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British Airways improves short haul snacks in Economy, and makes lounge loos unisex

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The longest journey starts with a single step, so we should roll out the red carpet for banana cake.

Unfortunately I wasn’t suppied with any photographs of the banana cake, but from 9th August, the bag of pretzels you are given in the British Airways Euro Traveller cabin is being replaced with it.

If banana cake isn’t your thing, you can also choose sultana flapjack.

A320neo airbus

These are, I admit, slightly bizarre choices – I suspect chocolate cake and plain flapjack would appeal to more people – and we have still to see the portion size. I would be pleasantly surprised if it was the same size as a standard pre-packaged corner shop flapjack. I suspect neither are gluten free.

The ability to offer much else than a piece of flapjack is hampered by the reduced galley facilities on the newest short-haul aircraft, where additional rows of seats were squeezed in instead.

The trial of free tea and coffee in Euro Traveller on selected short haul routes such as Amman and Cairo may also return – it ran for a couple of weeks recently as an experiment. Whether a free cup of tea is acceptable as ‘refreshments’ on a five hour flight is a different question, but it’s better than a bottle of water and a pretzel bag.

To be fair, Royal Jordanian (to Amman) and EgyptAir (to Cairo) run long haul aircraft on these routes for anyone who wants a flat bed in Business Class or more space and full meals in Economy – and Royal Jordanian offers Avios and BA tier points to Amman too.

Flying to India?

There is good news if you are flying to Delhi or Mumbai. All cabins will now get a second hot meal during the flight.

The airline has also announced that ‘chilled snacks’ will be placed in the Club Kitchen on these routes.

IFE improvements too

British Airways has also confirmed the completion of its IFE upgrade, which has doubled the number of items available. This includes the addition of Paramount+ content and a total of 395 movies and 770 audio titles. It does seem as if BA is getting competitive in this area, at least in comparison with other European airlines.

Heading to the loo?

In toilet news (and this was not part of yesterdays announcement, but I wanted to slot it in somewhere), British Airways has made the loos in the Galleries First and Concorde Room lounges at Heathrow unisex. I’m not sure about other lounges in Terminal 3 and Terminal 5.

It never made a lot of sense to have separate male and female loos, given that none contained urinals, and it led to unnecessary queues at times. A full refurbishment of these loos remains well overdue.

Is Calum the man for the job?

How much of the above reflects the appointment of Calum Laming as Chief Customer Officer remains to be seen.

If you thought that being, say, leader of the Conservative Party or Manchester United manager was bad for job security, it is nothing compared to being the British Airways ‘Chief Customer Officer’.

The first person to hold the title was, I think, Frank van der Post. Frank joined from Jumeirah Hotels, the Dubai-based hotel group with a strong reputation for customer service. Despite being well liked in the frequent flyer community, Frank left in 2014 after four years, allegedly frustrated with not being given the money he wanted for investment.

Frank was replaced by Troy Warfield. Warfield only lasted 18 months. His appointment raised eyebrows at the time because he had no airline experience, having previously worked at Avis and Kimberley-Clark, where he oversaw Andrex in Europe.

Warfield was replaced in 2017 by Carolina Martinoli who had done a similar role at Iberia. She was later promoted to the IAG board as Chief People Officer.

Tom Stevens, previously head of airport operations for BA, picked up the customer experience mandate on an interim basis during the pandemic. He was confirmed in the role in early 2021. In early 2022, he had a sudden desire to “pursue his ambition to work overseas” to quote BA.

Let’s see what Calum can do.

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Comments (300)

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

  • ADS says:
    2 Aug2 August 12:47

    “the bag of pretzels you are given in the British Airways Euro Traveller”

    BAG is way too generous a term for the 10 gram miniature excuse of a “snack” !

  • StanTheMan says:
    2 Aug2 August 12:56

    Find me a man, who will happily go in to a cubicle and lift a filthy seat up with his hands, empty himself, then put it back down with his hands again…..

    It aint gonna happen……

    Lose. Lose.

    • Ironside says:
      2 Aug2 August 13:06

      Sounds like putting it back down again is the problem.

      We should all agree to stop it.

