A Very British Airline?

[kirungi1]

Mr Mac

#119 is another great post but how I wish I could win you back for BA. Your business over the years and in the future defines this company. IMHO, management runs the company as a portfolio of customers with the purpose of maximising the value of customer relationship. Therefore it's critical to understand how your experience in the present can serve as an indication of the future behaviour and thus customer feedbacks and surveys. It's from this information and others that BA makes predictions for it's operations in high impact area.

BA's target is to be efficient with it's SH operations to feed the LH routes from LGW & LHR using cost effective means (fleet choice) in line with competition. I will understand why EK will use an A380 up north while BA will use an A380 to say Los Angles - long haul. Would EK operate an A380 from Dubai to Doha? I'm not too sure! It's essential BA ulitlises London effectively just as say EK makes good use of Dubai as hub.
For a company to operate in such a crowded air space and airport (LHR) with high fixed costs and competing with heavily subsidised companies while operating flights worldwide, I think deserves a mark of respect and admiration. It's that spirit of innovation and resiliency, that creativity and toughness that is captioned in that "A Very British Airline". It's also worth to note that British human resource personnel has revitalised aviation worldwide and so has character and attitude. EK and the "Unmentionable airline" have hugely benefited from this right from top management.
That said, I agree and accept with your fine words and correct me where you can as I'm here to learn.

[Mr Mac]

Kirungi 1
Ok I will bite, and give you a quick synopsis of my last 3nr LH haul BA flights to Nairobi ,Boston and JFK which were the straw that broke this camels back, bearing in mind I was already using EK/SQ for LH going east. All flights in Business or should have been.


New York
Man - LHR ok. Outbound to JFK gave up seat to Chairman as his in flight screen broken. Food patchy, and in comparison with SQ very poor(had flown back from lion city 2 days previous so good comparison). Chairman's bags lost !. Very unhappy with BA and me (why me ?, I wanted to fly Lufthansa !). Bags turned up 24hrs later in JFK - we were in Chicago by then !. My bag caught me up 3 days later. Chairmans never seen again !. Return from Philadelphia was ok, with Chairmans new carry on making journey with him, mine in hold I thought - silly me !, returned 24hrs later by "Fred" the white van man.


Nairobi flight
Outbound virtually accused of being an alcoholic for asking for some champagne to make a Bucks fizz at 10.00am by BA T5 ground staff in Club Lounge. Had serious conversation thinking it was a joke - it was not !. In flight entertainment unavailable as screen broke, food poor. CC who I went to speak (I was bored) were complaining about new T&C and rosters, with not a good word about their employer / carrier. Return flight duty free Gin confiscated (bought in Nairobi DUTY FREE) at T5 due to going on to internal flight to Manchester, and should have been told by BA staff in Nairobi according to security T5. Bags did not make connection to shuttle and returned early following day - coffee with "Fred" again, he takes 2 sugars, as I knew him well then, and likes digestives !.


Boston
Flight MAN - LHR delayed due to high wind so connection looking tight. BA got me on flight but no bags, which I can understand, as not BA issue. Not getting my bag for 3 days was their issue. Bag showed up in hotel when BA still saying it was in LHR - GO FIGURE. Return flight got down graded due to over booking (was flying on air miles) at the time, asked for Premium Economy and ended up in Economy. I asked for emergency exit and was told by BA ground staff at Boston "Honey you would have to be here 5 hrs ago to get those seats" !. Flight ok but no comment from CC on my situation, apart from shrug of shoulders, and told to take it up with BA upon my return. LHR - MAN more biscuit's for "Fred" with bag turning up at 8.00pm approx., after normal 05.30 approx LHR arrival.


To put this in context I was a Gold/Silver card holder with BA at the time as well as Silver /Gold with SQ/EK/LH. I have never met a "Fred" from any of those carriers either at home or overseas. I have not been down graded (or up graded yet either !) .They get me were I want to go, with my belongings, with in flight entertainment that works / reasonable meals, from my local airport, with staff, which by and large, are pretty good, with 1nr bad experience with EK as stated earlier.


I really do hope you get BA better, but count yourselves lucky that you are a London based carrier, which is currently the only fully thriving UK economy and you have most of the slots. If you are flying into Europe going via LHR from MAN is generally the long way around. Going further East the Mid East 3 and SQ pretty well cover it for me. Going West and South I use Lufty. Does some times feel odd when going West back over my house at FL38 but I do not go there often . I and my now ex Chairman no longer fly with you, as he pulled company account shortly after his North American adventure. Best of luck with BA. I do agree with you about British expertise running foreign carriers like EK, but does make you wonder why they could not make it in the UK. On the plus side Kirungi 1 Mrs Mac still uses BA to cross the pond once a month, so you have not lost both of us. Happy cone trails.


