BA A.319 Seats = torture
 

Spent 2.5 hours in a BA A.319 (in slave) - fitted with the thin seats - my God - the pain

No cushioning at the base of the spine, rock hard seat - I've seen more comfortable seating at a football match :(:(

I came up from Lisbon in one not so long ago and thought much the same as you HH. Very disappointing but sadly just a sign of the continuing downward spiral of BA service levels.

No doubt a big bonus was paid to someone for squeezing in more seats ...

That's a bit disappointing. Cue increasing sales of inflatable cushions ;)

It's a shame because the thin seats on EZY are more than OK and provide far more space than the fat seats on BA. Flying BA shorthaul on a full flight is torture with thick, reclining seats.

It's such a shame as the cabin looks great. Stylish, yet no frivolity like fancy mood lighting and unmistakably British. However, BA's new cabin seems to get almost as many complaints as a ten abreast 777.

Are there any plans to move to Spaceflex? I know the toilets are cramped but I'd much rather have more legroom and simply put up with a cramped loo for the 30 seconds that I'm in it. Spaceflex would free up some cabin space however no doubt they'll just cram more seats in. Not to mention the militant unions. I can't see them being happy. Not without a fight anyway. But I do think it would make operational sense for all IAG A320s to have the same layout.

When a ULCC is doing it better than you are, then you have a problem. No matter how many 'free' drinks or packets of birdseed you feed people.

Indeed. For the MAN-LHR sector that I use occasionally I would prefer the space from EZY and no worrying if the trolley dollies will get to me with my drink before we get to the point they have to go back in their galleys. (Or worse and have to go around - happened to me twice). I once flew BA on this route and had a huge and very smelly man next to me; I was by the windows. An extra 50mm would have let me breathe and escape to the loos without to much disturbance.

Thinking about it I've flown a lot on BA A.319's - even with the new seat - it's never been terribly comfortable but the latest one really was bad - the worst seat I've ever had in years of flying anywhere - so maybe it was a one-off

or maybe the new seats degrade fast to benches...........

The BA A319 that are based at LGW are ex BMA and have different seats and layout to the A319 that are based at LHR. They were not fitted with the new BA seat, they have the BMA seats still covered in BA leather. They are not as good as the new BA seats.

It's my fault and yours.
No one will pay the required fares to have decent legroom and in house well trained airline ground staff. It's so 20th Century, so by all means gripe, I do often, but it's your fault as much as mine.
BA would love to hang onto the prestige and classy aura of ye olden days but they'd be even less competitive and I'd just book EZY and gripe about how stuck up BA were.

#really

It's like competing with the other guy who is filling his B777s at ten abreast in Economy, you have no choice. Come the next cabin refit, we all know what has to happen as not nearly enough people will pay nearly enough money to maintain a credible business case for status quo.

I do feel for them however they still have a good short haul product. They're only marginally more expensive that EZY or DY however it has T5 which still looks amazing almost ten years on. BA also have a much better preflight experience with no barnyard style hoarding of passengers or bag police at the gate. The onboard snackage is a real disappointment compared to days gone by and the crew inconstatant. However it's still a good product. 186Y on th A320 should help too.

Also, Alex Cruz has written to crew promising major changes so who knows what the future may bring.

I don't mind the new Pinnacle? interior too much, yes the seats are thin but even at 1.85m tall, I can manage a two hour hop within Europe, for sure its not club seating but no worse than other carriers in Europe (I have to fly Lufthansa again to Munich next week ��) With
similar seats - last time I flew short haul with LH the seats seemed to be recycled from an old 2CV!
I guess it's economics - more lightweight seats, less fuel burn?
Muzzey

Absolutely Muzzey -that was the whole reason for the new seats - plus you can maybe squeeze in another row of the suffering....................

Alex Cruz will want more for less and has already told the BA community of more cost cutting !

They're also outsourcing maintenance, LGW is going soon I believe?

