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British Airways cuts Club World meal service for departures after 9pm

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Yesterday we covered the bizarre new breakfast / brunch service that British Airways is serving for lunch on long haul flights departing up to 11.29am.

It pairs a cooked breakfast with wine, a cheeseboard, coffee and liqueurs. Those who have tried it are finding it as odd as it sounds.

On the upside, you are at least still getting a three course meal of sorts. This is no longer the case for Club World departures after 9pm.

BA cuts Club World meal service for departures after 9pm

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I mention this because, about 20 years ago, British Airways launched something called ‘Sleeper Service’. It stripped down the Club World business class food service to the bare minimum, on the grounds that most people wanted to sleep on overnight flights and those who didn’t could starve. It was a failure, launching the catchphrase ‘To Fly, To Starve’ and was abandoned. This is despite the fact that it only operated from airports where BA had pre-flight lounge dining.

Multiple rounds of staff departures at British Airways later, everyone who remembers the failure of ‘Sleeper Service’ seems to have left and a version of it is back. This time it is on virtually all routes, irrespective of whether the lounge offers a full meal.

What is now served on Club World departures after 9pm?

The menu has been pared back sharply:

  • appetisers have been scrapped
  • main courses and desserts are massively simplified

Here is an example menu currently in use:

Main courses

  • Butternut squash and coconut soup
  • Grilled tiger prawn salad
  • Chicken and leek pie
  • Cheese and crackers

Dessert

  • Panna cotta
  • Fruit salad
  • Chocolate chip cookies

…. and that’s it.

Bizarrely the menu says at the top:

“Take your pick from an assortment of seasonal dishes. If you’re feeling tired and can’t wait to cosy down, then just choose your main and dessert and a night cap of your choice”.

However, you have no option but to have just a main and dessert because that’s all there is! The appetisers are gone.

This new service has been rolled out on virtually all long-haul routes. The only exceptions are 12+ hour flights. It is, apparently, being used on Cape Town and Mauritius which are over 11 hours.

The airline argues that a ‘one tray’ meal service will allow passengers to get to sleep more quickly. The problem is that British Airways ALREADY offered a stripped down ‘one tray’ option on late night Club World flights. Those who wanted to eat and sleep could have the ‘one tray’ meal whilst those who didn’t could – until last week – have the standard full menu.

It isn’t clear what is offered in First Class. I believe that the menu has also been cut back but bears more resemblance to a proper meal.

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Comments (477)

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

  • Marlon says:
    22 Oct22 October 12:34

    If you consider the amount of money you are paying and for what?
    A comfortable chair. BA are being ridiculous if they think that they can still charge Premium prices for a low cost stink fest then ppl should take their business else where.
    BA cannot have it both ways, either they are a Premium airline or a low cost one.

    • Yaa says:
      22 Oct22 October 16:02

      Thank you…people pay in excess of 4000$ for business class for just the seat. Experienced this snack for a 10.20pm flight and we’d decided we’d eat on the flight. I’m done KLM here I come.

  • Joan says:
    22 Oct22 October 12:43

    OMG our flight tomorrow is 11:10 so we will experience the Brunch despite the fact we will probably not be in the air till after 11:29 👎

  • D says:
    22 Oct22 October 13:00

    Got as far as chicken and leek en croute….

    A posh pasty.

  • NMac says:
    22 Oct22 October 13:08

    I used to pay extra to fly BA, now l pay extra not to. It’s now just long haul Ryanair.

    • Mikeact says:
      22 Oct22 October 16:22

      Long haul Ryanair….you mean their 4.5 hrs to Tenerife ?…You’ve obviously never travelled long haul.

      • Guernsey Globetrotter says:
        22 Oct22 October 16:57

        @Mikeact what @NMac is saying is that BA is becoming the long haul version of Ryanair with all these cuts to previously included services. I know this may be painful for you to recognise, particularly after laughing at all the VS points collectors last week, but BA is not always the shining paragon of airline virtue that you seem to think it is!

        • Mikeact says:
          22 Oct22 October 21:10

          @GG
          ‘BA is not always the shining paragon of airline virtue that you seem to think it is!’
          Show me where I have ever ,or intimated that. I have one complaint in their backlog at present. Perfect they are not, but I have to accept that the good old days are over.

    • JDB says:
      22 Oct22 October 17:11

      That’s just so absurd, BA is nothing like Ryanair and if you are flying on any airline anywhere for fancy good well…

      BA will still feed you a greater amount of food than medically recommended, even after these changes.

      • Occasional Ranter says:
        22 Oct22 October 20:25

        It’s true. BA is nothing like Ryanair…

        • Bervios says:
          23 Oct23 October 08:32

          Exactly. One is reliable and efficient with minimal faffing. The other is BA which continues to dissapoint.

      • louie says:
        22 Oct22 October 22:39

        I’m intrigued to know, what do you find so different? I flew Ryanair earlier this month for the first time for years. Other than the colour of the seats and them offering scratchcards (I think, wasn’t listening), I can’t recall anything of significance (to me) that distinguished them from my previous flight on BA (economy/short haul). Both seats felt equally uncomfortable in terms of the lack of padding, both had similar amounts of legroom, both fed you only if you paid them extra, both charge for baggage. What else?

