Is British Airways new Club World business class catering essentially a big con?

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

• Steve says:

  14 Feb14 February 10:28

  So, my question is. Why would someone pay the premium for BA when you can fly gazillion airlines with superior business/first class experience?

  Even when I am flying for business and the company is paying for it, I have a choice to take multiple different carriers. I have never booked BA. There are only 4 seats per flight so surely it can’t be only points, so there must be a lot of people who are actually paying BA for that.

  • Quark999 says:

    14 Feb14 February 11:13

    Simple really. Direct non-stop flights from LHR. There’s usually BA and the “national carrier” option of the destination country, or convoluted connections through someone’s hub. So I’d like to see those “gazillion” other airlines that fly non-stop to where I need to go…

  • Mr(s) Entitled says:

    14 Feb14 February 12:08

    All things being equal BA would not be my first choice. All things are rarely ever equal.

  • Mikeact says:

    14 Feb14 February 16:06

    Just wondering why you would subscribe to these BA threads ,if you never fly them ?

  • ChrisC says:

    14 Feb14 February 16:45

    I fly BA because of Price.

    I’m doing INV-LHR-LCY-JFK-ORD (and return) in J in a couple of months for ~ £1350 using a mix of BA and AA/

    Not one airline is offering ex LHR for anything like that price (or close to £1600 allowing for the positioning flights)

    IN January I did INV-LHR-JFK return in F positioning flights for £2k. Again no other airline was offering anything similar

    Is BA J and F the best there is no of course not but it is not as bad as some make out.

    • Steve says:

      15 Feb15 February 05:39

      Makes sense

  • Darren says:

    14 Feb14 February 16:59

    I think that’s a sensible question.

    For me points & 241 work well, never had a problem getting what I want but I tend to plan ahead. Coming from the outer reaches of the UK connecting in LHR is ok but I’ve used the ME3, although ex EU proves more difficult without the regular London connections.

    I don’t wear BA tinted specs, but balance cost, convenience and expected levels of service.

    • Steve says:

      15 Feb15 February 05:43

      Using 241 is totally understandable, it’s not paying cash though.

      • Darren says:

        15 Feb15 February 07:10

        I’ve never paid cash for BA J & F, only points. I have paid cash for J and F on ME3 from the UK but found the layovers less than ideal to the far east.

        As I said ex EU doesn’t work for me. Cost v Convenience when maximising the number of days in a final destination (plus the expense of the positioning flight and hotel). Two days travel at the start and end of a holiday isn’t worth the saving to me.

      • Darren says:

        15 Feb15 February 07:11

        Also my travel is both east and west

  • HAM76 says:

    14 Feb14 February 19:16

    There isn‘t a lot of airlines flying to the US who have a better product consistently. It‘s only a recent development that airlines have a better on board product on even some aircrafts, but you could still end up on an aircraft with worse seats, especially in First.

    The second reason is the price. Lufthansa has the better seat, pre-flight service, and a more consistent service on board. But it‘s 2000 Euros more expensive with fewer US destinations than BA.

    I guess it‘s different to Asia, but that is not where I‘m flying to.

    • Steve says:

      15 Feb15 February 05:45

      I see. I should have mentioned that I am flying mostly to Asia. This makes sense.

• Davide says:

  14 Feb14 February 11:07

  This in a nutshell is why I only use BA for point redemptions and never cash.

• Anna says:

  14 Feb14 February 12:46

  I tweeted BA last night asking them to justify charging £343 for the 40 hop from LHR to MAN in September (so hardly last minute). Their response was that they are sorry I am unhappy with their prices. No explanation for the culling of the service and charging £1.70 per mile flown!

  • JAXBA says:

    14 Feb14 February 13:07

    Why would they explain the price?? It is what it is, even if it doesn’t make sense, so find another flight/airline, or book BA anyway. It’s either the genuine price due to demand on that flight and date, or it’s an error that’ll rectify itself in a few days. Either way they don’t have to justify the price/service, so vote with your wallet and let the market decide.

    Booking flights isn’t a version of ‘Let’s Make a Deal’ – it’s take it or leave it.

  • Nick says:

    14 Feb14 February 14:30

    You could have got a walk-up train fare for £80ish return (off-peak). You chose to fly and pay that price. There must have been a reason… BA is just tapping into that whatever that reason was. Welcome to the free market, it’s how the world works.

  • Matt says:

    14 Feb14 February 23:11

    Get a train! It would be much quicker when you factor in transfer to/from airport. Also conserably more environmentally friendly. And cheaper. Seems a no brainer unless I’m missing something!