The whole problem here is one of "derived demand" - put simply people do not purchase an airline ticket because they derive pleasure from the product (i.e. The flight) - the flight is simply an unavoidable hurdle to get from A to B.

As such any airline that undercuts on price will quickly pick up market share. In economic terms it is a very price elastic market. The inevitable product of all of this is a race to the bottom. As one poster said previously as soon as one carrier starts ramming in 10-across seating into their 777s everyone else is forced to follow suit in quick succession.

Ryanair leads the market with a cost per seat of around 27 Euro for a one hour sector. Wizz is close behind at around 30 - the others are scrambling around to do anything they can to hold onto their market.

This, sadly is 21st Century short-haul aviation. My prediction is that Ryanair and Wizz will have 80% of this market by 2030 unless other carriers rapidly sharpen their pencils.

DtA, unfortunately you are right, much to my dismay. But am I the only one who still wishes for, and is willing to pay for, a little extra comfort? Business Class within Europe is ridiculously expensive and I certainly don't need that product for a 1 or 2 hour flight. But where I might now pay €150, I personally would be happy to pay an extra €100 for a little more leg room. Whenever, I fly to distant holiday destinations within Europe I always try and find carriers which offer a comfort class product. Generally I find it to be full or close to full, which would indicate that there obviously is demand for it. If an LCC was to sell a small percentage of seats at an appropriate fare with a more generous seat pitch, but with the same pay-as-you-go cabin service, they would fill them. It would quite likely generate an increase in their client base too.

Hotel Tango, they do - they are typically the emergency exit row seats and row 1 :)

Indeed DtA, but these emergency exit seats are not the best on the a/c (other than the legroom). Also (for obvious reasons) no armrest by the emergency window seat (may depend on type). I would still prefer the 1st three or four rows or so to be the prime seats, but without over charging for them the way the legacy carriers do. A good product I use whenever possible is Condor's Premium Class to destinations such as the Canaries. Decent seat pitch, guaranteed empty middle seat, extra weight allowance for hold (25kgs iso 20kgs) and cabin (10kgs iso 6kgs), dedicated check-in and upgraded complimentary catering. The catering option is not important for me, but on a 4.5 hour flight the lack of hassle and extra space is. On average the extra cost from Germany to the Canaries amounts to approximately €225 per seat each way. Many may think :eek: at that, but the fact that Condor sell these seats without any difficulty indicates that there is a market for them. I'm not flush with funds but it has always been my philosophy that my vacation starts as soon as I close my front door and not when I check-in at the hotel/appartment. Now I fully appreciate it isn't an option for a majority of travelers, especially those with families. My point and my worry is that I don't want to see future air travel excluding these reasonably priced options. In a European travel world dominated by the likes of RYR and EZY this could likely be the outcome.

Hotel Tango I agree that there are people prepared to pay a bit more as the great success of the PE cabins has shown, I'm just back from x4 sectors with SQ in their new PE and the small number of seats were booked.

BUT, the greatest majority of people paying their own ticket want the lowest price and the carriers will show them the lowest price to get their attention.

For example, an advert that was presented to me whilst looking at a UK newspaper site was touting 'Broadband for £2.50 a month'. I knew that was a come on and waited to see the adverts next page. The 2.50 was for the first year and then 5.00 a month, so a not untypical 'bait'. Then the small print says, 'line rental 16.99 a month'. So that's £22.00 a month then.

Humans are hard wired to go for the lowest price.

IWhat about wagon dragon then?;)

That's not true ... One want's the most cost effective and convenient trip and 'cost effective' includes travelling to/from airport of departure, transport costs, car parking, buggeration factor etc. etc. etc.

Now, let me think when I lived in the East Midlands, probably 1.5 hours from LHR, my regular destinations included AMS, CDG, DUS, FRA, MUC, CPH, ARN, MXP, FCO, RIX, KBP, SIN & HKG and, amazingly, I could achieve all of these, regularly, at schedules that suited my purpose, and at trip prices that suited my pocket, from BHX!