Regards
Mr Mac

[Hand Solo]

Now I know this is only one point out of many but do you really think its BAs fault that the duty free you bought in Nairobi was confiscated by Heathrow security staff? Would you really expect cabin crew to police the duty free purchases customers bring on board then correlate them with onward connections to determine which purchases comply with regulations?

[kirungi1]

Hand solo

I'm going to agree with Mr Mac on the issue you have picked on. In the environment where the buyer has power than the seller, it can only be right that BA provides it's customers with sufficient information otherwise the customers have a lot of choice. BA staff at Nairobi (at the boarding gates) should/would know the regulations and indeed think ahead of what awaited Mr Mac at T5.
Had someone taken responsibility, perhaps we wouldn't know Mr Mac's other passion and interest.



Mr Mac

I have a lot to learn from your post and I think it's fair to say that your circumstances defy the saying that "it takes two to tangle". Clearly you've met your part of the contract and IMHO, BA hasn't always done as expected. And I can Understand your frustration and withdraw of business.No one wishes to repeat a bad experience. It is vital that BA delivers you to the agreed destination with your baggage and on time as minimum requirement and perhaps we would be talking only about the on board experience.

Can I ask; Has BA sought feed back on your travels over the years or has some one called you or written to you personally? (at any one point say on line, in the lounge, check-in/boarding gate, in flight or call at home)
A sincere apology or effort to remedy a bad situation goes a long way and it's also a tool for learning how to prevent future problems by understanding first hand what BA is doing wrong so that managers learn how to coach and train employees to prevent same problems occurring again.
Obviously, BA is paying the opportunity cost of not getting your complaints instead of dealing with your complaints in the first place. Every customer is valuable but you being a Gold/Silver member and taking that to competition is bad and worse the fact that you wouldn't recommend BA. I treasure Mrs Mac for her loyalty and it's something to build again from. Some people say Mistresses are arbiters of good taste

Your delayed baggage claims are unarguable and it's unfortunate that those things have happened. I'm not going to make light of this but airport security, especially to and through New York, has had a hand in these delays. You will ask if the same applied with competition and again I will not know but this has happened to me a few times too.

coffee with "Fred" again, he takes 2 sugars, as I knew him well then, and likes digestives !.

Your mark of humility - it's not a perfect world. Thanks for that. But, does BA want to do better? I think they do after all they have always tried. The future is an extrapolation of the past add some few variables like technology and is BA integrating this? again, I think they are? BA is a leader in this industry and will always be. What Mrs Mac is doing here is following that old adage that history has a tendency of repeating itself.
Mr Mac, have you ever imagined a time when oil will have dried up and competition is even? (especially middle East). There is also a lot of research ongoing about these bio fuels.

I would like to work for BA one day but I don't want to be motivated by money in this. It has to be passion. Your experience of staff unhappiness with T & C again was/is unfortunate because employees have a lot to do with customer satisfaction. I think staff owe BA some loyalty and in good or bad times they have to weather with it just like Mrs Mac has kept her loyalty. Has BA done mistake with labour contracts in the past? I might not be the right one for this (United Airlines has had this issue for years).

I'm going to write to BA about this and if I have your permission, it would be fantastic to reference you in. Winning you back for BA is a challenge but I find a perfect opportunity in it.

[Hand Solo]

Kirrungi - There are no BA staff at the boarding gate in Nairobi, only Swissport. The Duty Free shop is remote from the BA gate and is not controlled by BA. I would suggest its the personal responsibility of the traveller to understand the restrictions on carrying liquids, particularly if transferring through any UK airport. Unless the gin was bought on board the BA aircraft there's nothing the cabin crew can do to assist, it won't be permitted through a UK airport security channel. Whilst Mr Mac has some valid points, some of the complaints are simply the reality of modern air travel with any carrier and are certainly not unique to BA. I recently chatted at length with a former Emirates steward who now worked for BA. He found it ironic that BA passengers often complained that things were better on EK as when he'd crewed the Emirates UK routes he often encountered passengers complaining that things were better on BA!

