VS016 MCO-LGW 29 Aug 05 (Upper)

This is a Trip Report from the Upper Class cabin

Ground Staff

Food & Drink

Entertainment

Seat

Cabin Crew

Over the last year I have notice a change in the ground staff and this was shown at the check in that I had on this trip. I was travelling back with my teenage children after meeting up with them in Florida. My daughter has been on her gap year being on a RWT and I had treated her to a reward ticket in UC for the final leg. I could not get her on my own flight, so she was on VS 50 which departs 15 minutes earlier. I had already checked and there was 2 spare UC seats on my flight. So politely at UC check in I asked if my family could be on the same flight. The reply was only if I paid a fee to change the ticket for my daughter!

My son was in PE on a K ticket and I asked if I could upgrade this using miles - no wrong type of ticket. Next how many bags to check in - 4. Sorry sir only 3 in your name and the other had to go in my sons name and have a PE label put on it! Looking in the V-book I can't find any limit in UC?
Then we had to drag the bags 50 yards over to the x ray machine. In the past there has been staff on hand to do this for UC passenages. So is this a sign of what out sourcing will bring? As over the last few years I had found that the MCO staff would always go that each mile to be helpful.

The one big improvement to the Delta Lounge is that it now has free wi-fi access and so was able to spend the time catching up on the emails. The flight was on time and had a very friendly crew to look after us. Even the food is better on the inboard trip. A quick sleep and we landed early.

Just to add on my previous check in at LGW. I again had that friendly service. Sir can I weigh your hand luggage - its 11 kgs and you are only allowed 6kgs. So I had to find my ticket print out which shows the limits being 16kgs for UC. Sorry Sir I did not know that! So may be there is a market for the V-Book as their training guide!

Thanks for the TR.

Hmmm..this doesn't bode too well for service at MCO. I do think that insisting on tagging one of the bags as PE just because of the 3 bag limit seems OTT (although it is, IIRC, techincally correct for a UC pax?). Perhaps there's a security concern, though, as that would mean you are inevitably submitting one of your son's bags as your own? This is guesswork, and doesn't seem to be the reason for the refusal from what you have said.

Changing your daughter's ticket though, opens the whole 'giving you flexibility where you haven't paid for it' can of worms. Not sure what the fee would have been to change a reward sector - did they indicate this?

I also had to drag my bags to the scanners when flying UC from MCO last Xmas. Never realised they used to do this for you, so had no complaint about it at the time! To be honest, it was a very short distance though, perhaps not even 50 yards?

Good news about the WiFi in the Delta Crown Room - looking forward to getting some use of that!

I assume your 11kgs of hand luggage was spread amongst 2 bags? I still find it amusing that >6kgs in Econ or PE can cause injuries, but in UC people's heads can withstand another couple of kilos [:)]. Still, good thing you had your ticket printout - really they should know better at checkin!

[Decker]

Well being au gets you ANOTHER bag to add to the three (which has been in place for as long as I can remember) - so it sounds like someone doesn't know their rules.... like Onionz I've never been helped with taking my luggage to screening but...

Thanks for the TR - sorry that the experience was more negative than usual [:(]

Originally posted by Decker
Well being au gets you ANOTHER bag to add to the three (which has been in place for as long as I can remember)

Now, am I going blind or something, but where does it say that Au get another bag allowance on that page? I never knew about that benefit, and can only see a reference to 'Priority boarding, priority baggage handling and excess baggage allowance, when a member flies with Virgin Atlantic in any class of travel.' on the FC Au benefits page...... [?]

Cheers

Michael

[Decker]

The extra bag isn't referenced there - a partial reference is Priority boarding, priority baggage handling and excess baggage allowance, when a member flies with Virgin Atlantic in any class of travel as you said! It took a call to the Premier Line to establish that this benefit has NOT been removed - one additional 32kg bag in any class of service.

Thanks Decker,

That is what I thought, but again could not find it anywhere, so I was unable to question the check in staff. Might be a useful addition in the next edition of the V-Book

Thanks for sharing your experiences eurohill,[:)]

VS seem quite tight on ticket classes upgrading with miles - but less so with cash.

Did you ask how much a cash upgrade would have been?

Originally posted by Decker
The extra bag isn't referenced there - a partial reference is Priority boarding, priority baggage handling and excess baggage allowance, when a member flies with Virgin Atlantic in any class of travel as you said! It took a call to the Premier Line to establish that this benefit has NOT been removed - one additional 32kg bag in any class of service.

That's excellent investigative work, thanks mate [y] I wonder why they don't publish this anywhere (unless the lack of publicity is to minimise the 'weight' problem [:D]) I mean, I'm not being daft here am I? I'm not doubting you in the slightest (and excuse me for going on about it) but I can't see it: online, in the Ts&Cs, on the FC statement, not even in the welcome letter (am I missing an Au benefits booklet?), and your posts on the subject are the very first I've seen [:)]

Cheers

Michael

[Decker]

When I was first made Au I was fascinated by the reference to excess baggage travelling for conference as much as I do - needing to take stand equipment and all. So I called and asked and was told about the extra bag. This time I spoke to a very helpful lady who went all through the small print and confirmed the extra bag (on the routes I fly at least - I didn't check Africa/Asia). She further explicitly said that the US guy was wrong in this situation and should have accepted the four bags. It DID take her a while to find though.

It'd be good if you called to confirm 'cos if 2 mods post it it must be true and then LRoM can put it in vBook III [:D]

Originally posted by Decker
It'd be good if you called to confirm 'cos if 2 mods post it it must be true and then LRoM can put it in vBook III [:D]

Well, not that I ever doubted you, but I did speak to Premier today, and the helpful chap that I spoke with had the information at his fingertips ...extra luggage allowances for Au members as follows:

Travelling to USA & Nigeria:
1 extra checked bag up to 32kg (in addition to class of travel allowance, so if you're in UC, it's 4 x 32kg)

Travelling to any other VS destination:
Extra luggage weight allowance of 20kg, with the limitation of 32kg per bag (so if you're in UC, it's 50kg max = 1 bag w/ 32kg + 1 of 18kg, etc...)

When I mentioned that it wasn't documented anywhere, he seemed surprised and said he'd pass that info on to the web team [:)][y]

Cheers

Michael

Two points I'd like to pop in here for differing services.

I travelled out to MCO in July and was booked (reward flight) on the VS15 but ideally wanted the VS27. I asked at Check-in if I could swap over as there was 1 seat left on the 27 and the ticket desk did this for me straight away.

On my return, my bags were taken from me at check-in and the ground staff dragged them to the security check for me! They always have done and I've been over to MCO 5 times this year!

Matt