BA Euroflyer
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From what I hear, the ex-Level/Vueling COO is at the heart of all of these problems. I don't hear anything positive there, but Flight Ops seems to be operating in tandem with the mothership much more closely than Cabin Services. CC rosters are awful and the other problem is that commission at BAEF is much lower than you would get at easyJet - so many have left eJ for BAEF and then gone back again after a couple of rosters and a couple of pay packets. They'll not manage to crew A321s at this rate.
Join Date: Jan 2008
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Surely this situation needs to be sorted quickly! Planes are full and yield I hear is good so time to move someone on or out.
Surely paying decent commission, giving food and having reasonable roosters is about good management and building a happy team.
I can't believe BA management will allow this mess to continue with the summer season approaching for the sake of a few pounds!
Surely someone must realise this has been going on for too long!
Surely paying decent commission, giving food and having reasonable roosters is about good management and building a happy team.
I can't believe BA management will allow this mess to continue with the summer season approaching for the sake of a few pounds!
Surely someone must realise this has been going on for too long!
Agree with everything you say. Unfortunately it continues. The “meeting” that took place yesterday shows we are HUGELY undercrewed, and that rosters going forward into March and April will only get worse before they get better.
I’m not sure how the current 6/2 pattern with 7 minimum days off per month can get any worse.
I’m not sure how the current 6/2 pattern with 7 minimum days off per month can get any worse.
"I can't believe BA management will allow this mess to continue with the summer season approaching for the sake of a few pounds!"
It's all about "a few pounds" as far as management are concerned
It's all about "a few pounds" as far as management are concerned
Join Date: Feb 2016
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I know IAG like to move executives around the group but the LEVEL / Vueling influence is not encouraging.
I remember many years ago before Alex Cruz moved to BA, there was a quote from him in an internal BA news article that Vueling’s 40% attrition rate for crew was “by design”.
The fact that BA thought to put this in an internal communication obviously went down badly with crew at the time.
I remember many years ago before Alex Cruz moved to BA, there was a quote from him in an internal BA news article that Vueling’s 40% attrition rate for crew was “by design”.
The fact that BA thought to put this in an internal communication obviously went down badly with crew at the time.
Join Date: Mar 2011
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Just back from a round trip to Malta from Gatwick on the recently "transferred" A321s. Great flight and top crew. Even better was the Gatwick South Terminal arrival experience. Starting to favour this over Heathrow T5 now.
Anyway, with 2 x A321s now in the fleet so far and a slowly increasing build up to the summer schedule, are things improving at BAEF? I see BA are leasing in 3 x Avion Express A320s for the peak summer season, i guess this will help out with crewing levels, perhaps whilst they continue to recruit and train for their own metal.
with 5 x more shorthaul config A321ceos still currently stored in MAD, I guess if the operation continues to be successful and passenger numbers increase then all of the BA 321ceos would transfer over to LGW.
Anyway, with 2 x A321s now in the fleet so far and a slowly increasing build up to the summer schedule, are things improving at BAEF? I see BA are leasing in 3 x Avion Express A320s for the peak summer season, i guess this will help out with crewing levels, perhaps whilst they continue to recruit and train for their own metal.
with 5 x more shorthaul config A321ceos still currently stored in MAD, I guess if the operation continues to be successful and passenger numbers increase then all of the BA 321ceos would transfer over to LGW.
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I see BA are leasing in 3 x Avion Express A320s for the peak summer season, i guess this will help out with crewing levels, perhaps whilst they continue to recruit and train for their own metal.
Do we know how many months they will be leasing in the Avion express A320's and for what routes are they going to operate.
Do we know how many months they will be leasing in the Avion express A320's and for what routes are they going to operate.
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i'd say highly unlikely considering the lack of aircraft and crew... if anything they could operate charters or high-peak scheduled routes for short periods like BA Cityflyer and even mainline do AKA - MAN-IBZ etc... However, i'd say the regions are currently well covered for the types of route they'd probably offer.
