Pax Going Hungry on BA
 

Gate Gourmet the supplier of long haul catering to BA have been hit by unofficial strike action resulting in the Company sacking 300 or so staff and not being able to supply BA with food for its long haul services.
I have heard that BA initially looked to use other caterers, the demise of GG has been rumoured for a while now, so presumably contingency plans in place, however BA members of staff refused to 'service', I would imagine on the baggage side, flights catered by other Companies, so BA has been obliged to fly without food....or otherwise ground flights!

BA could always rebrand as Dietair. Then they could promote themselves as the world's most fashionable airline!

No change to the short haul side then because you barely get any food nowadays anyway!

Is there a fly thru Mcdonalds around?

I agree R sole - having gone for light'n'healthy years ago, it is now hi-carb stodge designed to make you feel full rather than satisfied.

If you put one of the mini-muffins in a glass of water ,it grows/expands like wildfire - exactly what its doing in your stomach :yuk:

Much to the crews consternation,just about all flights are now return catered on shorthaul necessitating the crew having to do all the catering changes , and also meaning the loss of vital space needed for ice/water/waste.....

You should see Club Europe though, where the crew have to empty all the hot meals from a casserole dish onto a china plate, mid-cabin , all swimming in litres of sauce - its a right mess.
great fun with 80 club on a 1hr20 copenhagen - heathrow :rolleyes:

BA finally joins the real world then! Its not like the charter operators have ever had to change the catering over on turn round or have less space for ice etc.

I'll say it again. Take two bacon butties and a couple of litres of water and you'll usually eat better than a catered meal. Egg or tuna salad sarnies for the veggies.

I can bet the people up front in First Class, aren't that happy ... still they can always eat in the lounge ....

Jordan

Blimey and we talk on this forum about Ryanair bashing.

BA has a contract with a company whose staff go on strike and BA gets the static. How easy it must be to source the catering of hundreds of flights just like that. I'm sure the inflight catering industry has lots of reserve capacity in it just for just such an occasion as this...not!

Diverse....

WELL DONE! I agree with you on that, some people really have their heads up their own colons when it comes to BA Bashing! :ok:

Predictable
 

As I put in my original post this event or at least some disruption to catering was entirely predictable! Troubles at Gate Gourmet were the front page headline in Skyport, and if BA's supply chain management were not aware that is a huge failure on their part.
There was enough time to arrange SOME contingency cover for catering or have some kind of stand by plan. As I also stated in my original post when I originally heard about this the story I heard was that BA had some alternative catering arranged, however BA's unionised staff were refusing to deal with aircraft that were catered by a Company other than Gate Gourmet, effectively supporting the action of the catering staff.
So as I see it there are two scenarios...1 BA knew, made arrangements, but were stymied by the Unions...Plus ca change!! or 2 BA were either not aware or were aware and had done little to plan for this eventuality....
Having said that if the event happened this afternoon it would take time for BA to put any contingency plans into effect, so I think we will get the real answer to how BA managed the problem tomorrow when we can see whether flights are still going out without food...or if they have managed to make some provision for their pax.
On the lighter side...in economy....the pax would be better off eating at the airport restaurants with BA vouchers than eating airline food...

Now here's an idea for Qantas and BA. What about getting Boeing to build a six burner gas barbie in the back of the plane? Ventilation would be easy with an overhead hood coupled to a controllable outflow valve.

Light it after takeoff and put on the steaks, snags and chops. You could then get the Pax to form a queue, get paper plate, plastic knife and fork, bread, coleslaw and a nicely done snag or whatever plus can of VB.

Shove some plastic garbage bins at the isle ends for the leftovers.

Guess you get to draw straws to see who cleans the BBQ before landing.:E

I'm going to stick up for BA - I've flown with them a shedload, almost exclusively down the back (once or twice been upgrade when flying with my mother), and the food isn't that bad at all ... if you want bad food, you should try some school cantines.

Jordan

dont even think about it...
 

Its already been done.....aircraft burned out on runway....buggered barbi....Bumz

This could be classed as highly illegal secondary action. The GG staff were on unofficial strike. BA staff have no right to refuse to deal with other caterers. BA would be perfectly within their rights to discipline or sack anyone who refused to work/deal with alternative caterers.

I would be surprised if Skippy or WW would not look to use this as a (legitimate) excuse to get rid of a few troublemakers without having to make any pay-off.

Gaza

Seconded, I'm at the coalface at the moment and the rumour that some BA staff are in some way supporting the strike is co*****lers.

And as others have said - give BA a break, their main/only LHR catering supplier goes Tango Uniform and immediately the smart backsides here are over BA like a Rash......contingency plans are being used, but getting 100% onboard catering in place isn't going to happen overnight; or would the BA bashers just prefer BA to cancel services to give them more ammunition?

Rant over, it's been a long night.

80 club on a Copenhagen?

If memory serves me right there is a union limit on the amount of clubpax on sh. And it is lower than half of that figure.

Anyway: What do you need to stuff your face on a sh flight for?
You don't eat because you're hungry, you eat because you're bored!
The AlldayDeli in economy is perfectly adequate for flights under 2hours.
Only the greedy sods ask for two boxes and two cans of beer on a MAN-LHR.
As for lh BA can't be faulted, the food is good enough. What exactly do you expect????
I'm sure once you arrive at your destination you will more than make up your culinary deficits at all those lovely top class gourmet restaurants you are used to!

Now: the catering has been defended here, not the management.

Maximum Club Configurations on BA s/haul aircraft:



767- C-134 M-93

757-C-105 M-54

734-C-103 M-13

319-C-75 M-36

320-C-110 M-16

321-C-49 M-134

So 80 C pax on a CPH is possible on all a/c but the 319 & 321.

AMS/BRU on a Friday eveing will frequently attract 70-75 C class on a Monday am or Friday pm 319 flight, DME any day of the week will always have 80-100 C class on a 767/320 on average. Crew levels vary with C class load and extra crew are added if the load justifies.....the only time crew would limit the number of C pax is on a return sector and ground staff had exceeded the BA defined Crew/Pax ratios, and the number of extra pax would affect service levels on board significantly. This only happens when handling staff don't check the crewing levels and move passengers from earlier/later flights/LGW flts etc & all in all is pretty rare.

11th August - no food on any BA LHR flights.
 

From ba.com

Catering disruption at London Heathrow

Summary
We are currently experiencing disruption to our in flight catering due to unofficial industrial action by Gate Gourmet staff who supply our catering at London Heathrow.


More information
Gate Gourmet is British Airways' sole catering supplier at Heathrow Airport and we received no warning that industrial action would take place. Contingency plans have been activated and we continue to operate flights as planned.

As a consequence of the industrial action, all British Airways flights departing from and arriving into London Heathrow on Thursday 11 August will have no catering onboard, but will operate as planned.

We are making arrangements for limited catering to be provided on the ground prior to departure for affected flights. Customers are strongly advised to eat before leaving for the airport or to allow extra time at the airport to eat.

All other British Airways flights that do not operate in or out of London Heathrow are unaffected and will operate as planned.

We apologise to those customers who are affected by this action but, regrettably, this is a situation beyond our control.

Often because it's the only time in the day when you've got enough downtime to eat anything. It's nice to be able to plan to use the time on board for eating, so that you don't have to waste other time during the day for that.

Sorry, but that's just from the lowly perspective of a humble piece of SLF.