I understand from sources Alex Cruz was dismissed for gross misconduct because there were no steps available for an arrival at Edinburgh on Friday night

I can remember years ago arriving on KLM at AMS one morning and taxying up to the gate. After about 10 minutes waiting and not a soul to be seen we were told to get back in our seats and then proceeded to taxi across from D26 to E26..... a mistake anyone could have made..........

In Vanguard/Comet days, aircraft handler was viewed as a responsible and reasonably well-paid job. These days it’s min-wage, fire-at -will. There’ll be no spare steps if anything goes wrong. Or spare staff to position them. Or spare anything else. Back then of course an air ticket cost massively more than today in real terms. You can’t have it all ways!

But not immediately due to a lack of steps

First of all, I’m flightcrew and I have been for nearly 20 years. This period has and will continue to be very difficult for all of us, and as a workforce, I have a lot of respect and empathy for all of my peers and what they’ve had to deal with, regardless of carrier, at this time.

That said, with my work hat off and full fare-paying passenger hat on, BA’s service level is appalling nowadays. Several recent flights as a fare-paying passenger have left me less than impressed every single time. In my opinion nothing distinguishes them from other (average at best) low cost airlines - they’ve lost their USP entirely and they do know it - that’s why they no longer refer to themselves as ‘The World’s Favourite’ - it’s because they’re not. I used to willingly pay more for a BA service because of the better service level than the low cost brigade, as tempting as they’re fares were, but they have now aligned their product (and attitude) with that of said low cost carriers, yet still have the cheek to charge (in many cases), a much higher fare - I imagine they think some will still just pay for the name (and those awful M&S sandwiches), despite no real ‘substance’ any more. This is not the fault of the crew at all and I sympathise with them because they’ve lost the tools (and quality training it seems) to be able to do their jobs as well as in years gone by. But as someone said above, an experienced crew member would hesitate to ‘tempt fate‘ and shout from the rooftops about an early arrival before actually arriving (not overhead, not landing - at the gate with parking brake set and engines shut down).

I’ve had some awful diversions with hefty ground delays (on arrival) with both Aer Lingus and Easyjet before, where ground staff/company staff/crew could have done something (anything!) to help the situation, but did absolutely nothing - it happens unfortunately, it shouldn’t happen, but is not unique to BA. It’s not the end of the world, but the frustrating part is that whichever the carrier, what they all have in common nowadays is that the cost-cutting, bonus-hungry ‘management’ just don’t seem to care one jot about customer experience and inconvenience whatsoever: cue the copied and pasted insincere standard responses of ‘it was out of
our control’, ‘our customer’s opinion means a lot to us’, ‘we’re really sorry we didn’t impress you on this occasion’, blah blah blah - whatever. I don’t bother complaining any more.

As an aside - pilot hat back on - why is it I’ve found, increasingly in recent years, that only the BA flightcrews stare at you like you’re from another planet when you say ‘good morning’ walking through the terminal? Is it the impersonal BA management culture filtering down from above? If so, what a shame. Everyone used to be so friendly, even at 5 o’clock in the morning!

Have a good day all.

I've noticed that too, all the other crew you meet are fairly friendly, but I hadn't considered it to be a morale problem, more an issue of class as highlighted by John Cleese, Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett.

In my experience, as soon as the aircraft arrives at the gate, nearly everybody jumps up, grabs their bags and queues to get out. Getting them to sit down again is not the easiest of jobs...

That was before everything was privatised and funding pubic services became akin to communism. Everything is now fragmented into subcontractors and sub, sub contractors all shaving the costs with the inevitable drop in quality.

Edinburgh is an appalling airport anyway and I am thankful I no longer have to use it. Grumpy staff and arrive there after 2200 and access to the terminal from the apron may be via busses to a distant ground evel entrance. I have waitied an hour on the a/c and another hour to get past the 2 people on passports, processing 3 or 4 a/c loads of pax. Make a polite observation about poor service and you get barked at.

If we were to venture off aviation then volumes like War & Peace are easily possible on the degeneration of this country.

Are you sure you meant shaving costs 😬

Totally agree, even living closer to Edinburgh I try to avoid it if possible and use Glasgow, they seem to be far happier to see customers and Loganair were also fantastic, could not fault the crew/pilots, great service.

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​​​​​​That does like daily fail customers who refuse to fly X airline again until the next wave of £9.99 flights lol

i cant believe this thread is at 5 pages... in the middle of one of the worlds biggest crises...

Due to the crisis you mention, many air crew have been sat on their behinds for the past 7 months... PPRuNe provides the vent we would usually reserve for cruise chatter! You did just find time out of your crisis-ridden day to trawl through the 5 pages yourself, did you not?! ;)

I take it all back. A late set of steps at Edinburgh proved to be the downfall of Alex Cruz!

I thought it would have been the Unions...

After takeoff, before landing and after landing will be made by all operators (or a variation of) because they're mandated. Although I'm not sure why, nobody seems to be able to follow the instructions anyway.

An excellent response!

Haven't I read somewhere in the many pages elsewhere here that "BA Short-Haul is 'EasyJet where the pilots wear caps'!"?

About once a fortnight, during the time of my life when I was responsible for the ground handling of our airline as well as others we handled at a busy Middle East airport, I would go into a quiet room somewhere and pray to God (in all her various forms) to spare us from gung-ho Captains who just loved to be able to say the their admiring passengers; ".....and we are going to land 35 minutes ahead of schedule!" as though this was some kind of achievement. Early arrivals are often unavoidable, I know, but there's no point to striving for them. It disrupts everyone, including passengers, and frequently simply means sitting on a patch of tarmac, engines running, while a gate is cleared and passengers launch into their social media to complain about inefficiency. Handling equipment, and the staff to work it, are not an infinite resource.

It's a shame more people don't realise this.

6 pages! have not read all so I may be wrong - has anybody mentioned the necessity for TWO sets of steps to ensure optimum social distancing. I recently flew LGW-INV-LGW with LCC and found the cabin s-d procedures to be not fit for purpose - full loads each sector. I won't go into details but in these times two sets of steps should be mandatory, together with other COVID rules including maximum loading (middle seat free?) plus cabin rules which are currently guidance only in UK. A reasonable additional ticket cost should be accepted while train fares are typically double the average flight cost for domestic and European destinations.

As a former airline employee for several decades I flew frequently - both on and off duty. Since retirement my wife and I would normally fly several times a year for leisure, however following this experience we will not be flying again anytime soon.

Airlines need to accept that this 'new normal' is for many reasons indefinite. If they wish to keep customers they should be striving to keep them feeling safe from infection, otherwise, like us, they will find other ways to travel or stay at home.

You should have a look at the BA Executive Club forum on Flyertalk, there is a 95 page thread about lounges being closed.....