Went on the new service to Belfast City on Tuesday, an interesting flight, starting at the LCY terminal.
Here we are at the front door. In pole position on the bus stop are parked two unattended police cars. They are just standing idle, not involved in attending an incident. Now I can quite imagine the police’s reaction if I left my car there, why should they get away with it ?
What airline am I on ? The ticket says “Air France”, but then “Operated by CityJet”. It is in fact operated by Scot Airways. And once on board the skipper follows his script and welcomes us to “Air France in association with KLM”. For goodness sake how many airlines does it take to provide a service ? It’s not an idle point, because whose AOC am I on, whose insurance am I on, and which regulatory authority is responsible ? French, Irish or UK ?
Here comes check-in. Air France refuse to check you in at the desk (which is titled CityJet), which is nothing more than a Fast Bag Drop (which we all know is a Slow Bag Drop) and you must go to the centre of the concourse and use the check-in machine (which is titled Air France). Now I have used this confounded Air France machine many times before. I call it “The bo11ocks machine”. The software, being French, is about as counter-intuitive as you can get (in contrast to the BA and BMI ones which are well done), with all the French quirks like icons called “Validate”. It is so illogical it requires a full-time attendant to intervene as you go through. There are longwinded security questions you really have to study to understand if the answer is Yes or No. Now our company designs software for a living, but if any of the team put something together as illogical as this they would be out on their ear.
Once in possession of a boarding card, back to Slow Bag Drop where exactly the same security questions are asked all over again. Whatever for ? And then I am told the belt is out of order and I must take my bag to the window at the end. So what do they achieve in this step ? Precisely nothing.
Incidentally, it would help CityJet’s cause if they could handle UK domestic passengers with staff who were capable of speaking English. It seems to be the Air France training school for bored Parisiennes.
Upstairs to security, the usual LCY efficiency. Good. It is only marred by two scowling cops (possibly the ones who left their police cars on the bus stop) with fingers tapping itchily on their machine guns. It certainly inspires confidence as an air traveller to see I can be double-machine gunned in an instant.
Down to the gate, number 10 (alias the Portakabin). Here we find there are nine pax on the flight (and there were eight on the return). Seemingly an improvement on opening day. To handle these nine pax takes four Air France gate staff, though as you would imagine one does all the work and the other three stand idly with open mouths.
Out to the aircraft, up and away reasonably to time (Mrs WHBM
has come down to the other side of the dock to wave). The steward was a professional and decent chap trying his best to make sense of the extraordinary Air France bar stock he was provided with. Poor chap. Gin & Tonic ? Well, I could have a tonic but Air France do not do gin. They do however do whisky. With lemonade ? No. With ginger ale then ? No. But there’s Coca-Cola. Good. Rum and Coke please. They do not do Rum. Actually I have to apologise to the poor chap if he is reading this because my wisecracks as this all unfurled were making him want to laugh, but he was trying to maintain a professional standard of service. What a nonsense.
Oh, and pathetic little bags of French savouries. But more sad was that hidden in the overheads above seats 9DF (I noticed it on boarding) was a great basket of Scot’s shortbreads and tablet, staples of the Edinburgh run but which Air France doubtless prohibit them from offering on the Belfast route.
But the greatest stupidity came at the Belfast end. We parked on the stand furthest from the terminal, were bussed in, and waited for our bags. And waited. We were the only seven pax left in the terminal, last arrival of the day. Eventually it transpired that the crew had locked up the aircraft and left, but the bags were still on board. Now you never quite know what the situation really is. Did the crew hotfoot it too soon to get to their hotel and the end of the football ? Did the ground handlers not go out in time, for the same reason. But we waited 40 minutes for the seven bags to turn up.
While waiting and waiting in arrivals I find the only publicity for the service I have seen. A messy little stack of leaflets describing the service has been left on a table. I have the time to tidy them up.
Oh Merlyn, you have got into bed with the French but you must be writhing at what is happening under the Scot name.