[kirungi1]

Hand Solo

You have very original grounds and have supported your opinion satisfactorily IMVHO. I find your post very educative especially if one has to ask if customer is always right or should customer run the company?
Basing on your facts, I want to thank you and like to withdraw my defence for Mr Mac
I stand to be corrected but haven't I seen BA ground staff supervising outstation at boarding gates with instructions on liquids in the past? Wouldn't the same apply for Nairobi? (only an observation).

[Capetonian]

I had a very nasty dispute with BA a number of years ago and consequently strenuously avoided flying on them, particularly out of the station where the events occurred. About 5 years down the road, I checked in for a flight to CPT at T5 and the check in agent must have looked at my FF record and seen that having once flown a lot with them, I had stopped. She asked why and I very briefly explained. She seemed genuinely concerned and asked if she could send a customer service agent to chat to me in the lounge.

Clearly, there are individuals within BA who do care about pleasing customers and who are proud of who they work for, but as an organisation I feel they fall very short of excellent service delivery.

[kirungi1]

Capetonian

How refreshing it is from your fine words after your contact with a customer service agent - some good stuff,yeeee.... I can only sympathise with your other experience.

BA has recently won the UK Top brand award so it's my hope that this will pull the organisation to work together and then the individuals will thrive not the other way round.

Can we hear more of those memorable experiences please, perhaps..... never know, someone is/will read them.

[Mr Mac]

All
To make things Gin clear the products were purchased in Nairobi duty free after check in and first X-Ray. As I am used to travelling in 3rd world I asked if there were any restrictions at that point with transfer, as I have had this before, and that time did not purchase the aforementioned Gin. This time I was told there was no issue by check in staff. If these are Swissport employees working for BA, in BA uniform, then surley they are an extension of BA and should be aware of issues as they only have 1 flight a day now. Any way I think the Gin / champagne are minor issue compared with other problems that I recounted.


Handsolo
Your comment about the other issues being common on all carriers I would have to disagree with as I have yet to encounter any problems like those mentioned with the carriers I now use. Maybe I have been lucky ?. For an example of customer service I will give you Lufty who when the Icelandic volcano blew up transferred me from Frankfurt where I had arrived from Man, to Munich (no ash cloud there) to make a connection to China in a well driven 4 door Porsche with bags and 3 other passengers. My colleagues who were with the worlds favourite airline did not get there. That,s what I call going the extra mile.


Capetonian
I agree some staff do care but I gave up a long time ago trying to get in touch with BA about issues and just chose not to use them as many of my friends and colleagues do in the North of England. However as Mrs M has not had any issues recently (she only goes for 2 days and has carry on) therefore has not met "Fred" yet.


Regards
Mr Mac

[Hand Solo]

Mr Mac,

I'm a little confused as to where (and indeed when) you bought the gin? From your information I'm concluding that you bought it from the official airport Duty Free shop on the departures level and before the second security point at the boarding gate. This leaves me a little confused as they normally confiscate liquids from passengers at this checkpoint. Did they give you one of those security carrier bags at the duty free shop? If not I'm not sure how it got through the security point. If I remember correctly the staff at the security point are G4S and the gate staff are Swissport in Swissport uniforms. Having your gin confiscated at T5 is annoying, I recognise that, but to be honest I'm having a hard time pinning the blame on BA for that. I don't think it's a reasonable expectation for contract gate staff in Africa to police every passengers onward connections and confirm the suitability or otherwise of their DF purchases. It would be nice if they did, but this is Africa and I'm a realist.

You raise the issue of other carriers going the extra mile during the ash cloud, but you've kind of answered it yourself when you said "No ash cloud there". If Lufthansa have the flexibility to operate to China from Munich clear of an ash cloud shutdown then great. Unfortunately BA didn't, through no fault of BA, and if none of their aircraft can fly what do you expect them to do? There isn't capacity to book all of BA's passengers on other carriers, nor to set up much in the way of ad hoc flights should an window of opportunity arrive in the cloud. Nobody did more in the UK to pressure the CAA to lift the ash cloud restrictions, but you seem to be making a point that something that affects BA far more severely than LH was better handled than LH. I'm sure it was, just as BA handled flights to Germany a lot better than LH did when Lufty last went on strike.

I've read your post in detail and to be honest there are some things in there that are BAs fault, others that are not and are inherent to air travel, and some where the blame is unknown.

New York flight: Patchy food: definitely BA's fault. IFE broken: BA's fault but it happens on other carriers too, even Emirates. Bags misconnected: maybe BAs fault, hard to say*. Happens on other airlines too. Bags in JFK, you're in Chicago: Not BAs fault. The bags are sent to their destination airport then forward shipped from there. If you'd be staying some time in Chicago they'd have been sent there but it's hard to hit a moving target.

