Here at London City we have BA, as in Cityflyer (not that many pax would know) with little of the above. The drinks and snacks are free on board. The crew are always great. And above all there is NO STRIKE today and they are carrying on just as normal. Doubtless with 100% loads on many routes. And yet the BA PR team seem to have been quite unable to push this fact out to the media. There must be a good few who think their LCY flights are not operating.

Way to go, BA guys and gals !! I'm all with you on this one.

BCAL
 

"I wish they all could be Caledonian Girls". Super cabin crew (at least on shorthaul; can't speak for longhaul). When BA had the "Shuttle" service Aberdeen to Heathrow, Caledonian ran the "Subtle" service to Gatwick. Far, far better.

Just a bunch but I'm guessing you didn't get the job at BA when you applied...

I'm not clever enough to know whether the pilots are either whinging or overpaid. What I am convinced about is that the fallout from this dispute has been disproportionately heightened by the incredible stupidity surrounding communication with passengers and the media. Whatever you think of the pilots' position, Balpa gave plenty warning. Management, once again, messed up. Will Mr Cruz never pick up on the point that cheap does not always mean good.

Extreme cutbacks are suffocating BA
 

The poor communications with pax (not for the first time) and the totally inadequate data resilience after the outage last year rather supports the pilots' contention that BA has lost the plot by curtting back infrastructure costs to such an extreme that the business is suffering. There is always a time lag between cutting costs to the bone (immediate benefit to the bottom line) and declining activity and reputation (disaster for the bottom line) which allows directors to take handsome bonuses in the interim. Sorry to say that BA seems to be on that curve now. Nice if someone could correct me.

Sadly , therein lies one of the reasons for the strike. It is not really about the 11.5% at all. That Captains word is not final in BA. There would follow a person to person interview with a manager - perhaps just a telephone interview if you are lucky - inorder for them to assess your judgement call and take what they feel is appropriate action. Bullies

BA generates dollars and other currencies by selling tickets to London in other countries. Converted to pounds to pay salaries they buy more. Simplistic but you get the drift.

Short answer NO. It was he who cut and expanded Vueling at the same time and presided over total chaos as the system fell over and the result was that he got BA to play with. This is standard MO in BA where managers are paid bonuses for coming in under budget with no penalty when the result of cuts is collapse. They are all in thrall to Mr O'Leary and of course having to compete with him. They have learned that everyone hates Ryanair, pax, staff et al but the profits keep rolling in.

Sure BA jocks earn plenty but in truth when you take responsibiity and skill levels required that should be the norm, not the exception.

Ah, but I did. OK, it was then BOAC, and the job was with an Associate Company. But we still had to undergo the full recruitment process with BOAC.

Apparently the spin given by the BA management easily persuades some simpletons here. The average salary of a BA pilot is £160k p/a! Really!!! Therefore anyone that gets paid more than me is an overpaid sponger.....

The Atlantic Barons on the old contract big bucks are either gone or close to retirement. The company comprises many new pilots who have either trained with BA and have the $$$$ obscene debt from the experience or the direct entry guys who have moved on from Easy or Ryanair. The ab-initios earn around £26k before deductions and the direct entry guys £45-50 with all new hires going on the new contract.

They want a pay rise linked to RPI, not one that might just keep pace with inflation. By the looks of it BA want this strike more than the pilots. Top of BA's wish-list is BALPA out of the picture. Then BA can get of with slashing costs and squeezing employees without union interference. It's all about profit, profit and more profit.

Yes, it is Magplug but as is always the case - everyone loses. The mgmt have failed in the last 20 years (as countless others have done) to manage their business for the true long term. Flight and Cabin crew are scrunched by it all and nothing helpful will come of this. Strikes rarely bring good things - especially when the public does not see the employee's problem.

We can blame who we like but it is another nail in the coffin.

This is just boring.

It is a race to the bottom. An eternal one. You do it faster, cheaper, better. Tomorrow a compeditor will do it slightly more effectively. Management will work out a new method to do it faster, cheaper, better! Why? Well consumers want cheaper, faster.....and aspire to better! And it is a vicious circle. Because we've all less pay, we need cheaper, better, faster! Management at BA most likely wish they had the "Worlds fave airline". This won't change anytime soon - so it will be a continuous erosion of service standards until we are all standing up in the cabin, eating from paper boxes ........in an argument it is better for the environment etc. But it will be dressed up as Club class or whatever..........

As the old saying goes, pick any two.

Sad to see the decline of what was once a world leader. Surprised that nobody seems to recall that BA owns half the slots at Heathrow simply because they were once reserved for domestic flights -- essential to Scottish business, even more to both parts of Ireland where the train is not an option. It's a licence to print money for its foreign owners, just like most of our airports in fact. To my mind BA never got over the competition from British Midland and BCal introduced by Mrs Thatcher; as an occasional traveller I would no more consider BA than Ryanair. Good luck to the staff seeking their share of the profits.

Striking may appeal to many and be seen as the way forward. In my 40 years of observing British life (as an adult) I can only think of two or three occaisions when it has. They were to do with equal pay and equality of opportunites. But bear in mind, that those issues are still not resolved. Since British Mgmt sees it as a do-or-die issue, expect no way forward.

Heathrow Slots Owned in Perpetuity ?
 