Now how many imagine that one needs to travel to London, perhaps Manchester, to travel to these destinations? ... It's a case of educating the travelling public, many will be driving past such an airport as BHX on their way to/from London, spending perhaps hundreds in travelling costs to save a tenner on an air far?

I agree there are those who want the right deal PF but the advertising goes where the money is. On holiday I was talking with a retired man ( a genuine multi-millionaire) and he was complaining about the LCCs and how they charged him $$ for being 1Kg overweight.

At his local airport there are at least three carriers to take him on his regular domestic sector in Australia. So I asked him what made him choose a particular carrier? "The cheapest". [unquote]

Yeah, but he was an Aussie! :E

Hotel Tango - this issue for a short-haul LCC is how many seats to convert to less dense config. If they are lowering the capacity of the plane they need to make sure that the seats fill. The problem is that the demand for premium seating will be different by month, time of day, day of week and destination so getting the mix right if you are a large LCC like easyjet with a diverse network is nigh on impossible. You can of course run different configs on different aircraft but all of this detracts from the one feature common to successful LCCs - simplicity.

Yes indeed and I am of course aware of that. Going back to Condor, they have a number of rows with just that little bit more leg room. When booking Premium the seat selection engine offers only row 1 until such a time row 2 is required, and so on, until all YP seats are allocated. If for instance at a given time (I don't know what criteria they use for this) some of these YP rows remain free and the Y cabin is full, then those remaining YP rows are released for sale as Y. Yes it means that some lucky people will have the extra 2 inches or so but they get none of the other extras. The airline therefore retains a certain amount of flexibility with the cabin configuration.

New Boeing 737 Seat
 

A real benefit for customers of airlines using this seat, or a triumph of accountant-led cost reduction and who-gives-a-toss-about customers' comfort and well-being? You choose.......

Boeing Selects New 737 Seat Supplier

Here's a typical response in one forum....

I actually like squeezie's slim line seats. In particular the 'no recline'.

Here here!

Jet2 were the first to introduce these slimline seats a few years ago. I can't say that I find them at all uncomfortable, I have been as far as Larnaca and back in them, 5 hours, no trouble.

The additional legroom that they facilitate is a great benefit, I'd much rather that than my last Monarch flight with the "old" padded seats with no leg room at all.

"The additional legroom that they facilitate is a great benefit"

Ho ho ho - the airlines fit them so they can squeeze in more seats....... you don't get extra leg room - just more bodies to checkin and get on and off the plane and a rotten seat as well................

Possibly 'more useful legroom'?

HH U2 was already at the max number of pax seats with the old seats. Fitting slimline did not give them more seats. As I said I find them more comfortable - and I love the no recline

I hope they have all their aircraft configured with them soon.

To get even one more row in a 737/A320, the new seat would have to enable seat pitch to be reduced by an inch-and-a-half (i.e. 2 inches in practice).

No amount of seat redesign would achieve that without also involving a significant reduction in legroom.

Emergency exits and crew numbers determine the maximum number of seats. If already at maximum number with regular seats then slimline seats by default increase the pitch.

My only arguments on board have been about morons reclining their seats to maximum deflection, at full speed and no prior warning. Not great if there is a glass of liquid on your tray table.....

So three cheers for slimline, no recline seats, which I also find are comfortable.

Was on a Brussels A320 this week with a new interior. 30 rows (so same as EZY), with the same number of seats, but a different arrangement with much smaller toilets and the last row of seats has no windows. Far less comfortable, despite the recline and less space for the cabin crew on their rest. What a waste....

I think you mean they increase legroom, not pitch.

Seat pitch is the distance from the back of one seat to the front of the seat behind it. As slimline are thinner the distance (seat pitch) increases.

Or, alternately, if enough room is made, airlines can put another row of seats in, whilst not increasing "needlessly" the distance for passengers legs.

No, it isn't, never has been.

It's the distance between any (fixed) point on a seat and the same (fixed) point on the seat in the next row (for example the attachment points on the seat rails).

http://www.trolleytips.com/wp-conten...8/03/pitch.gif