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Interestingly, BA are temporarily moving NUE/PSA/VLC from Heathrow to Gatwick in early April.
https://twitter.com/londonairtravel/...9nzZ0zwTbRWkkw
https://twitter.com/londonairtravel/...9nzZ0zwTbRWkkw
I'm hazarding a guess that this temporary move is to help alleviate the ground handling staffing issues at Heathrow.
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It would be good if they could operate to the Mediterranean from Manchester as though there are many flights to that area from Manchester by the likes of Jet 2 they keep all the best slots and times for their holiday business now and you end up flying early morning and late night as a result.
As there are quite a few people with properties down that way I think they would be pleasantly surprised at the take up.
Cheers
Mr Mac
As there are quite a few people with properties down that way I think they would be pleasantly surprised at the take up.
Cheers
Mr Mac
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It would be good if they could operate to the Mediterranean from Manchester as though there are many flights to that area from Manchester by the likes of Jet 2 they keep all the best slots and times for their holiday business now and you end up flying early morning and late night as a result.
As there are quite a few people with properties down that way I think they would be pleasantly surprised at the take up.
Cheers
Mr Mac
As there are quite a few people with properties down that way I think they would be pleasantly surprised at the take up.
Cheers
Mr Mac
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Just back from a round trip to Malta from Gatwick on the recently "transferred" A321s. Great flight and top crew. Even better was the Gatwick South Terminal arrival experience. Starting to favour this over Heathrow T5 now.
Anyway, with 2 x A321s now in the fleet so far and a slowly increasing build up to the summer schedule, are things improving at BAEF? I see BA are leasing in 3 x Avion Express A320s for the peak summer season, i guess this will help out with crewing levels, perhaps whilst they continue to recruit and train for their own metal.
with 5 x more shorthaul config A321ceos still currently stored in MAD, I guess if the operation continues to be successful and passenger numbers increase then all of the BA 321ceos would transfer over to LGW.
Anyway, with 2 x A321s now in the fleet so far and a slowly increasing build up to the summer schedule, are things improving at BAEF? I see BA are leasing in 3 x Avion Express A320s for the peak summer season, i guess this will help out with crewing levels, perhaps whilst they continue to recruit and train for their own metal.
with 5 x more shorthaul config A321ceos still currently stored in MAD, I guess if the operation continues to be successful and passenger numbers increase then all of the BA 321ceos would transfer over to LGW.
We are hoping the Avion aircraft take the pressure off somewhat, however Heathrow have been operating a large chunk of flying recently and that too helped, although I don’t expect they will be able to keep up that level through the summer (One day last week, 15 of 23 flights were LHR cabin crew).
Crewing levels are still wholly unacceptable, while they claim to have “fixed” the 6/2 problem, many crew still continue to find themselves operating 6 in a row, EasyJet, Norse Atlantic and Virgin just sent out new rounds of training start dates, and I believe around 50/60, yes you read that correctly, are on their way out of here to those airlines by the time May rolls around, which is the biggest issue we will face, especially Norse, almost everybody who started at EF pre-Summer 2022, who came from other airlines and are considered experienced, are on their way to Norse.
Add to this the fact that recruitment has sloped off lately, with less and less people coming through the door.
But things are slowly improving, very very slowly, at times it often feels like 1 step forward and 2 steps backwards, but we’ll get there.
In terms of flying, it’s clear to see changes in terms of rostering, since last month. The issue now lays with the crewing numbers, if they can’t fill the gap now opened up by the crew leaving for EZY/Titan/Virgin/Norse, I fear we might find ourselves in the same position as before.
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Don’t know who we p*ssed off, but the CAA are lurking and boarding almost daily now for past week.
Cabin crew interrogations and failure to supply suitable answers are too, unfortunately, daily.
Cabin crew interrogations and failure to supply suitable answers are too, unfortunately, daily.