Q/ How do you bu**er up several solidly profitable companies?
A/ Sell 'em to BA of course.

Rumour mill
 

ETOPS could you elaborate on what you actually heard?
as the rumour mill is currently working overtime

The latest is that the Dash 8s are to be sold off to a consortium (which may or may not include Sutton Harbour that own PLH (and operate NQY) as an ex Brymon manager now holds a senior position there)
This XYZ airline will continue to operate the current BACX routes but without any of the security of BA.
I know everyone is quick to put down the 'mother company' but this alleged consortium certainly sounds a damn sight scarier, they can't manage an airport let alone an airline!

Oh and Sarl there are all the pax svcs and office based people that will lose jobs too if these rumours become fact (don't they do a good job too?) :rolleyes:

You aint seen me - right?
 

Hostie

Sorry to sound oblique but I didn't hear the info. If you read my original I said that this chap was "broadcasting" the plans and I was right next to him. Think "laptop" + "powerpoint" + very sharp eyesight!!!!!

BACX Announcement
 

No sign of the BIG citiexpress announcement yet then:D

I have heard from a reasonably reliable source that next Wednesday 11 Dec is the day an announcement will be made.

Don't shoot me if i'm wrong.

And so the farce continues!!
The problem is that the only place that where Dec 4 was mentioned was here and as is more often than not it proves to be wrong."AGAIN"!!
I've no doubt that people's lives will again be messed up with no visible signs of improvement in the company with a Future Size and Shape Mk2,as it did in Mk1, but do we honestly believe that our management would close bases, get rid of fleets etc, without telling the troops first?

These are the facts:-
Yes they are reviewing fleets, as BA do on a regular basis.
Yes they are reviewing routes, as BA do on a regular basis.

This is what we have been told from TDLF himself.As for an "Announcement"? Diddly Squat!!

Suppose Wednesday's won't be the same again untill there is one though:rolleyes:

Nevermind,Soon be Christmas!!

Citi Express Base Closures
 

This thread is too good to die. Each year the BBC brings back Frank Butcher for the Christmas edition of "East Enders" and creates great gloom for the fans therof. Why should "Rumour Control" fail its devotees this year? Has anyone asked the refuellers at SOU, especially the gentleman from Ludgershall?

Amusing though the rumours may seem, there are many who feel the cold chill of yet another job failure. North and East of Watford Gap the nights draw in quickly, and crews huddle around their braziers with glasses of excellent Brown Ale and mull over the inanities of the postings from their rich colleagues in Cheshire and Crawley who have taken over the thread. A slice of reality would help.

"Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper." So it is on "Prune." A Christmas prize for the first correct identification of the ex-policeman who wrote this.

George Orwell ;)

Is it correct that some Dash courses have just been halted ?

Wednesday 11th

Come on, be real chaps. Do you really think that TDLF, The Car Salesman, or any of the other of the so-called, big wigs, would make an announcement on a Wednesday?

They are biggest bunch of Liars, Cheats, Con-Men, etc......
These are the people that make an announcement at 1700hrs on a Friday afternoon. Just in time for which ever flight they are taking off that horrible little rock! Don;t expect anything during the week.

AOG007

AOG007, say what you want, but don't bad mouth my "Little Rock"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:D

AOG might be less than generous about the location mid Irish Sea but he is absolutley right about the senior inhabitants of this screwed-up company's HQ on Fraggle and let's not forget the even more senior company wreckers in WSM and Olympic House.

have any January rosters appeared yet? they will give the game away.

There will be an announcement of some sort tomorrow morning, don't know what the content is but it can't be good.
:confused:

base closures
 

:mad: can somebody for gods sake say what the hell is happening. Is there an announcement or not !. I knew i should have been a train driver

Citi Express Base Closures
 

Amidst the acrimony, spare a thought for AMEX. As the winner of the prize for identifying George Orwell - real name Eric BLAIR, funny old thing - as the source of the comment on correct reporting, AMEX wins free travel for a year on any ship of the Vogon Constructor Fleet.