        • Londonsteve says:
          23 Oct23 October 18:10

          I’m with you, reality for someone in Economy without status is that there’s no difference, other than the usually much higher ticket price. One area of difference in Ryanair’s favour is the excellent timekeeping and the assurance the flight will depart as advertised. A lot of folks here that rate BA above Ryanair are often travelling in Club or as a minimum, use their Silver status to travel towards the front of the cabin where there’s more legroom and often fewer people resulting in empty middle seats. Down the back where the lowly Blues and passengers without status get dumped, I think it’s actually tighter on legroom than Ryanair.

  • OhBA says:
    22 Oct22 October 13:17

    Flew Club from Dubai last week and the only dinner service option was a dry panini accompanied with a bread roll! I took a pic it was so unpalatable. I wasn’t the only passenger to send it back. Apparently “passengers preferred to sleep on this route” when I questioned the absence of the meal service. IMO the lounge wouldn’t be able to accommodate all passengers if they had known they had the eat pre boarding.

    • Lee says:
      22 Oct22 October 13:39

      That is amazing. So it was bread and bread…

    • Can2 says:
      22 Oct22 October 14:43

      I will be on that flight some time soon. I’d better pack some potato sandwiches!

    • TGLoyalty says:
      22 Oct22 October 20:38

      Was this the 1am service? No way should anyone be eating anything but breakfast on that flight!

      The Dubai lounge is being changed to a bigger space

  • Gerry says:
    22 Oct22 October 13:44

    I for one liked the Sleeper Service. But it was limited to a few late departures on two (JFK, BOS) very business-heavy routes where a lot of travelers really wanted to maximize sleep on a short eastbound flight.

    That’s very different to cutting dinner on all routes…

  • Alex G says:
    22 Oct22 October 14:00

    Before Covid, BA trialled an option of ordering a premium meal in advance for a fee. I think it was aimed at Y class passengers.

    Perhaps they need to reintroduce the idea. But for J class.

    And F.

    • NorthernLass says:
      22 Oct22 October 15:47

      Don’t give them ideas – pre-Covid you could do this for nothing!

  • BBbetter says:
    22 Oct22 October 14:00

    At this rate, only those using a companion voucher might be flying BA. Anyone paying cash or redeeming miles will choose better airlines.

    • Alex G says:
      22 Oct22 October 14:09

      That’s been my policy for years. BA if I’m paying with Avios. Anyone else if I’m paying cash. Although as I’m focused on flying East these days, it’s getting harder to find redemptions on BA anyway. Thank goodness for Finnair (who’s rather poor in-flight catering suddenly looks delicious compared to the new offerings from BA).

      • meta says:
        22 Oct22 October 15:10

        Not really, you can use 241 vouchers on Iberia. I have ditched BA almost completely on long-haul when this was introduced. I flew BA long-haul only twice since 2019 and actively tend to avoid them. Even Iberia’s sometimes surly service is better compared to BA.

        • Alex G says:
          22 Oct22 October 15:25

          As I said, I’m focusing on flying East these days. 3 flights a week to Tokyo doesn’t add significantly to Avios availability.

      • Lee says:
        22 Oct22 October 16:41

        Finnair F&B is much better than ba. Onboard and in their premium lounge. Much better

    • Russell G says:
      22 Oct22 October 16:35

      HI, I’m flying direct from London to SFO, can you point me in the direction of these “better airlines” please?

      • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:
        22 Oct22 October 17:47

        I usually fly AA – LHR-JFK then JFK-SFO

        Last time I flew via DFW.

        I find AA to be much better than BA.

        But surely it depends on your definition of “better”

      • Expat in SJC says:
        22 Oct22 October 18:03

        There aren’t any and BA know that. I continually battle with this decision on my 6 weekly SFO-LHR flights.

        VS- food was considered worse than BA (IIRC Rhys got Shay to admit as much in an interview) and you get the good awful 787 UCS

        UA- Polaris seat is decent but the food is also pretty poor

        AA- one stop and the $ partly ends up back with BA via the JV. It makes for a long day also- fine when on PTO but when on business routing via DFW is a drag.

        EI- is once a day and a v early start ex UK

        B6- LOL fares are through the roof and on the TATL there is no hot meal service.

        This is the underlying issue. BA is really focused on the North American market. It sees what its competitors are doing (look at B6!) and decides it can cut service and still get passengers.

        They are happy to give up traffic elsewhere on the world to the ME3.

        • meta says:
          22 Oct22 October 20:56

          You can fly with one stop via Europe – AF, TP, LX, LH, KL, EI, IB (seasonal), plus a few others. All of these have better quality of food then BA.

          As long as you choose the convenience of flying direct, BA will continue eroding the service.

    • ALISON says:
      22 Oct22 October 16:53

      On a flight LHR – JNB pre-covid my seat in CW was broken. The cabin was full and the crew had to look around for someone to be moved. It was then apparent that almost everyone except me and my OH were flying in J as BA crew/BA staff/BA pensioners/BA friends&family or else Avios rewards flyers. In the end 2 BA pensioners were moved to other seats to enable us to have reclining seats (I did feel a bit bad about this, but then I’d paid cash!).

      • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:
        22 Oct22 October 20:29

        If you’re in staff travel you’re expected to move.

        One of the consequences of not moving is to have your concession removed.

      • John says:
        22 Oct22 October 21:39

        Same F is the staff cabin.

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