V-Flyer

So I booked manchester to boston direct in early April. Great price in UC.

Booking vanished from may account but thought it was the new Virgin site.

Decided to book my son on today. Th flight doesn't show on virgin or expedia.

Called Virgin. It is blocked out from booking. Isn't full- it just cant be booked.

Not looking good?

Hmmm, maybe something to do with this? (Although the MAN-BOS route isn't mentioned)

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=294991

Hmm. It might be as the same plane is doing Boston and San Francisco on alternating days I think.

They said on the phone that it is was cancelled I go go from LHR and at the moment there is space on that plane- just need to get there. I usually go from LHR but thought for a change manchester was a good idea.

I've just done some dummy bookings for April. Looks like they've cancelled the MAN-BOS flight on Sat 8th April but all the others are still showing as operating (it's only running twice a week, on Wed & Sat).

Was it the 8th you were booked on?

8th out and 15th back- both are missing

On the 8th about 15 UC seats were booked out. About half of PE- but an odd booking pattern- all of one side and none of the other and less than 25% of economy (but I imagine that seat books later as not free)

Well it's very strange.

On the 8th there doesn't seem to be an outbound VS121 but there is a return VS122 available to book.

On the 15th (and the 22nd) there is an outbound VS121 available to book but no return VS122.

Baffling!

odd indeed.

I wouldn't mind flying out of LHR as long as I could fly back into manchester direct.

He said it might be locked out as other flights had been cancelled and they might be trying to use this flight for rebooks but that seems odd as Boston isn't the best hub really to fly on.

seems odd to cancel the 15th April as that's Easter Weekend and likely to be busy

Might possible be related to the refurb schedule for the A330s combined with the Easter break leading to a shortage of metal

I assume it is but it doesn't explain why on certain days the outbound leg appears to be operating but the return leg isn't (or vice versa). Unless the aircraft is repositioning in the US to cover another route.

It seems quite a few schedule changes coming through. One to watch though the crew on my flight today were still really excited about operating to BOS & SFO though they were not aware that DL were operating some ATL flights in April (could be extended...)

It's no surprise SFO is selling stronger out of the two hence the stonking UC deals to BOS recently.

Jon

I just wish that they would say it was cancelled. I need to book my son to travel with us but I am in limbo.

Given a choice I would rather fly out of LHR (for the clubhouse) and back into Manchester (better times and shorter journey home) . I don't want to fly out to Boston via JFK as I don't want to change, do customs (and luggage?) at JFK as I have a dodgy knee!

Interesting rumour on headforpoints today (and it is only a rumour at this stage) that BA are taking over AA's MAN-JFK route and looking at starting other long-haul routes from MAN. Which suggests BA may be feeling threatened by VS's expansion at MAN.

gumshoe wrote:Interesting rumour on headforpoints today (and it is only a rumour at this stage) that BA are taking over AA's MAN-JFK route and looking at starting other long-haul routes from MAN. Which suggests BA may be feeling threatened by VS's expansion at MAN.

This rumour has been going round for some time. Given how BA reduced its presence at MAN to a token LHR route (bar the Sun-Air routes and the recently-announced summer weekend routes with BA CityFlyer that also involve BHX and BRS), I'm firmly in the "I'll believe it when I see it" camp, especially as BA don't have spare aircraft to deploy out of MAN at such short notice with the 747 and 767 retirements progressing.

However, given the VS/DL expansion and AA's poor performance on some of the MAN routes (using the 787 on the ORD route was a disaster punctuality-wise and was quickly reverted to a 767), it wouldn't surprise me if this hasn't gone unnoticed at BA. Don't forget Thomas Cook and it's probably only a matter of time before Norwegian joins the party. People won't tolerate the inferior AA product or be willing to connect at LHR (or DUB with EI) if good quality direct routes exist from MAN, especially if the price and timings are right.

I agree that MAN will not be as big of a cash cow as LHR, but I think the threat of losing market share out of MAN is real unless they try something different such as using BA metal ex-MAN.

Well further development. The outbound flight is now available for booking again (hurray) butter return has now been taken down (boo)