drat01 Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Have the "delight" of BA Club to the Caribbean soon (it's a freebie) Is the wife going ? Jamaica ? ...... Here is the traffic news for Surrey. Major roads were closed due to an abundance of tumbleweed p.s. will message you on FB Tony re that parking thing, need to sort something out - cheers 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloBarnesi Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Flew Qatar to Goa last year. Doha was in a state, but was impressed by the lounge. Wish I could have stayed longer. Enjoyed the offer of the vintage bottle of champagne on the Doha to Goa part of the flight. Fly BA pretty regularly; agreed they are in general disappointing. Also pretty annoying frequent flier programme. Virgin on the other hand are really good when they are really good, but my goodness when things go wrong, they really go wrong. Better than the shite rail service. But thats Beardie for you. Flying Air New Zealand next year, be intrigued to see how good they might be.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Fly BA pretty regularly; agreed they are in general disappointing. Also pretty annoying frequent flier programme. really ? their points + cash offers are superb .. £27 + avios return to Berlin , Wife + 2 kids to Budapest for £150 + avios .. I did Business to KL for £320 + avios using a one world partner but booked through BA I have a BA Amex card so rack up the points plus I get a free companion ticket every year , though it can sometimes be difficult to redeem if I use 2 at once and try and take the kids as well , but 4 freebie tickets is probably quite hard on any airline I should imagine I signed up to their OnBusiness account last month so now the company account , gets reward with tier points and avios points as well as the individual , so double bubble every time we fly ... so if anyone flies BA ever let me know your flight details and membership number I'll have some more free avios points admittedly I don't use other airline points system to compare , but the BA one for me works pretty well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloBarnesi Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 I can never seem to actually use the things. Wanted to fly to LA next April; nothing doing on the days at all. I spoke to someone who is PA to one of the big wigs at BA and she said it was rubbish... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 I can never seem to actually use the things. Wanted to fly to LA next April; nothing doing on the days at all. I spoke to someone who is PA to one of the big wigs at BA and she said it was rubbish... yeah some of the popular routes you stand no chance on .... they are putting the A380 on that LA route shortly so that may free up ticket options ....it's worth checking back from time to time I did LHR - Washington and Philadelphia - LHR last year on Avios without any problems ... Vegas is the one I can never get annoyingly Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloBarnesi Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Were you able to do these when you wanted, or had to fit your time around BA... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drat01 Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Were you able to do these when you wanted, or had to fit your time around BA... I agree Paul - there never seems to be any sort of availability re Avios when you want. When I used to fly Star Alliance a lot that was simple flight anywhere and everywhere - shame BA are not part of that rather than One World which also seems limited Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloBarnesi Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Virgin aren’t part of star alliance officially are they? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drat01 Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Virgin aren’t part of star alliance officially are they? No - but you can sometimes book flights off them - not sure how that works exactly Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 (edited) Were you able to do these when you wanted, or had to fit your time around BA... bit of both .. my initial exit point would have been New York but they only had economy free on Avios so I just re-routed my schedule slightly to get the club ticket out from Philadelphia (was going to both cities anyway so didn't make any odds to me) funnily enough , a friend of mine has enough Virgin miles to take him to Mars and back and his complaint is that he can never redeem them ... I don' think it's just a BA thing tbf Edited September 2, 2013 by tonyh29 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Virgin aren’t part of star alliance officially are they? No - but you can sometimes book flights off them - not sure how that works exactly my mate used his virgin miles with Singapore airlines once but at a funny conversion rate like 1.5 virgin miles = 1 Singapore mile don't think you can do that anymore though ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloBarnesi Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Were you able to do these when you wanted, or had to fit your time around BA... bit of both .. my initial exit point would have been New York but they only had economy free on Avios so I just re-routed my schedule slightly to get the club ticket out from Philadelphia (was going to both cities anyway so didn't make any odds to me) funnily enough , a friend of mine has enough Virgin miles to take him to Mars and back and his complaint is that he can never redeem them ... I don' think it's just a BA thing tbf I had some Virgin miles and it seemed to give me financial discounts on future Virgin flights. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thetrees Posted September 3, 2013 Share Posted September 3, 2013 Virgin aren’t part of star alliance officially are they? No - but you can sometimes book flights off them - not sure how that works exactly my mate used his virgin miles with Singapore airlines once but at a funny conversion rate like 1.5 virgin miles = 1 Singapore mile don't think you can do that anymore though ... Singapore's stake in Virgin has been bought by Delta, so the expectation is that Virgin will join Skyteam in the next couple of years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dom_Wren Posted November 27, 2013 Share Posted November 27, 2013 Thinking about doing a review with pics of the envoy (transatlantic biz) service on us airways (a330) if anybody is interested, they fly lhr-phl/clt and man/phl with the envoy suite i think. Anybody else flew these? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted November 27, 2013 Share Posted November 27, 2013 (edited) Never flown US airlines But read that they have just merged with American Airlines to become the biggest airline in the world Edited November 29, 2013 by tonyh29 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AVFC_Hitz Posted November 28, 2013 Share Posted November 28, 2013 Thinking about doing a review with pics of the envoy (transatlantic biz) service on us airways (a330) if anybody is interested, they fly lhr-phl/clt and man/phl with the envoy suite i think. Anybody else flew these? I never did get around to getting my pilots license. Just a passenger these days. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drat01 Posted November 28, 2013 Share Posted November 28, 2013 Thinking about doing a review with pics of the envoy (transatlantic biz) service on us airways (a330) if anybody is interested, they fly lhr-phl/clt and man/phl with the envoy suite i think. Anybody else flew these? Yup - Like many american airlines you never really feel as though you get personalised service, always felt you were just a number / commodity on the plane. BA of late have certainly followed that model and that is why they no longer get anywhere near the "title" they had of "worlds favourite airline" etc - bit a lot of that is the conversion to London airways by that awful bloke Willy Walsh. American have invested in some new equipment and refurbed planes but really is like letting someone decorate your house but you are still a sha fan, it's a nice place to sit but the people are still ugh! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted November 28, 2013 Share Posted November 28, 2013 Tbf to BA they know via the exec card where I like to sit , my meal choice and they always address me by my name and ensure I've had some champers before take off ... Their lounges have got over crowded and there does appear to be a clear cost cutting exercise going on in some of them however.Mrs H came back from Hungary the other day and BA don't pay the airport to allow its biz passengers to use the fast track ... No biggie but it is a bit on the tight side for a big airline But as a comparison I didn't get any personal touch off Qatar airlines.. with them I most certainly just felt like a passenger , though maybe if I had walked in with my wife 50 paced behind me that would have been different .... Malaysian airlines I did well to get a drink until about an hour after take off etc etcSo BA may do a few things wrong but they do get a lot right as well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wainy316 Posted November 28, 2013 Share Posted November 28, 2013 Emirates are great and i was very pleasantly surprised with Mongolian airlines last year too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted November 28, 2013 Share Posted November 28, 2013 Emirates are great and i was very pleasantly surprised with Mongolian airlines last year too. yeah I was a little unsure about flying Mongolian air but they have a license to fly into Europe ( they operate direct from Berlin ) so figured they at least met a certain standard !! I'm sure 99 % of the passengers were half way out the door the second the wheels touched down though , always love that when you fly to that neck of the woods ... it's like they think the plane is going to spontaneously combust if they don't' get off it 23 seconds after wheels down Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts