of the terminal.
13 minutes?!?!?! This Piccadilly service back into central London was every ten minutes a couple of years ago, apparently now reduced to every 20 minutes. For most parts of the country a 13 minute wait would be normal for public transport, but in London it stands out as feeling a long time.
Anyway, this was another perfectly operated flight from British Airways, I remain entirely pleased at their service. All rather lovely.
I wasn’t sure if this lounge would be open, as British Airways have closed some of their outstation lounge facilities, and also there are a few third party contracts that they haven’t yet renewed at other European airports. However, the facility was open and there was a friendly welcome from the staff member at the desk.
It was busy when I entered, as the previous flight was about to depart, but it soon emptied out to this. I like this style of desk seating, but there were a range of higher chairs and lower seating as well, which should offer a suitable option to nearly everyone.
There were plenty of power points dotted around the place and efforts made to put some artwork on the wall.
Looking down the lounge back towards the entrance. The lounge was clean throughout and the staff seemed to be trying to thoroughly clean it after the first wave of customers left. There are also toilet facilities available directly from the lounge, so customers don’t need to go back out to use those in the main terminal.
The food and drink section was closed off, so customers were served by staff. Unlike the system that BA have in their London lounges, there’s no app provision here, just helpful staff pouring coffees and the like.
The menu wasn’t very broad, although I was there for breakfast time. They seemed to be mainly providing porridge to customers, that was certainly the most popular option. I went with the yoghurt and fruit, as the thought of porridge or muesli didn’t appeal. That was complemented by crisps and a pastry, along with a latte. The food and drink was all quite basic, but given the size of the lounge and limitation of the facilities, it seemed a reasonable offering.
Announcements are made when it’s time for customers to go and get their flight, but there are numerous screens around the lounge so it’s easy to know when and where to go. It never got very busy during my visit, so there was always plenty of seating available for those who wanted it. It was also evident just how many customers knew the lounge staff, I imagine they must commute on a regular basis. As a lounge, it’s perfectly sufficient with food, drink, helpful staff, wi-fi and lots of power points, so a positive start to the day.
