bmi upgrades on longhaul

[pollypocket36]

I'm staff for bmi and have travelled to the US with us a fair few times. I must say that out of MAN, upgrades are RARE, pratically non existant. Comparing us to BA, you rarely se a BA staff member in Economy class on leisure travel unless that was the only seat spare. We all work hard, no matter what airline we work for and when on leisure travel a perk is to be bumped up the front. However, when we travel on our own airline (in smart clothes) we don't even get rewarded!!! It makes me so angry.

Whenever I've travelled from LHR, and various other bases an upgrade is almost (usually on the ground) instant. Why the big difference at MAN? Longhaul is nothing special, just an extra perk. So CSMs, no 1s and crew from MAN longhaul, look on the PIL and if staff are on board and you've space in "the business" do something about it. I'm sure you'd expect it when you travel!!!

bmi girl

[Little Blue]

Hey, Polly?
Yr obviously talking to the wrong people !!
Are you talking about travelling on yr annual frees,
or just standby?
But never "expect"!! It is precisely what you say it is..
a "perk"...!
Saying that, I'm usually happy with a sarnie and a beer
down the back !!
LB !
;)

[Stickies]

pollypocket36

Hardly ever see a BA staff member in economy (world traveller)? I am lucky enough to have access to BA staff travel (have had for the last 26 years) and I can assure you that upgrades are not lightly or freely given and I have seen MANY staff *down the back*. It is true, however, that they are good with upgrades IF there is no other space available.

[SLF3]

How about upgrading your frequent fliers before your staff?

[pollypocket36]

I do agree with what you are al saying and perhaps "expect" was the wrong word to use. However, when
"frequent flyers", gold and silver card holders have been upgraded, if enough space, they should establish if any staff are on board. I work at LHR and its done quite alot there. Don't get me wrong, not all the time but more frequent than not. You come across some No 1s that do it all the time and some that never. However, I've worked for bmi for some years and its like getting blood from a stone with reference to a longhaul upgrade. Shorthaul is again instant, so why the difference between long and shorthaul. Do you see where I'm coming from? I've no probs with sitting down the back. I'm glad to be on the flight. However, when all the upgrades have been done and the flights is pratically empty with 1-5 staff on stby (a number of times I've travelled), it's a bit of a let down when you are all put down the back.

I don't mean to offend anybody who works at MAN longhaul I'm just pointing out a feeling.

Polly

[Little Blue]

Hey Polly...next time I see u in Crew Dispatch, I'll give u a
few names to speak to @ MAN !!
Not that I recognise you from yr sign -in !!!
Ops monkey

[bmimainline]

However, when all the upgrades have been done and the flights is pratically empty with 1-5 staff on stby (a number of times I've travelled), it's a bit of a let down when you are all put down the back.

Polly, I think I can explain this one and you have answered your own question. There is a good reason why upgrades are not given, in particular when the flight is empty, it is simply to make sure there is a sensible ratio of full fare pax to staff in the business cabin in particular.

If I remember correctly there are 24 seats in 'The business' which BTW is without doubt the best longhaul product out of the UK at the moment, if there were say 5 full fare pax, you would not expect them to upgrade 15 staff even if they were on their free firms, well I wouldn't anyway. So infact, what you want is the flight to be quite busy cos the more there are in 'The Business' the greater the chance of an upgrade subject to a seat available. It does of course depend on who is on 'on the day' but there is a pretty good bunch of people working behind the scenes at MAN. I am sure they help out whenever they can.

Good luck next time !

How about upgrading your frequent fliers before your staff?

SLF3
Do you get any perks where you work mate ? Cos, if you do, you will understand why staff can be upgraded b4 frequent fliers. Long may it continue. If you want to fly in 'The Business' then get your travel dept to buy a ticket.

Thanks for flying bmi !

[SLF3]

The perk is the cheap ticket you are travelling on.

No, I don't get any perks where I work. I get club over four hours, economy otherwise. I'm often upgraded (about 1 in 3) on the short haul flights, and thus all things being equal fly with the airline that provides my frequent flyer card. If you routinely upgrade staff before me, I don't get upgraded and have no incentive to fly with you.

And yes, passengers do notice, because invariably the crew look after their mates first, or even worse spend most of the flight chatting to them, and the service detiorates for the paying punter. Doesn't happen? I can give you an example from BMI.............

