This is a Trip Report from the Upper Class cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
The young gentleman at the desk was charming and friendly. I enquired if the bulk head seats 18 A&C were still free which they were and he changed them for us , so I came away very happy with seats 18 A & C.
We walked over to the side to sort out our hand luggage when we were approached by a member of the ground staff, she asked which cabin we were flying in to which we replied PE. She wanted to know if we would be interested in upgrading to Upper Class for the special price of £825 each, I told her that was too much, I could have got it for that price at the time of booking. She went away and very quickly came back offering the upgrade for £825 for the two of us, this time Mr D was interested ( he often gets excited when extra leg room seats are involved being 6ft tall ) I asked if there were two seats available on the side, she went to find the seat plan and all that was left was one on the side and one in the middle. So I declined the offer still happy with my bulk head seats in PE for a day flight of just over 7 hours, also realising they must be oversold and we might still be in with a chance of better price upgrade later on .
We made our way to the business lounge, which is OK but not great. We left when the flight was called. On arriving at the gate we saw the girl who had tried to sell us the upgrades and asked if she had managed to sell them to which she replied " yes" just as the magic bleep went off on our boarding cards. We had been upgraded to Upper Class seats 2A &2D the very seats she had tried to sell us.
We boarded the flight and I very nearly forgot to turn left! Handed a glass of sparkling wine but no refill even though we were a long time preparing for take off, which was eventually 35 minutes late due to congestion.
The cabin crew were OK but they didn't sparkle, they didn't interact with the passengers, nobody was referred to by name. They just did what they needed to and very little was seen of the FSM who seemed to hide around the front toilet / cockpit area (staff room) - Passengers were discouraged from using the front toilets. We were surprised to see the cockpit door open for long periods of the flight.
The food was again fine but not outstanding. We had much better in business class on Turkish and Malaysian airlines.
Still I was very grateful for the upgrade so am very loathe to criticize.
We circled over Heathrow for 25 minutes before landing and eventually landed 25 minutes late.
Large queues at border control, but I have just renewed my passport so we were able to use the scanner which was much quicker. Luggage was there waiting for us at the baggage carousel, so straight off to pick up the car from Business Purple Parking and set off on the long trek home down the M4.