There was supposed to be an announcement this morning however it was cancelled yesterday afternoon. With no date set, it is anyones guess as to whether it will be this side of christmas or not

I think any announcement has to be carefully thought through with regard to the effect it could have on BA mainlines share price, and that possibly this is one of the reasons for the delay.

Lets hope its earlier rather than later, two FSS reviews in one year is enough for anybody and the sooner we know what is going on behind closed doors the better.

Lets hope 2003 is a better year for aviation and that Mr Bin Laden gets to meet the 70 virgins he so desires in the next world and in order to persuade him to go over he can have my 70 as well as an early christmas present.

Happy Christmas to one and all

Not sure if this is true so maybe someone can confirm it. Apparantly the NCL-DUB route is to be stopped in jan 03? I do hope this is not another nail in the coffin for the BACX staff in NCL.

Good Luck to evreyone and lets hope that your management tell you sooner, rather than keeping you hanging on!

Announcement
 

And so the speculation goes on about base closures and rationalisation.
Are the management of BACE or Mainline aware of the impact all this has on the lives of people who work for them at the bases which appear to be targetted??
It isn't just about protecting share price and reputation, it's about people and I would suggest that somebody "grasps the nettle" here and starts to treat them with the honesty and integrity that they rightly deserve.
I've always worked on the premise that if I have only three minutes to live, then tell me quickly because at least I can then make a plan going forward, albeit a short lived one!!
The prospect of going into Christmas not knowing your fate is dreadful so come on BA, give your staff the truth now.

Sarl

Listen chaps.
If there is something to say, the people at CitiExpress will find out first. Is this so hard to understand?
The sort of crap that Transwede has come out with "IS" what screws people's heads in.
When, and if, it happens, it happens! But in the meantime, and i'm in the boat too, don't worry about it. There's nothing we can do about it yet anyway.
Life's too bloody short!!

Merry Christmas:( :(

Flights still bookable
 

The rumour that I heard about not being able to book flights from Leeds after Jan is untrue, BA website still shows availability. Similarly Newcastle-Dublin still shows availability up until April at least.

Sit tight chaps and don't let the rumors get you down. When we hear, we hear, up until then enjoy yourself. The 'announcement' might have been delayed as Jet2 had a press day at Leeds today, but that is just my speculation.

Regards,
J-Rider

The announcement is - there is no announcement
 

The latest news today was
'the announcement is - there is no announcement (not yet anyway!!!)'

Although there were local press crews at PLH today and pax were asking staff when BA were pulling out as they'd heard it on the news!!!

All good reassuring stuff as usual

Welcome to mushroom land

:(

It is very obvious to anyone observing the frantic goings on at Olympic House that the proposed plans to unwind the fiasco that was CitiExpress have hit major rocks. Hence no announcement again today.

Might one hazard a guess that one of the proposed buyers has decided to up the anti at the last minute to secure a better deal in the knowledge that they are dealing with a bunch of incompetent amateurs who daily demonstrate their inability to organise a drinking session in a brewery let alone run an airline?

If Eddingtom does not sever the heads of everyone and anyone associated with this shambolical and mind bendingly incompetent disaster then he is not fit to remain in office himself.

If I were one of the City clever clogs who gains intelligence from this web site and is congratulating himself on anticipating the BA share recovery.........I'd be taking my profits now. Things arent quite as rosey as you might think mate.

Tinytim,

With all due respect unless you have hard evidence or verifiable information that the company is up for sale as you seem to suggest in your posting, then it is not very helpful to start spreading these sort of rumours amongst an already anxious workforce.

Whilst I am no fan of the present management the combining of two companies and all that involved has been an enormous task and you can't say that its been a total disaster, yes mistakes have been made and great problems have existed in operating the company on a day to day basis but it is starting to work.

And while you may have no loyalty to the present company, if you believe city types do occasionally look at this site than your last comments show you have no consideration for your colleagues whatsoever.

BA had a 1/4 page colour advert for their LBA routes in the local paper this week. Strange that they would choose to invest in marketing routes if the rumour-mill is accurate and the routes won't be be flown beyond March??

682

Amazon I never said the company was up for sale.

