-
Have BA got the worst lounges of any airline (for business class passengers) at their home base ?
1 – It is often difficult to get a seat
2 – When you do get one, it rarely has a power socket
3 – The food is appalling, like something you’d get at a Harvester or Toby Inn buffet
4 – The drinks selection is as bad
5 – The tables are rarely cleared, and even less frequently cleanedYou just have to look a mile away at Virgin’s Clubhouse to see the other end of the spectrum, but have HfP readers experienced anything worse than T5 ?
It’s a long-standing gripe with the Galleries lounges, though I personally think the wine selection is pretty good.
They would probably benefit from a few Toby Carvery or Harvester menu items!
Depends which lounge you use. I always avoid the north as like a school canteen with alchohol. I tend to head south turn left at the top of the first escalator and always manage to get good seat with power though have to say that’s not a patch on the Cathay Pacific in T3 which I used last month for the first time.
We had such a nice time in the Qantas lounge last month we’re planning to return in July in lieu of Cathay! The first QF departure wasn’t until lunch time, so from opening at 8 until we left to board our GIB flight at 10.30 there were only a handful of people in besides us and the staff were wonderfully attentive. In Galleries you pretty much have to drag someone out of the back room to get a table cleaned or bring you a glass of champagne!
Adding to the problems of a lack of staff and poor service, last time I used a BA Club Lounge at T5A I found it difficult to find a seat because of people putting their luggage on seats and people lying down sleeping on sofas.
The lounge at 5C is OK.
You mean 5B.
People sleeping on a sofa I can just about accept (I don’t want to share a sofa) but I simply ask people to move their bags / coats and most people will do so.
Or what happened once was a seat was empty so someone sat in it, person came back witn a drink / food and said “you’re in my seat” to which the new occupant responded ‘”no thats your seat with the bag on it”
Love it! You often see 2 people managing to take up 6 or more seats by spreading out and putting their copious hand luggage on or next to the other seats. I find it so ill-mannered – we always make sure ours is tucked away next to us so there’s a clear route to any seat anyone else might want to occupy.
Maybe BA should start implementing a 3-hour rule as it often looks as though people have settled in for a full sleep! Or start allocating seating on entry like they do in the Escape lounges at MAN.I don’t blame people for sleeping in lounges given the extensive flight cancellations and delays there have been in the past year. BA should provide a quiet area with extended armchairs for this.
@Greg you were a bit too nice in your original post. Surely the very poor quality of the bathrooms (showers and toilets) in BA lounges is worth mentioning? The cleaning staff do a valiant job but with such poor quality infrastructure build in the first place, there is only so much they can do.Also bit insulting for Harvester or Toby Inn – the BA Lounge food comes nowhere near that with very very few exceptions.
My main fun in BA lounges the last few times was finding out where they’d put the decent alcohol… there’s usually always some choice if you can work out where they’re hiding the good stuff now.
Not madly in favour of the 3 hour rule especially as many flights down fron NCL always have long delays at LHR so there’s a good reason why I’m holed up there. That said I suppose the staff on the gate will know if you are connecting or just takinf the Pxss & trying to drink Canada dry or or in this case BA!
I once spent 7.5hrs in Galleries South after BA changed my boarding gate but never updated the screens at the original gate and left a good third of the passengers behind. It was during the face mask era too. I’ve never been back since; I get a nervous twitch even thinking about the place.
Not an airline lounge but my worst ever lounge was the airport-run lounge in Tirana. First arrivals of the morning and the food offering consisted of 2 crossaints. I asked would more be coming out; was told no so use a knife to divide between the 3 of us. Juice was vivid neon orange or green ‘stuff’. There was a single domestic kettle for hot drinks which I set to boil but within minutes was spewing out boiling frothy milk as someone had filled it with milk.
Milk, lol. That reminds me of when I was living in halls in my first year at uni and there was a rather pampered young man (from Hong Kong IIRC) who had never had to prepare his own meals before and thought he would try to boil eggs in the kettle. I guess it’s an easy mistake!
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
Popular articles this week:
