British Airways cuts the new Club World business class meal service – before it even rolls out

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• Richard Brown says:

  7 Jan7 January 08:30

  This is simply sad. Other airlines are in the main enhancing their premium products. If what you say about their not being enough time on board to provide a proper service, there is something very wrong with the service ethos on board. Whatever happened to going “above and beyond” to “to fly to serve”. Cabin crew should be proud to offer service enhancements and management should do all they can to facilitate this. Salt and pepper shakers, olive oil, a pillow and bread rolls should make no difference to the time it takes to serve.

  • Paul says:

    7 Jan7 January 11:33

    Other airlines need to compete. BA is protected by both fortress Heathrow and ludicrous revenue sharing agreements which allow BA AA JL and other to share revenue. In the old days it was collusion. They don’t need to compete, they are making mire money than ever and provide the worst service since privatisation. You can do that without be protected.

• Max says:

  7 Jan7 January 08:41

  I flew LHR-JFK last month and “experienced” the new meal service. It was so slow and the crew were running around like headless chickens. It took nearly the whole flight to serve 3 courses.

  • Catalan says:

    7 Jan7 January 08:59

    @ Max. That’s a shame. Would it work on a longer flight? Say Hong Kong or Los Angles? I prefer the ‘faff’ when flying business class. It’s the feeling of luxury I want. 🙂

    • Max says:

      7 Jan7 January 16:47

      Yes, I think once they have perfected it and have been doing it for a while, it will be really good and less chaotic 🙂 The food was very well presented when it arrived.

      As Gary says, it’s probably just down to the crew and it being a new thing they are still getting used to.

  • Gary says:

    7 Jan7 January 09:02

    Probably down to your crew. I also flew LHR-JFK last month, 747 upper deck. No sense of headless chickens and not only was the food and its presentation a nice step up, but chatting to the crew it seemed they very much enjoyed delivering the new premium service.

    • Yuff says:

      7 Jan7 January 09:14

      Sounds to me like too many passengers and not enough staff.
      My last 2 CE flights have run out of meals 🙁 and my most recent F flight, in an 8 seat Cabin, had only 2 available main courses, of my preferred choice, which had gone by the time my order was taken.
      I like BA F but Qatar J, and Etihad F, are a different league to BA in terms of consistency from what I read on here. I’ve not had a poor flight in F although my wife has thought some of the BA cabin crew haven’t been friendly.

      • John says:

        7 Jan7 January 09:56

        +1

    • Keith says:

      7 Jan7 January 09:23

      I experience the same thing as Max but this was only a few days after the launch. Hoped it had been improved by now. I put it down to the start of the roll out but the crew all had bad attitudes when I tried to give feedback and even got swore at by the director! I was on the upper deck so only 20 passengers to serve. Still, shouldn’t take 15 minutes to get a pre-flight drink. I’ve avoided the JFK route since.

    • Alan says:

      7 Jan7 January 17:46

      Ditto, I was impressed with the food and service on a recent JFK flight. No issues with time taken to provide service either.

• Joe says:

  7 Jan7 January 10:04

  For God’s sake. Aren’t they pathetic with their constant cuts. It’s almost as if they deliberately rolled out a new service just so they would have the opportunity to make new cuts.
  And by the way, since when is handing out pre-prepared meals from a trolly ‘restaurant-style dining’, Vs someone coming to your seat, taking your order from a menu, and then returning with your order. That is, in fact, ‘airline-style dining’, particularly in economy.

• Ian B says:

  7 Jan7 January 10:12

  Virgin still has Wilbur and Orville after 20 years IN PREMIUM ECONOMY

  • Rob says:

    7 Jan7 January 10:14

    Are they in PE too? Never knew that.

    • Mrs B says:

      7 Jan7 January 10:28

      Yes, PE are black and upper silver – that’s the only difference

  • mark2 says:

    7 Jan7 January 10:28

    To me that suggests that the food is not correctly seasoned.
    It would never occur to me to use salt and pepper in a restaurant.

    • Richard G says:

      7 Jan7 January 10:53

      I’d say a good quarter of the populace add salt and pepper to their meals without even tasting them.

    • RussellH says:

      7 Jan7 January 11:15

      It never occurs to me to use them at home either.

      If it were not for my partner wanting them, they would not be in the house. People who attack your food with giamt pepper mills should be made to fly BA pleb class 10 seats across in a non-reclining seat with the person in front fully reclined.
      🙂

    • John says:

      7 Jan7 January 11:44

      Airplanes are not restaurants (possibly except for that Etihad chef thing). Although your taste buds are supposedly dulled when flying, I still find airplane food in all classes and airlines to be overseasoned. This might just be me because I feel the same way about most restaurants on the ground until we get into places which charge £40pp+ just for the food and leave you feeling the money was well spent.