[QUOTE=Geriaviator;10567592]Sad to see the decline of what was once a world leader. Surprised that nobody seems to recall that BA owns half the slots at Heathrow simply because they were once reserved for domestic flights -- essential to Scottish business, even more to both parts of Ireland where the train is not an option...…}

Yes. I am sad to see BA Managers getting bonuses for a profit that they have done nothing to create.

cessnaxpilot
Not at all. I am saying that mgmt have only themselves to blame for this mess. Sadly, striking will not improve the mess. Mgmt failed but everyone loses.

Sorry about that,,flew domestic BNESYD
OLD AGE IS A CURSE

Did anyone watch last night's Channel 5 programme on BA. I thought it was really interesting. What I didn't like was the Y seats being replaced from 9 a breast to 10 a breast. They look just like the short haul seats on Easy. Do they actually recline?

All that fiddling around with cabin service reminded me of my training at Cranebank. We learnt how to use a spoon and fork properly and serve from a trolley, not moan about a stiff paif of tongs! Poor thing couldn't even pick up a tart with them!

Theres more than one way to pick up a tart!

Personally I am sad to see any manager getting a bonus just for doing their job correctly - that is what they are being paid their salary for, in the first place.

Anyway - latest I heard on BBC News this morning is that BA Pilots/BALPA are planning a "super strike" in October to bring BA to its knees, something that will cost the airline "at least 400 million pounds" IIRC.
Is this really a sane way for any union / member of staff to carry on ? Could BA go out of business and IAG build up Iberia instead, totally unconcerned that some BA staff wipe out the company in its nominal 100th year?

BA management are girding up for a fight. They are notifying pax due to fly at the end of the month of cancellations scheduled more than 14 days ahead to avoid compensation payments in the event of a 27 September strike so it looks like they are in no mood for compromise and are expecting further disruption. So it is hardly surprising that the pilots are not backing down either. I don't know why BA can't offer the staff shares, or similar, and a voice on the board so they can participate in the success of the airline and be involved in its future. I was a frequent BOAC flyer in the old days (got the badge etc) and it is really sad to see this situation.

Are you suggesting IAG simply replace BA with Iberia? If so how would you envisage that working? Do you envisage Iberia taking over the UK operation, LHR slots etc.

3 years ago I would have laughed and say no way, but watching the current Brexit debacle I must say that would not surprise me .
For most of my career I regarded the UK aviation system being CAA or BA or its safety culture and what they represented with admiration. How can they in a few years only go down where they are now ?:(

Perhaps it is time for the idea of a national airline to go. The economic competition from low cost carriers is making the full service/national airlines marginal, especially as they usually have sub scale integrated operations including training, maintenance etc.
The example of the shipping industry is a relevant guide, the national carriers did not survive, but rather were replaced by the likes of a Maersk or a Carnival Cruises, specialized and ruthlessly efficient global players with only two or three surviving competitors.
If BA management shares that perception, they will be looking to reposition the enterprise accordingly, irrespective of the short term disruption. The core BA asset from that perspective is the preponderant London slot ownership, rather than the existing staff.

Firstly do you mean BA management, or IAG management?

Can I also ask if you are of the opinion that retaining "BA management" whilst "repositioning the enterprise" would guarantee ( as much as that is ever possible) the future of the enterprise itself?

Maybe the survival of BA doesn't matter to managers
 

That's a really interesting perspective. You might be right. If we take the example of cruises, with which I am becoming more familiar as the years advance, the old national lines taken over by Carnival still keep their national flavour eg food in the restaurants, ports of call, senior staff recruitment, language of signs etc. but are still part of one family. I was amazed to find that two totally different cruise experiences (good but that's not the point) from Cunard and Holland America Lines respectively were in essence both run by Carnival who use their massive dominance of the industry to generate economies of scale. There are advantages in having different brands for the same product supplied by a monopoly supplier. If that is the case, then pax suggesting they will never fly BA again because of poor service are wasting their time because what they really need to say is that they will never fly IAG again, which will be difficult.

I have no idea who would wind up in charge, but historically, the process has a handful of very senior managers with a small team purging the entire structure while also reslotting the survivors. So a BA manager would be even more at risk than a BA pilot.
The enterprise, in this view, rests on the effective ownership of air access to London, still the global financial hub. The restructured entity would control that asset still, no matter what the name.

If by ownership of air access to London you mean the London slots, these are not owned but allocated. They can just as easily be re-allocated. If BA, by strikes, management incompetence, whatever, is unable or unwilling to provide a dependable use of those slots then they should be re-allocated. The slots are not there to provide life long employment to anyone.

The navel gazing by some here has only one logical outcome. No company is too important or too large to fail, as those employed by Pan-Am discovered.

You put your finger on the critical issue, who decides who gets the London slots.
I do not know what process is used to allocate them, but it was very contentious iirc last time when some were reallocated, possibly after the Pan Am demise. Obviously the government has ultimate authority, but presumably there is compensation if slots are removed by decree.
So they are a huge BA/IAG asset right now which should remain intact even if BA/IAG gets massively restructured, as long as the enterprise continues to maintain the current usage level. That leaves plenty of room for massive personnel and policy changes.

etudiant, like so much that is coming under the spotlight these days, the concept that slots are an asset that can be bought and sold along with the operator that they are allocated to needs revisiting. BA has absorbed many airlines into its own operation (including many that preceded it as we are reminded by its so called centenary). Many of those operators held London slots that then became added to those already allocated to BA). Does BA therefore own these slots that they paid good money for when buying otherwise worthless airlines (I speak as Devil's advocate of course)? The answer legally is no. The answer politically? Anybody's guess, but I suggest that those advocating those slots be denied at their whim to the travelling public need to take into account the possibility of being hoist by their own petard.