What is obvious from anecdotal evidence from colleagues around the country (absence of J41 rosters for example), statements made to Cabin Crew at NCL, press turning up to PLH and a whole host of other incidents is that some major shake up is happening-somewhere along the lines of the speculation on this thread.

It has been daily apparent that this lot are out of their depth in running a multi-based, multi-type regional airline so some form of slimmimng down and hiving off of readily disposable bits is totally logical.

My speculation is based upon these observations and that there are more than one third parties involved, one of whom is going in for the kill at 5 minutes to midnight because he knows that these incompetents have backed themselves into a corner and have to do the deal-whatever that is at any price. I supect that that is why we are all being left hanging now.

I am sorry, I think CitiExpress has been a total disaster. In terms of morale, career opportunity and job satisfaction.
We have been messed with not once, not twice but now three times in quick succession and are governed by those elements of BRAL which contained the worst that that company had to offer now with a goodly measure of some high level BA incompetence thrown in.
Out of the former profitable companies of BRAL and BRYMON there has been created a giant which thanks to the attachment of BAR is now losing money.

As to the share price issue, The price that BA stock is quoted has no bearing whatsoever on the day to day performance of the business.
It is a measure of the effectiveness or otherwise of the company to give a return to those who buy bits of paper with BA's name on. As such, BA senior managers consider the price an indication of their machismo and corporate virility. In reality it is utterly irrelevant to us.

The point that I wanted to make was that the recovery of the price over the last few weeks seems remarkably coincident with these forthcoming announcements. So much for all this Bo£$ocks about secrecy.......the city know exactly what is happening already I suggest.

Now I wonder how?

If these brokers really knew what was going on I wonder what view they might now take?

BA and CX are sick companies which need a very hefty dose of some strong corporate medicine in the guise of the obliteration of several layers of apalling mangement.

Some observations from the back of the bus.....
 

A Club Europe regular writes.....

1. Anyone seen December's High Life? Singing the praises of Newcastle and plugging BA routes - and specifically singing CX's praises as well... be odd if they are going to close it, but BACX management move in mysterious ways....

2. The boys and girls at CWL (surely the best looking/performing crews in existance) are getting VERY nervous.... reports that the ABZ-BHD(or is it back at BFS?)-CWL-CDG is not long for this world, since AF do CDG-ABZ direct now.....

3. Strange recurring tale.... several people I know have tried to book BACX Club seats out of Cardiff (3 or 4 at a time for a group), to be told they are all but full, so only one gets on.... to an empty plane.... what is are reservations up to?

4. Load on CWL-CDG and BRU looks pretty good these days - the cheap fares mean that there are usually 35+ on the 145, and Club is rather fuller than it was. But this has never stopped BACX management pulling disaster from the jaws of triumph....

5. CWL is quietly going down the tubes thanks mainly to those clowns at Aviance.... tonite, got off a 145, 20 minutes wait on the bus whilst they find a driver (he is marshalling another 145 onto stand apparently...... wonder if he checks passports as well??) and got to hear two Aviance monkeys having a loud slanging match with each other, complete with expletives..... Not impressive...

Do wonder if BACX at CWL is not long for this world - and sadly, it will be the really good people - the crews - who lose out. Bet no managers get the bullet. Bet no Aviance twits do either.....

The Full Monty
 

The message is going around from all but the proper sources that another mis-management monumental cock-up has occurred. We are a workforce who have shown commitment and dedication to our company over 18 difficult months. We were asked for patience, promised much, delivered more, and received very little back. A number of aircraft and bases are being disposed of with nothing to replace them with.

Be reminded how top level management have run our company. Consider the following :-
The business case made to close Bristol. Loyal and profitable staff there were made redundant. Last week, our management had the nerve to circulate around our company intranet a job vacancy for a Line Engineer at Bristol. A Bristol engineer who relocated to Edinburgh wishes to apply for the post.

The company continue to pay huge rental costs for empty Bristol premises.