• Kathy says:

  7 Jan7 January 10:15

  Looks like the roll out is slow enough that I won’t be bothered by the new service on my flight to HKG next month and back from SYD in early March. I wonder why it is taking so long?

  In any case I need a special meal these days. No idea what that will be like – can’t find much about the low lactose meal they serve in Club. I expect it won’t be up to the standard of even the usual Club meal, but hey-ho, what can you do?

• TS77 says:

  7 Jan7 January 10:44

  I flew LHR-SIN on Monday and the BA staff seemed more surley than ever before, everything was an absolute ask for them.

  That said, based on recent experiences they are pretty much selling this route out, so someone must think they are doing something right I guess.

• Jane says:

  7 Jan7 January 10:52

  Partial OT – can anyone confirm how many meals are served in WT LAX-LHR on BA? I read somewhere that they’ve cut the number of meals in WT. Should I bring my own catering….? :p

  • Anna says:

    7 Jan7 January 10:56

    If it’s overnight, expect a main meal then nothing until shortly before landing when you get a small breakfast box. I did a 12 hour overnight from the Caribbean last August, it was 4 hours before we got our evening meal (at 10pm!), then the breakfast box about an hour before landing.

    • Nick says:

      7 Jan7 January 11:29

      Anna please remember that different routes have different offerings. LAX as a longer flight still has a more substantial second meal. The Caribbean does not.

      • Anna says:

        7 Jan7 January 18:57

        If both flights are 12 hours, why should the catering arrangements be any different?

      • Anna says:

        7 Jan7 January 18:59

        And Lady London seems to concur…

    • John says:

      7 Jan7 January 12:03

      Was that 10pm or 2am?

      • Genghis says:

        7 Jan7 January 15:33

        Indeed. Isn’t the biggest cause of jet lag the time you eat? I try to adjust as much as possible to the meal times of the place I’m headed.

      • Anna says:

        7 Jan7 January 19:01

        Well it’s a 6 hour time difference in the summer so I guess if they were re-setting our body clocks they should have served breakfast for the first meal then lunch just before we landed!

    • Lady London says:

      7 Jan7 January 14:49

      If LAX is same as SFO and SEA then Anna is right. The breakfast was absolutely pathetic on those. Main meal not that great either.

• Nick says:

  7 Jan7 January 11:33

  Some thoughts on these comments…
  – the salt and pepper pots and small cushions are being removed because customers have been stealing them in large numbers and BA doesn’t want to increase fares to compensate
  – the longer flights will suffer with the current service style because legislation mandates a certain crew rest. For those asking why it’s not an issue on EK/QR… well that’s obvious isn’t it? I’d rather fly on an airline where crew welfare is maintained, thank you
  – it was always intended that JFK would be a test bed, that’s why the full rollout wasn’t planned till this year, and they publicly stated it wasn’t yet set in stone

  • Paul says:

    7 Jan7 January 11:43

    Utter nonsense in my view and a disgraceful slur on those airlines to suggest they are any less safe than BA. Moreover if crew welfare were such an issue the service standards simply could not be maintained. You really need to experience what these crew deliver and how they do it, with style and professionalism, rather than listen to trade union scare mongering.

    Wake up BA employee. The fares ex Heathrow are the highest in Western Europe. So the idea that the loss of a few salt and pepper pots could impact £5000 fares is balderdash. It’s cost cutting and laziness, pure and simple and will only change when BA comfortable protected status at LHR is broken. Till then we have to put up with the crap BA and it’s crew deliver

  • Ziggy says:

    7 Jan7 January 11:52

    Some thoughts on your comments:

    – why can Virgin maintain salt and pepper pots and BA can’t?
    – BA managed a far more impressive meal service when it was still a premium airline (and when legislation wasn’t too different) so why can’t it step up now?
    – I’m not sure what BA found out on the JFK route that’s resulted in the change to the bread it offers or that has resulted in the olive oil being removed from view but it’s unlikely to be anything that couldn’t have been foreseen before the service was introduced (I’m guessing it’s a cost thing)….so why wasn’t it foreseen?

  • Phil Gollings says:

    7 Jan7 January 13:15

    Legislation says ‘adequate’ rest. Assuming the crew havent done a day job, then what rest would be adequate for an 11 hour night shift ? Having no one around for hours (from four at the start of the flight) seems excessive to me.
    I would assume crew are ‘rested’ before and after a long haul ?