[YYC F/A]

SLF3.

When travelling (Business Class) on a UA flight as a non-rev, I was asked by the ground staff to move to another seat as there was a pax who was sitting in a seat with inoperable audio/IFE, and so I was moved to the defective seat and the full fare pax was moved to my (working) seat. I moved without so much as a murmur, but when settling into my new seat, the pax sitting next to me sussed that I was a non-rev.

"How come you get to sit up here in Business on a staff ticket when I pay X$$ to sit here?" she demanded.

I was about to formulate a tactful reply, but the Purser, a flight attendant with 20+ years with UA happened to be standing adjacent. She leant over, and what she said really hit it home.

"Madam. When you fly on United, we give you frequent flyer points to say 'thank you' for flying United, to reward you, and to give you an incentive to fly us again. You can use those frequent flyer points for upgrades to Business class, or for free tickets.

As a United employee, we are fortunate enough to get some privileges. We work hard, the pay isn't the best, but part of being in the industry is some well earned travel benefits. And when there are empty seats up front here after all the upgrades are processed, we are given the privilege and 'reward' of sitting up front.

Now, I have purchased Ford cars all my life. I always and only buy Ford. But do you think that Ford recognises my loyalty? Do they give me a Free Car after so many purchased? Do they give me a free 'upgrade' when I buy a lower grade car to a nicer more fancy model. Of course not. But if I worked for Ford, do you think I'd get a great deal on a Ford car. You bet I would. Do I begrudge that? No.

So when all is said and done, I don't think it's too rough a deal when one of our own get's the chance from time to time to get a little special treatment.




SLF - Do I agree with 'detoriating service' because of working crew spending too much time chatting with Non Revs. No, of course not. But if you (or your company) have opted to purchase a cheapy ticket rather than paying for the Business class service, AND you have opted not to upgrade using the points that said airline gave you for free to reward you for your custom... should you still begrudge a staff member sitting in an otherwise empty seat?

You say "if you routinely upgrade staff before me, do I have any incentive to fly you?". I don't know a carrier out there who would say 'No' to you using your points to upgrade to Business Class several day before travel because they wanted to 'keep' seats for staff. Even 'on the day', at United (who has one of the 'best' employee upgrade programmes), they will ALWAYS accommodate on the day upgrades first before staff are accommodated.

And finally, in closing, I would remind you that on our 'cheap' tickets, we travel 'sub load'. These 'cheap' tickets, especially ID90's, are often not much less or sometimes even more than the cheapy advance purchase tickets you can buy from some Travel Agents or the Internet. Yet, for this 'privilige', we get to go standby. So if the flight is full, we get left behind. Paying for our own hotels trying (in some cases) for days to get on a flight. If the flight were to make a detour due to weather or mechanical problems, us sub load pax would have to sort ourselves out while 'regular' pax are given hotels or alternative transportation. So when all is said and done, I don't feel an iota of guilt about sitting up front. Many many companies give their employees perks of some sort, and hearing constant employee bashing about sitting up front feels somewhat unjustified.

[jbird11]

Hey come on folks...

We should all be grateful, we all know that airlines polcies have changed over the years to cut costs and so forth. When travelling on free tkts this to me is a perk and much appreciated and I am very happy to be sitting in prem econ. Staff sometimes stand out like a sore thumb and it is very obvious to other paying pax. BMI longhual routes I imagine are steadily busy with bmi staff on free and zz tkts so I guess they have to draw the line somewhere. Also if there are a few staff on sby it wouldnt be fair to upgrade you and your partner and not everyone else.

Also smile, be thankful and appreciate what is given. Besides Sitting in econ or prem econ can often be better fun, I always find you get a few more bottles of wine:) ok you dont have the choice but so wot :D

Staff travel is not the same as it was years ago when you could walk straight onto a flight, with todays competive prices, flights are always busy and it is a gamble whether you get on or not let alone fussing about upgrades

[flymeagain]

dear pollypocket,
As a Flight Supervisor on Longhaul out of Man, i can assure you that it's not that we don't want to upgrade staff but more that the powers that be, (all be it K.B Amcc, and T.L.) would hang draw and quarter anyCSM or fltSup if they upgrade anyone other than those who are on the free firm ticket. not only that but staff have in the past been taking the **** such as being very demanding with the crew, asking revenue pax to move so they can sit together, and evan clicking fingers to crew for more champagne, I could go on!! its not that we don't want to upgrade, we want everyone to see the service in The Business, but ask the managers!!!

