V-Flyer

Since the VS/DL tie-up, I'd been looking for an opportunity to fly the new(ish) Delta Business Elite LHR-JFK flight.

And a genuine reason to be in Brussels allowed me to book a very reasonably priced ticket from BRU, changing in LHR, to JFK (£1,350 return). I bought this as one ticket direct from Virgin Atlantic, so that I could earn miles on my VS credit card. I flew with hand luggage only.

[The LHR-JFK leg on VS has its own Trip Report here: http://v-flyer.com/forum/index.php?f=21 ... =viewtopic]

The BRU-LHR leg was in BA Club Europe. Not much to write home about: usual average BA Galleries lounge at BRU (self help bar, crisps, cold meats and cheeses). Club Europe gets you fast track access through the airport.

If you've got Priority Pass and you get bored with Galleries, you can go across the hallway to the Diamond Lounge for, er, exactly the same thing (food identical, but slightly better wine in the BA lounge, slightly better beer in the Diamond lounge)! I assume many of these lounges subcontract to local providers for their maintenance, which explains this phenomenon.

The flight itself (45 minutes) was speedy with good service. Plenty of booze, and a strangely excellent fresh chicken salad meal was served (I have had appalling food on short hop BA Club Europe flights before).

I was given very accurate advice on how to transfer from T5 where our flight arrived to T3 for the Delta flight to JFK.

One more thing: the seat is the usual Club Europe seat (i.e. identical to an economy seat, just with the guarantee of nobody sitting between aisle & window seats in a 3-3 layout).

I don't understand the new BA Club Europe seats myself. I prefer the old leather seats with the leg room and 2-2 layout. At least Air France calls that section premium economy.

Tinuks wrote:I don't understand the new BA Club Europe seats myself. I prefer the old leather seats with the leg room and 2-2 layout. At least Air France calls that section premium economy.

Pretty simple from BA's point of view - slimmer seats and less legroom = at least one extra row = more revenue.

From the passenger's point of view the benefits are less obvious, granted!

It's certainly provoked a healthy debate over on Flyertalk. A surprising number of people think the new seats are more comfortable even with less legroom in CE.

To me, by removing one of the key points of difference from economy (more legroom), they've left me with even less of a reason to choose CE. All you get now is lounge access, a guarantee that the seat next to you will be empty, a few more miles & TPs and a sorry excuse for a meal.

My meal was surprisingly good (and wholly unexpected on a 45 minute flight), but as I don't fly BA that often I've no idea if that's the norm!

I just read in an article that the seat pitch in Club Europe is reduced from 34" to 30". Is this the case now?

iforres1 wrote:I just read in an article that the seat pitch in Club Europe is reduced from 34" to 30". Is this the case now?

It will be true, they have fitted one aircraft so far with the new interior.