    • Alan says:

      7 Jan7 January 17:50

      Couple of half hours breaks under WTR – wish I’d consistently got that much rest on nightshift – more like quick 10 min gap to grab some water and sandwich at some point!

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Jan7 January 18:03

        good job you’re not making life or death decisions

        er…

    • @mkcol says:

      7 Jan7 January 19:32

      Interesting – on a 12 hour shift in an office-based environment I have to have 2 x 30 minute breaks. And that is it.

      Before anyone else says: yes, I *am* making life or death decisions which will impact on others’ safety, wellbeing & even existence.

      • @mkcol says:

        7 Jan7 January 19:32

        Correction: 1 x 45minute & 1 x 30 minute break.

    • Nick says:

      7 Jan7 January 23:15

      Actually, legislation dictates the maximum length of a crew member’s ‘duty day’, which counts from report (90mins prior to departure) to the point at which they leave the aircraft after everyone has got off. And for flights over a certain length, this day can only be extended with the use of a certain amount of time spent with ‘available horizontal rest’. This covers pretty much anything further than about Delhi.

      For the avgeeks among you, you’ll notice that the VII* range of 777-200ERs never operate the long range flights, despite technically being able to. This is why – they don’t have crew bunks, so if they did, enough J seats would have to be blocked for crew that it would be uneconomical.

      And for the record, neither BA nor its unions makes these rules, they’re determined by EASA.

  • Julian says:

    7 Jan7 January 17:34

    Thank you Alex Cruz (or alternatively one of his loyal corporate disciples) for attempting to justify your and Willy’s usual extreme penny pinching mean spiritedness that has also seen Club legroom on an Airbus A320 slashed this year to only the same miserable 30 inches pitch as in Economy (and that’s even for somoen who’s tallness is only in my neck and torso and who only has a standard 31 inch inside leg despite my 6ft 3in of height) – see http://www.seatguru.com/airlines/British_Airways/British_Airways_Airbus_A320-200_D.php for proof.

    Also can I assume that now that the Fizz in Club Europe on a flight only comes in a glass with no bottle in sight that it has been secretly downgraded to Cava from Champagne? And that’s before we get on to other issues such as the large well located (with excellent views of the airfield that cannot be faulted) Business lounge in Prague doing no hot food of any kind at at all at 5pm in the evening, the fruit as usual in the BA offered Club lounge only being a crappy orange or apple (i.e. 1970s budget fruit that lasts forever with not a single strawberry, raspberry, blackcurrant, kiwi, cherry or mango in sight as is also always true in Heathrow T5) and nothing approaching scones or cakes during afternoon tea time (which might have possibly excused no hot food had they been available at this time of day).

    Fortunately I only have these sporadic dismal Club Europe experiences after having paid the extra £7.50 Avios redemption fee over the Economy equivalent but of course the further 4,500 Avios (in this case but for other destinations it could be 7,500 or 10,000 more Avios) should also be valued at £45 if not more. The on board food from Prague to LHR at 6.30pm on 1st Jan was also a total joke with no starter and the so called duck salad consisting of three ultra tiny slivers of meat with about 80 calories in total plus a load of inedible shredded salad and yucky Sauerkraut. Also the member of cabin staff held out on even offering this choice at all until I complained strongly that I didn’t fancy the sole choice of chicken breast and roast vegetables that she was offering me. The desert was also only some dry and untasty slab of chocolate cake.

    So anyway although I know you do better than that for legroom and to some extent also the food in Club World my point is that your service is also being downgraded there too and you still only get to use the same crappy Club lounges that give you only a baked potato and some swilling chilli or chinese chicken in a large unappetising vat at Heathrow T5 and at other Club lounges the food choice is less than that and in general significantly inferior to the main restaurant in most modern motorway service areas.

    So although it has been interesting to do more redeeming than just collecting of my Avios in Club Europe over the last three years (mainly thanks to both to Head To Points and also due to BA making more Club seats available for redemption short haul than was once the case) my end conclusion is I can’t see why anyone would pay some of the massive cash fares that BA charges (up to £700 one way for a flight of generally no more than two hours) for this service and that if having to pay real money to buy the flight the best option generally seems to be to travel with Norwegian (wherever possible, so basically only if travelling to or from LGW) and buy a Boots Meal Deal before boarding the aircraft. Norwegian of course also offer free wifi on all their planes ,unlike BA who are taking forever to roll it out and who then also plan to charge for it at a level that will stop most non business customers from using it!