[YYC F/A]

My understanding (at Bmi at least) is that you can pay a bit more for a Business standby ticket, so the issue is not that staff shouldn't be up there, it seems to be that you have to pay more to get up there.

Like previously, UA allows (appropriately attired, and with fairly comprehensive 'rules' and guidelines) it's staff to sit up in C or even F class, but you pay more for the privilege than flying in Y.

So if the same programme that used to exist at bmi is still in place, you CAN sit up front, you just have to cough up a bit more for the privilege, and I don't think that's too much to ask.

In any event, when I was working on the bmi longhaul product design etc, there were a number of managers (SG comes to mind) who were adamant that staff should not get to go up front at all as they 'detract' from the product. While those views might have made Cabin Services management so strict on on board upgrades, I'm glad that someone in staff travel was decent enough to make it possible for staff to travel up front (provided they pay for it).

At BA, I understand you don't have the option to even pay more for C class, and if it's calculated on ID90, then you're paying quite a bit more then bmi staff pay on the service charge tickets.

[pollypocket36]

Hi everyone, thanks for all your replies. They have made me think. I agree and disagree with several points made. I'm not saying that we should be upgraded EVERY time we fly, but every now and again. In addition, if we've never experienced it, how can we promote it?

With regards to crew being demanding and requesting pax to move, I totally agree that this is totally out of order. However, we are not all like that. All I'm saying is that once in a while it would be nice to be in business as yes," we do work very hard and the pay isn't the best in the world".

Thanks for all your replies guys. It nice to have a discussion without all the cat fighting.

Polly xx

[av8rboyz]

It would be great to bump all our fellow flyers into the business cabin ...................however this is not company policy.
All CSM's and NO.1's do their upmost to upgrade our staff there are some reasons why!!

The ground staff in manchester physically check who is in that cabin and on arrival in the US the united ground staff do the same. Some of the crew also land the CSM in the :mad: by telling the management that upgrades have been given onboard!!! Therefore we are being stabbed in the back by our own fellow work mates!!!!!!

As a CSM I don't like being dragged into the office to explain why I have upgraded employees.

If you all kept your mouths shut and your fellow work mates were trust worthy then you would get an upgrade, as you all don't and can't then the upgrades don't happen.

By the way you can buy a business class standby which is very cheap for bmi employees. In fact its better than some other airlines employee discounts!!!

The last time I upgraded an employee on flight bd 705 man-ord 25/ 03/ 04 into the business cabin he was very rude!!! Asked for more food than was available and then complained when we couldn't give him what he wanted, as full fare get first choice of meals. Then preceeded to tell the rev pax next to him how crap he tought the airline was, told them how much he had paid for the staff ticket and then said to the full fare pax that he was stupid to have paid so much money for his ticket!!!

So how can we weed out the idiots from the sensible staff!!

[greenpark]

slf 3

If you are not an airline employee you have no business being on this forum.The posting is about staff upgrades, not about regular passengers.If you have a comment to make adress it directly to the airlines in question. I m sure their customer services agents will have suitable replies for your grudges and jealousy against airline employees.
Also, if it is the company you work for who pays for the tickets ( and the money s not coming out of your own pocket), they are the only ones with legitimacy to complain about their staff being upgraded, not you.

[baboy]

Pollypocket36,

I am so sorry to say this, never ask for or expect an upgrade.
I have been very lucky especially in the last 2 years to have only flown economy 3 sectors out of about 20 and have ONLY ever been upgrade at the gate. Yes it is great to get the upgrade, but because most of all I just want to get on flights to see my friends.
This post is not meant to be nasty to you (my parents first trip on standby was spent split up on a 11 hr LAX-LHR Economy flt)
and that was no fun, but we were glad to get back home.
Concessions are GREAT and I personally never take them for granted, as I use them about 15 times a year and wouldnt have been able to see and do some of the stuff I have done without them.
ALL I CAN SAY ...... ENJOY YOUR CONCESSIONS