      • StanTheMan says:
        2 Aug2 August 13:30

        So just leave it up? Or maybe have some kind of bowl with no seat ? Or loads of them, all attached to a wall in a row?

        • Gordon says:
          2 Aug2 August 13:38

          Everyone was slating India! But they appear to have have had the right idea all along. A hole in the floor!!!!

        • Ironside says:
          2 Aug2 August 19:10

          Yes, Stan. Leave it up. Bring it down only when required. Then it won’t be filthy. Problem solved.

          Now we just need to train women to put the seat up when they’ve finished. Maybe having them on a spring would help? (The seat, not women. Springy women aren’t relevant to this particular solution)

    • JDB says:
      2 Aug2 August 13:53

      @StanTheMan – lifting/lowering the seat is easily enough done with one’s feet. This whole thing is about having a modicum of respect for one’s surroundings and other people. It’s no more acceptable to pee on the seat than it is to chuck a finished McDonald’s bag out of your car window or wiping your hands on the seats after messily eating a packet of crisps as frequently observed in ‘exclusive’ lounges etc. etc. It’s pretty tragic just how many people aren’t house trained.

      • StanTheMan says:
        2 Aug2 August 14:04

        But being house trained in your own house is different to touching a soiled toilet seat.

        I’m not against using my shoes to lift a seat, as opposed to you using your feet which sounds rather repulsive.
        Though as I’ll have just walked through a toilet/airport/street, I’m not sure that leaves the seat particularly clean either…..
        Which brings me back to concept of urinals.

      • yorkieflyer says:
        2 Aug2 August 15:32

        But they only have to stop this gender neutral twaddle and provide urinals. Men will benefit from speedier turnaround and women could have more cubicles than the men in the same overall floor area. What we used to call a win win

    • Tracey says:
      2 Aug2 August 16:14

      positioning the flush mechanism behind the lid, so it is only accessible with the lid down, forces (hopefully) people to close the lid before flushing.

      • Greenpen says:
        2 Aug2 August 18:02

        But if you can’t get the seat down easily then no one bothers to flush.

        Although everyone seems to enjoy discussing toilets, no one wants anything to do with them. Hence they remain dirty places that people treat as such. The part of the F experience I can’t believe is the on board toilets. Cramped, almost impossible to use or change in without wiping miscellaneous liquids from the floor and walls, and awful to look at, never clean even on black plastic bowls!

        • Lady London says:
          3 Aug3 August 01:47

          Sorry er… but you need to fly Qatar on the A380’s then… seating upstairs near the better loos

          (And the downstairs ones aren’t bad compared to other planes either)

    • Lady London says:
      2 Aug2 August 16:59

      ..Or even pee straight, let’s be frank.

      Unisex loos simply don’t work for women.

      And they’ve not even refurbished the bathrooms at T5 since the terminal was built, I believe. The bathrooms being so cheaply built, you’d think in a new terminal they’d have maintained some standard for at least a period, but they deteriorated rapidly.

      So really, BA loos, at least so far as women are concerned, are going to become even more of a $h1thole.

      • Bill says:
        2 Aug2 August 21:50

        The United lounge in T2 does a relatively good job. Unisex from the start, and with a cleaner at hand to mop up the womens’ piss. 🙂

    • David says:
      2 Aug2 August 20:08

      Just use some toilet paper to lift it.
      Not difficult.

    • Dubious says:
      3 Aug3 August 06:10

      I flew on Saudia recently. The business class toilets (onboard the aircraft) automatically lifted and lowered the seat cover. Didn’t have to press anything – it just sensed when.

  • PB2 says:
    2 Aug2 August 13:05

    They’ve also stuck £167 pp on top of the surcharges for F ex-DUB. Can buy a lot of banana cake for that 😂

    • Shanghaiguizi says:
      2 Aug2 August 14:23

      Best banana cake in all the skies I’ll have you know 😂

  • Ruairi Cullinane says:
    2 Aug2 August 13:16

    Still way behind the other flag carriers out of Heathrow.
    And still can’t run anything on time

    • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:
      2 Aug2 August 21:26

      “Flag carrier” is an out dated concept which is of no relevance today.

