A lot of people (Augustus included!) seem to be assuming 'low cost' means crap quality. I can't speak for RYR, but certainly with EZY 'low cost' means 'no frills' but the aircraft are generally clean, service is good, and punctuality on a par with BA....for a fraction of the price. BA may be great for long haul, but who wants to pay hundreds of pounds extra to get a 'free' meal and an inch of extra seat pitch for the sake of a 50 minute sector?

I think BA's arrogance over the past few years, shrugging off the likes of EZY and RYR, may come back to haunt them.

George etc & The Guv et al.

What is a 'full service' airline, as I got my all day deli bag on the flight deck the other day I cast back to sitting in the Three Maggies on the evening that British Eagle went down. They were a 'full service'
airline. An egg and cress double decker is not worth an extra £100 on the ticket. BA watch your six o'clock!


Good 'ere innit

I don't think you can quite right off BA shorthaul just yet, its quite common to find 75 club pax on a flight into LHR these days. Short haul may be expensive, but like all things in BA, the real cost will never be determinable becuase the accounts make it cost what the management want it to cost. There is room in this market for both full service and low cost carriers. Of course the low cost carriers are great if you can book months in advance and you're off on a leisurely break somewhere. Maybe if you're a cost conscious businessman in the provinces then it makes sense to do some essential business travel on a low cost carrier. Despite this, you cannot get away from the fact that some people will not travel low cost, be it for reasons of convenience, reliability or simply taste. Luton, Stansted et al simply arent as easy to get to as LHR if your based in Central or South London. If you're a busy suit, do you really want to spend more time going to Stansted to fly to Hahn then travel to Frankfurt by train? It may be cheap but what happens when the aircraft goes tech and your stuck there overnight? Do you really want to lose the first day of your weekend break because an orange 737 is bust. Getting your ticket refunded for a 12 hour delay is scant consolation if you've little time to spare. If low cost carriers really were the only way to do shorhaul, then why haven't BA and BD lost all their major corporate customers to Easy, GO and Ryanair? Simple answer is people know that you get what you pay for. If you choose a large, scheduled airline you'll pay more, but you'll know that you've got less chance of being stuck in the middle of nowhere for a long time when things go wrong. If cost was everything then the rise of Skoda would have meant the end of Mercedes Benz, but as we've seen there's room for them both.

What happens when the aircraft goes tech?

OK firstly the EZY fleet is almost new and very well maintained. Secondly there is a system in place for using a spare aircraft and crew these days, to try and avoid the knock on delays of yore.

What happens if a BA ship "goes tech"?

In my experience most delays have been caused by missing/late passengers/late baggage and ATC slots - or a combination of both, (plus at LGW disinterested ground handling by Servisair.)

Hand Solo -

"the rise of Skoda would have meant the end of Mercedes Benz, but as we've seen there's room for them both."

- spot on matey

[ 09 September 2001: Message edited by: yorkunt ]

Few Cloudy We rarely seem to get delayed due to tech problems. On the flights that I operate the gate is supposed to close 15 minutes before departure. Yet we can still have pax boarding 2 mins before. I don't think the gate is 15 minutes walk away. People seem to think it's okay to be late for their flight. But they wouldn't expect a train to still be in the station if they were 5 minutes late. I say close the gate 15 minutes before. If your not there, tough catch the next one.

Is this the same bunch who are knocking B.A. but at the same time Have been sending in there C.vs to BA.or even been rejected ?

Speedcheck,

What a typical "Head-up-ar**" comment we come to expect from you boys.

PS2000.

I am suitably unimpressed by the arrogance of our cousins at BA and the like. Geography dictates to many which airline they will fly with, this in many instances applies to flight crews also. I do not want to live any where near london, I would also hate to take a massive pay cut to go to BA, and that is before I give my excellent share deal back. :)

Mainfrog 2,

Corblimey ain't communication difficult?
My leading sentence "what happens when the aircraft goes tech?" was a direct quote from Hand Solo's preceding post and my response to that (basically in agreement to your's) followed.

Techs do happen - as in all airlines but it is the pax problem which is the main holdup - specially in Luton. By tthe way what is with the 15min. gate closing? Should be closed before that according my latest info. Pax should be ready to board before that even.

Few Cloudy, I totally agree with what you said about delays but the gate does close 15 mins before we are due to push back. Most of our flights are 30-40 mins turn rounds and small a/c. In BA's ticket info at Gatwick check-in for a flight closes 30 mins before. Pax are requested to be at the gate 40 mins before so that all pax can be on board no later than 10 mins before departure. It seems pax get lost between check-in and the gate judging by the number of times we have to offload bags.

Thanks Mainfrog - we work for the same outfit and a month back I got "confidential"
(for some reason) info in which the closing and boarding times were redefined.

As it was marked confidential I won't go into detail but the main point was that unless there was a significant delay anyway, these restrictive gate closing times were to be respected - even if pax were still showing up.

Problem is that the pax very soon learn when they can check in late and expect it every time - with the results noted above. Even if the pax can be boarded 15 min. after checkin, the baggage will cause a delay. Maybe we didn't get the same info - wouldn't be the first time...