Nairobi: Alcoholic comment: BA/Contractors fault, not acceptable behaviour, nothing wrong with champagne at 10am in my book! IFE unavailable/poor food: see above. Cabin crew conversation to your liking: not BAs fault, and indeed try getting any form of conversation out of Singapore Girl. Duty Free confiscated: see above. Baggage misconnected: see above*

Boston: Bags delayed: BAs fault*. Downgraded: BAs fault but also happens on pretty much every single other airline in the world plus you'll have got your air miles back so effectively flew for free. No comment from Cabin Crew: not BAs fault. What would you actually expect them to do other than offer tea and sympathy?

*Mishandled bags. All airlines do it, every single one of them. And often you can actually get statistics as to how each airline performs. BA handles in excess of 99.5% of its bags at Heathrow correctly every day, with over 50% of passengers transferring. The vast majority of those 0.5% of mishandled bags are inbound to LHR on a non-BA flight and fail to meet BAs minimum connection time. The baggage system itself at T5 is operated by Heathrow, not BA. There have been two major failures of the system in the last month. The most recent was Heathrows fault. The earlier was due to a worldwide SITA fault which affected numerous airports worldwide. Each of those failures left BA with approximately 20,000 short-shipped bags. Imagine what a row of twenty suitcases looks like. Then times that by a thousand. Then think about how long it'll take to clear that backlog even if you threw all your spare resources at it.

You appear to have been exceptionally unlucky with your bags Mr Mac and I have every sympathy for you, but given that 99.5% of bags transit BAs Heathrow operation without delay each day then you really are a statistical outlier on the bad luck scale. Doesn't make it any better for you I know, but thats the maths of it. You may find a continental hub suits you better, especially if flying from the north, but Frankfurt has it's own problems and a friend who earned his AF/KLM Gold Card the hard way (in the cheap seats) will only travel with hand luggage these days.

In times of disruption I often hear praise for Emirates. I often wonder what people think would happen to their own businesses and livelihoods if a foreign owned competitor, backed by the state, with unlimited resources, low taxation and third world labour costs and social rights, was permitted to set itself up in their home market and flood it with a similar product. Perhaps I might ask them next time.

[Evanelpus]

The last page worth of comments has very little to do with the thread subject, the TV programme "A Very British Airline" but has once again descended into another BA bashing opportunity.

[Mr Mac]

Hand Solo
Gin in sealed bag from duty free and went through scaners. But as you say it is Africa, and when back in the UK having my Gin confiscated a school party came through of the same flight were two young men were being relived of lock knifes with 3in blades which had accidently been packed in carry on and not pulled at security. Africa don't you love it.


Evanelpus
I agree with you totally, and will say no more on the matter.






Regards
Mr Mac

[Ancient Observer]

They try. They just do not see that by the standards of the best in the game -consistently excellent delivery of operations and high service standards - they are at best average.

[WorkInProgress]

Mr Mac

I also live in the North of England and amazingly have met Fred!!! This was after our Miami - LHR then LHR - MAN bags did not meet the connection.
Fred absolutely loves BA!!! He earns over £100 per bag (according to him). On the day he arrived at my house his little white van was full to the roof.
He was far too busy for a cup of tea and a digestive.

[crewmeal]

I'll try and get this thread back on topic by saying when I was trained at Cranebank on what to say to passengers when something went wrong be it missing bags, poor quality food, delays etc was good old empathy. Also apologise just once, keep saying sorry and you begin to loose the plot. Nine times out of ten it always worked. However there will always be crew moaning about rosters, the company they work for and relationship problems.

[Capetonian]

Agreed, this whole thing about 'sorry' more than once doesn't work for me, as it doesn't solve the problem, and I tell them that. I'm not interested in how sorry they are, I'm interested in a solution.

In a recent dispute with a bank that messed me around for three months (regular readers of my column will know about this) one of the snotgobblers kept saying : "I can empathise with you ......"

"You can't" I said "because you go to work to do your job and you get paid at the end of every month. I don't get paid for the time and effort I've wasted on this matter, I haven't been able to bank my fee income for three months, , so don't tell me you know how I feel."

[Gibon2]

Ancient Observer really hit the nail on the head:

They try. They just do not see that by the standards of the best in the game -consistently excellent delivery of operations and high service standards - they are at best average.