      • Dubious says:
        3 Aug3 August 07:25

        It’s odd isn’t it.
        Flag on aircraft = good.
        Flag on GHIC = bad.
        🤔

  • James Harper says:
    2 Aug2 August 14:40

    Chief Customer Officer at BA is probably a soul destroying job if your idea is to improve customer service when the real remit of the job for years has been to make cuts, save money and detract from any pleasant experience a customer may have. Perhaps instead they should appoint a Head of Customer Dissatisfaction and Contempt and at least call the job role what it is.

    • Lady London says:
      2 Aug2 August 17:02

      It’s clearly one of those jobs where they put people there’s some other plan for.

  • Gordon says:
    2 Aug2 August 14:41

    Although I must admit I have contributed, I find it rather disturbing that out of the five brief articles that Rob has posted today. By far the one that has attracted the most interest and comments, is the one that refers to a small room that you mainly use to urinate and defecate in!

  • Steve says:
    2 Aug2 August 15:23

    Linked to BA: There are absolutely 0 seats with avios from London to Singapore or is it my impression? I’ve tried every single date for next year and I found nothing.

    • Gordon says:
      2 Aug2 August 15:37

      Redemption bookings to SIN tend to get snapped up for the SYD route.
      I need to book J with a 2-4-1 in a couple of months and I’m not looking forward to it!

    • Danny says:
      2 Aug2 August 15:38

      Try Manchester as a starting point

      • Mark says:
        2 Aug2 August 18:39

        Starting from Manchester won’t help unless you’re using an Amex 241 voucher. The 241 does tend to help considerably (even for flights from LHR if you’re willing to be flexible) – though booking each leg at midnight/1am T-355 is still the best way of getting specific dates.

        • Gordon says:
          2 Aug2 August 20:02

          Yes flexibility is key, I also believe this route has the club suite now….

          • Numpty says:
            2 Aug2 August 20:12

            My flight to Sin in June 2024 had been swapped to an a380 with the old club seat.

          • Rob says:
            2 Aug2 August 20:27

            Yes, will cover this in the next couple of days.

          • Gordon says:
            2 Aug2 August 21:07

            That’s disappointing, I’m booking for Q4 2024, So I will look forward to your article Rob.

    • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:
      2 Aug2 August 15:55

      If you’re not getting ready to book at midnight GMT 355 days out there is little chance of getting such a reward.

      And even then other people can beat you to them.

    • iamfugly says:
      2 Aug2 August 20:43

      Just checked and only economy and premium economy seats to Singapore. Several dates in Nov going out. Coming back several dates late Dec, several dates late Jan and several random dates in Feb. (There is also random dates going out in Mar for Econ and Premium but absolutely nothing returning for the rest of the year).

  • Ian says:
    2 Aug2 August 15:37

    TBH, I feel sorry for the women, but in fairness there is ALWAYS a queue for the ladies i most parts of the world, what do they do different to us chaps? Usually there are never enough loos for ladies, so i think this is a good idea. But a word of warning and a word to the wise to the fairer sex.. There are tonnes and tonnes of dirty, unkempt, no hand washers, no flushers, snorters, spitters.. bar-stewards that use the men’s…… of course the smell of evacuating ones bowels is the same.

    • Lady London says:
      2 Aug2 August 17:06

      And you think we didn’t know, @Ian?

      I really, really do not know what BA is thinking, with this.
      Perhaps that despite it being the 3rd decade of the 21st century, male business passengers and male passengers in the upper classes of an aircraft and male passengers from their corporate accounts still very much outnumber women. So even if every woman travelling on BA complains, BA can still claim that the majority of passengers will enjoy the extra cubicles now open to them.

      And being women are not totally perfect either, well guys how many of you may accidentally come across some red stuff if someone’s forgotten? How will you cope?

      • IanSoftLad says:
        5 Aug5 August 09:50

        Last London…. I would balk, gag, put my hand over my mouth and gasp. Geez i thought you chaps/ess were totally ignorant of the snorters, and p*** bad aiders… I apologise. Maybe BA have a genuine spirit in this regard to help, but of course this will be Woke influenced… so the age old battle continues x all the best

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