6 personnel relocated from Bristol to Glasgow, being promised by Someone Whizz that Glasgow had a promising future. Some have just signed new mortgages in Glasgow. Others had their wives give up their jobs to relocate. More company cash will now be used to close down Glasgow and resurrect Bristol. What planet are these people on?

Following months of negotiation with another operator, Mr Whizz, Mr Mildew and Thick Dental Floss will shortly announce the demise of the J41 thus leaving Glasgow and other dependant bases high and dry and after paying huge amounts in personnel relocation packages. This will likely be the loss of Newcastle, Cardiff and Leeds Bradford, where only 2 months ago, BACX took on all the engineers from Nordic Aero! As there are no new aircraft to replace the J41s despite the work (!) of the FAG, the aircraft and the routes will be given away to a competitor. Our company has much past experience of giving away routes, aircraft and jobs – left, right and centre.
You want to fly to Cork? Here - take our route. We can’t compete- costs you nothing.
You want to fly from Kirkwall to Aberdeen? Take this route. Have the aircraft as well. We can’t manage.
At the slightest hint of competition our talentless mis-management withdraw.

Following the loss of the JAR 147 engineering instructors who left solely because of dissatisfaction with the management, the company had to pay a huge sum in training to contract BAe to supply training for ten company engineers to complete a J41 type course – just last week.
Other fleets of our aircraft are being maintained by third party engineering maintenance so that the company can close down our own facilities. Aircraft now receive as routine planned maintenance at locations not specified in the company’s capability listing.
After throwing masses of cash to diminish Bristol, masses more cash will be thrown to resurrect it and close the Glasgow Hangar. The J41s will be given away to Eastern who it is speculated will become a franchise partner. How many of the BACX crew and engineer staff they take on, if any at all, is unknown. How much loss in pay they are offered for the privilege of remaining in a job with a company with a poor reputation . . .
The Bristol personnel who relocated to Glasgow 2 months ago will be offered a relocation package back to Bristol. It’s all a bad joke.
It doesn’t take a crystal ball to see the Isle of Man facility will be next. Rob Sperm has already relocated to Manchester.
The talentless mis-management do nothing to confirm rumours or allay a loyal workforce’s fears.
The talentless mis-management are now a liability who have lost the plot. What are their mis-management qualifications? They are disgraced, despised, disloyal, discredited and dishonourable. Their integrity, ability and credibility is plain for all to see. The talentless mis-mismanagement sit back detached in their ivory tower and refuse to confirm or allay a loyal and worried workforces fears.

I hope Rod Eddington is watching.:)

Twin Aisle,
Thanks for the vote of support, but I should point out that the bus drivers are employed by 'Airway Handling', a subsidiary of 'Servisair' and they are even worse at organising things. They (sic) allocate the parking spots,in their capacity of 'Apron Controllers' (joke)
so they should know to send a bus driver out.....happens with everyone not just BA flights.

Dai Rear,
You should mail that reply to Rod Eddington,his address is in the corporate directory.

Good post Dai

Every one of us has got a tale to tell of the most blistering and money wasting incompetence.

What emerges from this whole sorry tale of woe is that CitiExpress is out of control and there is no one within the present shower capeable of managing it. The bunker mentality of reducing back to BAR and getting rid of profitable routes and bases in the regions is melting CX back down to the very roots it was created from.


Instead of sacking David Evans and Rob Hearn for starters and a whole host of other similarly incompetent managers further up the line, the self same idiots who got us into this mess apparently still enjoy the confidence of Rod. That they are now being given a third chance (in 18 months!!) to get it right (at our expense) beggars belief.

Dai, your a F#&king star!!
You've got to send that to skippy.

Nav Armed correct me if I'm wrong is this or is this not a rumour site? If so then there is no need to get on your moral high ground and roll out the pet lip!

Infact the rumour I mentioned earlier is true. BACX are pulling off the NCL/DUB route, being replaced by none other than Aer Lingus, who correct me if I'm wrong stopped the route when the old Brymon started a code share. Looks like another nail in the coffin for NCL!?

Having whizzed through all the goss. I can confirm the main thrust of aircraft going and base closures are all along the correct line. Announcement delayed, that is the worrying bit!