I think this is a beautifully concise and accurate summing up of BA's entire operation - in the cabin and beyond. And it's not all about money: sure, it helps if you have gleaming new planes and top-notch IFE. But so much of good service relies on good organisation and training - and this doesn't necessarily cost more than bad organisation and training.

An example from I trip I took on SQ: returning from Jakarta, we were delayed by an hour or so due to a tech problem, so missed my connection in Singapore. OK, happens to all airlines. But it's what happened next that made the difference. On disembarking in Singapore, there was an SQ lady waiting at the top of the air bridge, with my name on a sign. She handed me an envelope containing boarding passes for the next flight to Zurich and connection to Geneva, meal, hotel and taxi vouchers, and tourist brochure for Singapore. No queueing, no waiting, no haggling, no hassle - all fixed. I was still inconvenienced, but instead of feeling grumpy about the airline, I left awestruck by the efficiency of the SQ machine.

Now, I'm sure BA and many other airlines would have duly got me on the next flight and provided the requisite meals and accommodation - eventually. But could they turn a grumpy customer into an impressed one? Would it even occur to them to try? Doing it the SQ way needn't cost more (the main cost is in the meals and accommodation), but it does require thought, organisation and planning - as well as the ability to see things from the customer's point of view, rather than the airline's.

[Wannabe Flyer]

It is all about labor costs. SQ, EK and the like will catch up to BA standards (or down) eventually. At that time probably Vietnam air, or Air Cambodia will be lauded as the poster child of air travel.

Mr MAc, I personally don't like BA cause as a family of staff I was privy to some of the training they would conduct, especially profiling........I was the practice dummy at home. However I must say your bags seriously did have bad Karma on that airline and you were better off switching from a Feng Shui point of view!

[Hand Solo]

@Mr Mac - with your gin in a sealed bag I can see no reason why security should have confiscated it, that's the whole purpose of the sealed bag! I fear you may have fallen victim to the tendency of the security staff to be ignorant of/make up the rules as they go along.

On the matter of Eastern airlines service, it's a bit horses for courses. You'll get a much more fawning service on an airline where they hire their staff from a servile culture. The ex-EK steward I spoke to made an interesting comment that in his entire time there almost nobody ever said thank you to him, which he felt reflected greatly on customer expectations there. In BA he is often thanked. Service standards in the West will never be the same as in the East because culturally Western staff won't think or act like domestic servants.

[kirungi1]

Gibon2

BA, like other major western airlines, has been severely affected by increasing fuel costs, labour challenges and fixed costs that it has become much more vulnerable to low-cost competition. The key to this scenario has been for BA to provide a slimmed down service and has tried to be good at it whilst maintaining it presence around the world in a more realistic and sustainable way.
Ask me if the middle East Airlines and the Far East Airlines have had these fuel costs, labour challenges et la scenarios.....Arrh
You just have to waddle through this forum to find Pilots of a certain Middle East Airline vent their frustration about their QOL.

I'm neither trying to leap to BA's defence here nor justify it's short comings but with hindsight BA exhibits modern age enterprenual skills by men and women selected and developed in Britain and hence that "A very British Airline" slogan. BA in it's arrogance has the belief that even the very average candidates like "Jodie", given a chance and exposed to their training regime and with a right attitude and passion, can be exceptional. This is the real challenge which competition doesn't ever want to know about. All BA staff are ordinary employee who live ordinary lives next door.

All airlines are in this business to sell time and time is of essence. You will ask me then that why do people still fly BA if competition (with excellent in-flight experience) can offer all these incentives on missed connections, delays et la and yet they all sell time?

BA's objective is to make money for it's shareholders by serving customers well. It does not promise exceeding customer expectations but to meet them normal conditions permitting. And how has it done this? by the basics of the basics in business, the elementary issue of doing well in the future - How should we act today in order to be better off tomorrow - the principal of foresight. Now there are not many airlines which are going to claim to do this but I will state here that this is BA's most secret weapon and that's why BA would rather fly it's customers without IFE but when they've followed schedule. It's not that IFE is not vital but in operation the opportunity cost of delaying a flight basing on a non safety failure highly affects customer satisfaction since your in the business to sell time.

Ask me if it's sustainable to be providing vouchers et la to all customers worldwide every time nature strikes and I will still be sitting here in the loft carrying my head and thinking of what to type.

I would encourage constructive criticism of BA whilst acknowledging the environment this flagship Airline finds itself in. Your voices are important for this company but how about wonderful programs of relief efforts to Phillipines et la and community projects that BA gets involved in -A mark of real British values.