    • the real harry1 says:

      7 Jan7 January 17:55

      yep I guess very few people actually pay £600-£700 though the return Business fare is usually cheaper than the single

      I usually have a little snort of derision at the stupidity of people who have paid good money for Club Europe as I pass them on my way to my free Exit seat – got it again on the 2nd Jan

      I would probably have a derisory doggy widdle on them if I could get away with it – which I obviously can’t, so it’s all in the mind

      fair play to points people, though – on the assumption you sank a few in the lounge

    • Doug M says:

      7 Jan7 January 21:27

      no bottle in sight that it has been secretly downgraded to Cava from Champagne?

      In all seriousness if you need sight of the bottle to know what does it matter?

      • Julian says:

        8 Jan8 January 02:47

        Of course it matters if its Champagne or not as that’s the whole point of feeling that travelling Club Europe is something special. But as BA Club Europe now offers no extra leg room for up to several hundred pounds per ticket extra compared to Monarch’s only £39 or so extra for real extra legroom then what exactly is the point of the product?

        As it happens on the way out to Prague I travelled in Economy (I only booked Club on the way back as no Economy Avios redemption seats were available for the very good reason that the cabin was absolutely chock full of Czech’s on their way back to London after the Christmas and New Year break) but as there were only about 30 people on the plane on the way out and strangely none of them had chosen to pay £30 extra for an extra legroom seat I was then able to upgrade myself to extra legroom for free by the simple expedient of boarding the plane last.

        To make matters better still all of us in Economy were then offered a free glass of champagne both because the New Year was imminent and because apparently BA still refills the plane with Champage/Cava on each flight regardless of the actual expected passenger load (in this case a total of one Club Europe passenger out of a possible 24 seats). Of course no doubt once Alex the Slasher gets to hear of this bean counting omission he will both make sure that in future anyone sitting in the Emergency Exit rows has to show their boarding pass and also that in future Cabin Crew have to account for every single bottle of fizz that they open.

        So anyway the only reason for travelling Club is because frequently its the only way to get a redemption seat on a particular flight. But then having the chance to sample the Club service and noting that some corporates still pay quite a lot of money to book their business bods in to these seats at the last moment it is just interesting to find how little one has actually been missing out on for all these years.

        Having said that it was clearly a rather better quality of service in the past but it does seem odd that having so extensively downgraded the physical product that BA has made precisely no effort at all to also cap off the ridiculously high prices it charges for Club Europe fares booked less than 72 hours or so before departure.

    • Gary says:

      8 Jan8 January 12:41

      You do realise that the lounge at PRG is not a BA lounge per se, but operated by Menzies and open to priority pass etc?

      Presumably you were the guy berating the desk agents for 10 minutes about lack of hot food in a voice loud enough for the whole lounge to hear? And then again whilst pouring drinks, moaning about the lemons being sliced too thick, how Willie Walsh is an accountant and how CE doesn’t meet your expectations? Judging by the eye rolling from the other occupants, that was a bigger downer on the lounge experience for other guests than the facilities 🙂 And yes, I was there…

      Apologies if this wasn’t you, in which case you missed a potential soul mate on that fight 😉

    • Anthony Dunn says:

      8 Jan8 January 17:09

      Julian: I guess some who book at the eleventh hour and need total flexibility will be paying £600-700 but, I suspect, the majority (as I do) pay nowhere near that amount – and not several hundreds of pounds extra over and above a Monarch fare. BTW, the Monarch’s route network would have taken you mainly to the bucket and spade destinations of southern Europe/north Africa – somewhat limiting.

      En route to Palermo just before Christmas, the duck salad was delicious and it came not with any kind of sauerkraut but with a celeriac coleslaw that was extremely tasty. The bubbles from a bottle was champagne and NOT Cava. And no, there was no dispensing meter attached to the neck of the bottle limiting the number and frequency of pours.

      You give a very strong impression of seeing the glass half-empty and given your clear perspective on BA, in your shoes, I would do myself a favour and take my custom (and complaints) elsewhere. After all, it’s only hard numbers such as RASK that matter to the IAG bean counters currently running the show – and delivering the kind of profitability that most other carriers would drool over. For myself, I have followed Rob’s (and other’s) advice by using BA Holidays to minimise price whilst maxing on benefits for continental European travel. Thereafter, anything further afield to Asia and it’s either CX, QF or QR.

  • Adrian says:

    7 Jan7 January 18:32

    What utter crap! I would love a job where I work 6 days a month and work for 7-9 hours AND have rest in between. BA are comical! Pathetic and really sad.

    • Rob says:

      7 Jan7 January 18:58

      CAA makes the rules, not BA.

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