• Adam says:

  14 Feb14 February 13:23

  We flew CW recently, no amenity bag, 1st & 2nd meal choices not available. Stewardess didnt even bother to offer any alternatives like a WT sandwich, pretty appalling.

• Alex says:

  14 Feb14 February 13:38

  I’m not going to say I look forward to the food (it’s BA, remember the Brits’ idea of food is something useful, not something nice), but new bedding will certainly be an improvement.

  • Leo says:

    14 Feb14 February 15:16

    “The Brits’ idea of food” ?! This is a British blog you know.

    • Steve says:

      14 Feb14 February 15:37

      +1. Somewhat of a backward and incorrect view of our tastes and food expectation. I thought I was on a different site for a moment….

  • Anthony Dunn says:

    14 Feb14 February 16:38

    Really?! A regrettably cliched, stereotyped and inaccurate response. Other than in Italy, I have been served bad food in every country across Europe at some point or other.

    • mark2 says:

      14 Feb14 February 18:03

      I have had bad food in Italy on a number of occasions. There are thousands of places where you can get bad food aimed at tourists.

      • Pieretto says:

        16 Feb16 February 10:54

        As an Italian living in UK, I agree with your comment. You can also find excellent food in UK. It’s up to us to do our research in advance (when possible) via web or (in my opinion always the best option) asking a local.

  • Darren says:

    14 Feb14 February 17:14

    Ahahaha, troll

• CV3V says:

  14 Feb14 February 14:05

  Did anyone watch the Channel 4 documentary on Singapore Airlines new First class suite? BA arent even close to competing with it. I also watched an old Heathrow documentary which included the first BA 787 flight to KUL – the flight delays were comical, and BA made a big deal of the afternoon tea service which isnt even served on the KL flights (in and out are overnight flights).

  • JamesB says:

    14 Feb14 February 16:27

    CV3V, do you have the name of tge documentary please so I can try to find it on catch up?

    • Clive says:

      14 Feb14 February 16:36

      http://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-worlds-most-luxurious-airline

      • JamesB says:

        14 Feb14 February 17:51

        Thanks Clive.

  • Darren says:

    14 Feb14 February 17:16

    It was really interesting to see that a UK company were fitting the suites. Very nice product.

    • Graham Walsh says:

      14 Feb14 February 22:12

      Great to see British built suites. Shame about some of their staff and choice of “Analysts”.

  • Polly says:

    15 Feb15 February 13:21

    We were on their 3rd flight in F..it was amazing then..got the program recorded to watch when we get home.

• Tom says:

  14 Feb14 February 14:17

  We flew CE to Barcelona on Saturday. Had the ‘afternoon tea’ service. The cake was inedible and sandwich fingers dry and curled up. We had nearly reached the Pyrenees when they finally served us drinks (in row 10). When collecting the trays back up I noticed that almost all the food remained on trays. When will BA get the message?

  • Andrew says:

    14 Feb14 February 16:33

    Be careful what you wish for. The message BA will take from left over food is that clearly customers aren’t hungry during the afternoon so they can cut back on the catering even more

  • Gavin says:

    14 Feb14 February 18:13

    The trick with afternoon tea service is to order a special meal!

    • Peter K says:

      14 Feb14 February 19:09

      You can’t order special meals short haul.

      • Rich says:

        14 Feb14 February 21:05

        Yes you can.

      • Irons&0 says:

        14 Feb14 February 21:09

        Er yes you can in CE except if the aircraft has overnighted before your flight

    • Tom says:

      14 Feb14 February 22:39

      I did.. but on a different flight! We were in fact offloaded from our original flight (to LPA) after our son had a nosebleed as we taxied.. and BA refused to fly us until he had been ‘incident free’ for 2 hours. So after a brief visit from a paramedic, we spent 6 hours in various Heathrow lounges before travelling onto LPA via BCN.

  • Jonn says:

    15 Feb15 February 02:47

    When people start recognition of the reality of what they offer in 2018 and move their bookings elsewhere

• Cate says:

  14 Feb14 February 14:26

  This is a shame if true as comments on BA soft product looked as if they were turning a corner at one point. Perhaps this is just a delay caused by problems filling Gatwick slots with charters and they’ve temporarily diverted resources and will continue the roll out in September. Curious to see what the ‘seven’ refers to…

  ‘Booking flights isn’t a version of ‘Let’s Make a Deal’ – it’s take it or leave it.’ @JAXBA In some quarters bartering is still alive.

  • Jimmy says:

    14 Feb14 February 22:35

    you can barter with an airline?

    really? which airline is offering “Buy now or Best Offer” ?

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.