Maybe the first cat out of a large bag?

From the BA web page: Press news 13th Dec 2002

British Airways is to switch its current aircraft order with Airbus to receive 10 A321 aircraft instead of 12 A318 aircraft and three A319 aircraft.

The airline’s capital spend with Airbus for the orders placed in 1998 and 1999 remains unchanged.

The 108-seater A318s and the 126-seater A319s were ordered originally to be based at regional airports in the UK. However, as part of its fleet simplification strategy, British Airways’ has decided to base its Airbus fleet at London’s Heathrow and Gatwick airports and re-deploy its fleet of 16 110-seater RJ100 aircraft from Gatwick to the British Airways CitiExpress fleet at regional airports.

Transwede - Just been shown a timetable for Aer Aaran Express operating on NCL-DUB from the new year. 2 x daily with an ATR-42.

682

How the cookie crumbles ........
 

I remember TdlF telephoning me as a regular customer when he had first joined BACX telling now they had got the 145 even BRS weather would be no problem............
Look at the schedule today, cancellations galore, and GO flying their passengers from Scotland to Bristol!
Clearly a far-sighted fellow!
LOL

Latest information from a Handling Agent Manager is that Eastern Airways have bought routes and J41 aircraft, at Newcastle. No mention was made of jobs for current BACX staff etc. This comes as no shock especially when Aer Arran are starting NCL/DUB service with effect 6 Jan and rumour has it they are doing the same route out of LBA and SOU, in place of CX.

And please................DON'T SHOOT THE MESSENGER!

Its a shame that CX management are treating their loyal and dedicated troops so badly. Indeed the BACX crew I have come into contact with are better than ones at my current airline.Someone in CX needs to take their heads and fingers from their arse and tell the staff what the hell is going on and stop playing with their lifes! Maybe then the people affected could get back on track, with maybe a better company!

If someone could explain to me the rationale about not telling the workforce that restructuring plans were being evaluated I would go to bed tonight a happy man. As it is all I am hearing, and reading, are rumours, speculations and in some cases scare mongering. The truth of the matter is that the management are looking upwards instead of downwards. It's no use securing the roof of the buillding if the foundations are crumbling away. The Easyjet road show is taking place next week at the very hotel in NCL that the BACX nomads from CWL and BHX have been staying in the best part of this year thanks to FSAS1. Surely the management team are aware of the venue of this road show and yet still no official word from on high as to what is going with regard to a restructuring of assets and bases, nor a date for an official date for an announcement. I think it is an absolute disgrace and a total lack of respect from the people in Olympic House for us.

Transwede:Ok,point taken.I see what your trying to say but please try and understand the position of the guy's who are directly involved with this, of which I am one of them, who constantly read as you correctly put it "Rumours"which the messenger claims to be true!! I'm directly involved in the various routes that you mentioned and I've not heard a dicky bird.Our management, who have obviously never been introduced to the concept of CRM, ie communication! haven't said anything. Suppose that's what i've come to expect now though.

Nothing personal Transwede, but i'm sure you can appreciate how bloody frustrated myself and my colleages are, at being treated like S@#T.
Just upto Christmas too. GREAT EH!
Professional mushrooms!! That's what we've become.:mad:

Rumours I've heard:

1. LBA BACX base to close. Eastern Airways to takeover
ABZ/SOU/BRS routes with J41's/J32's.
BA to keep LGW route with larger a/c. (DH3/AR1??)
Aer Lingus or Aer Arann to takeover DUB route.

2. ATP's to replace J41's at LBA?? (very doubtfull!)

3. DH3 to operate BRS-LBA-DUB-BRS at the same time as BRS-DUB-LBA-BRS.

a few weeks ago i read someone on here telling a BA mainline pilot to get over the fact that some mainline work ( the RJ100's) would be going to BACX because they were cheaper.
it now appears that if the rumours are true some of BACX's work is going to be farmed out to a cheaper operator ie Eastern which just proves no-one is safe.

and perhaps more ominously for the future dont Eastern also operate EMB135s .

sad !!!:( i hope im just a pessimist