V-Flyer

So, time to head back to the UK. There had been no Gs available in the days leading up to the flight (the buckets had been drifting around the J5 D4 R3 Z0 area for the whole of the previous week), but I held out hope for upgrades to be available on the day.

I do like SFO. It's one of the better US airports if you ask me, especially the International Terminal, with it's high ceilings and feeling of space.

Check-in wasn't bad - quickly seen by the head-of-line Virgin contracted private security person (who seems to wear a more TSA-looking uniform every trip) - a chap who I recognised from previous trips, and then directed over to the UC desk. It looked like I might have had a bit of a wait, but I was quickly beckoned over to a desk, and enquired about an upgrade.

The check-in person was pleasant enough, but the upgrade process was a rigmarole - phone calls, lots of clackety-clack on keyboards, wandering off to ticketing to process the fuel surcharge on credit card. I still think the US airlines - mostly from my experience on United - set a Gold standard in this area. Heavily automated and all easily processed either by the agent, or even DIY on a check-in terminal!

I only mark check-in down from excellent to good for that reason. The time taken to process a simple seat upgrade seemed disproportionate, but I suppose I shouldn't sniff, I guess I should be happy to get an upgrade, and I was, as I left for the CH with a purple boarding card! [:D]

There was a massive queue at security - probably for the AF, Cathay, and KLM flights, so I was rather glad to be missing that out and heading up to the SFO Clubhouse.

I congratulated Claire on her recent V-Flyer recognition and she told me to 'get online and send her regards to the V-Flyer community' - I followed orders, naturally, but not before having a bit of lunch: a pleasant green salad, followed by the grilled herb chicken. Simple food, washed down with a couple of glasses of Anchor Steam.

Being the geek I am, I listened to the inbound flight via the feeds on liveatc.net, and before long I saw the unmistakable shape of a 747 loom over the San Mateo Bridge, G-VFAB approaching in the breezy conditions - everything at SFO was landing and departing on the 28s (usually, SFO lands on 28s, and departs on a mix of 1s and 28s), because of the stiff westerly breezes.

The Clubhouse got quite busy, I'm guessing as a result of it being somewhat easier for people in the US to earn Gold status on VS via Amex spend - something I still think is a bit out of order. You shouldn't get status without setting foot on a piece of airline metal! Many of those who were in the lounge I didn't see in the Upper Cabin during the flight - though I noticed several in the PE cabin.

Another thing I noticed is that the SFO Clubhouse has had a bit of a refresh, with what looks like new carpet (a slightly different shade of grey, and different weave), and the seating looked brighter, like it had been valeted.

People started drifting off around 3.30pm, and we were called to the gate about 3.50pm. The massive security line had gone down to nothing, and I was through in minutes. It looks like SFO is trialling one of those short-wave body scanner cubicles, but it wasn't in use today. Sadly, when I got to the gate, boarding hadn't started at all, and the sign said that boarding wouldn't start until 4.15pm.

It turns out that TSA inspectors had chosen the Virgin flight for an unannounced spot-check, however it looks like this couldn't have been communicated to the lounge in time to delay the boarding announcement.

So, given that VS boarding cards call pax to the gate quite early anyway (1540), there was a sizeable mass of people milling around, so I chose to stay upstairs and watch proceedings, at least until the queue went down, while getting hard stares from a sour-puss bouncer-looking chap wearing a jacket with 'TSA' on the back of it.

Boarding finally started around 1620, and I waited until the UC/PE/AU queue had gone down before heading down in the lift. Just as I got there, one of the ground handling crew had directed a stream of Y pax over to the priority boarding line, and I was at the wrong end of it! [B)]

Fortunately, the purple boarding card was quickly spotted, and I was frog-marched to the front of the queue by the same ground staff member, and I was onboard through L1 door, welcomed onboard by name by the J CSS, and settled into 22A.

It took (compared with previous experience) a while to be offered a drink, by a male scc who I can only describe as going for the George Michael look - tan, stubble, same haircut.

Despite the late boarding, we still managed to push back around 1645/1650, which wasn't bad at all - we'd boarded a whole 747-400 in about 20 minutes. I think this reinforces my opinion that VS call the majority of pax (Y/W) down to the gates too soon, which in turn increases anxiety and causes a boarding scrum when boarding is delayed.

During the taxi out to runway 28L, the Captain welcomed us onboard and talked to us about routing and flying conditions that evening - in sufficient detail you could have probably flown it yourself - takeoff to the west, cross the shoreline, then a right turn to take us over the Golden Gate Bridge toward Sacramento, Reno, across Idaho toward Great Falls in Montana, cross the Canadian Border into Saskatchewan, with a right turn to pick up a strong (100KT plus) jetstream over Manitoba, across the southern part of Hudson Bay, starting to cross the Atlantic over the Labrador Coast, pass to the South of Greenland (Hi Godthab!), and make landfall in North Western Eire, with a flying time of just over 9 hours.

We were airborne around 5.10pm local time, the 25KT headwind giving us a shortish takeoff roll, getting wheels up around the intersection of the 28s and the 1s, and a strong initial rate of climb.

As soon as service could start, the FSM was very visible in the cabin, distributing amenities, though it took a while before 'George' in our aisle was around to take drink orders - the guy working the other aisle seemed much quicker. The J CSS came and offered our sole serving of bar snacks from a tray, which came long before drinks arrived. When the drink came, the glass was dirty. This is the third or fourth flight in a row that I've been served with dirty glasses, crockery, table linen or silverware. Dinner order was taken with a question of 'What are you having?', which seemed a bit 'direct', when compared to the more usual 'What would you like for dinner?'. I also did my usual thing of saying 'Don't wake me for breakfast if I'm already asleep, but if I am awake, I'll have something'. Remember this, as I'll refer to it later.

I can't help thinking that this style seemed to set the tone for the service as a whole. It felt a tad slow, even with the FSM helping with water, clearing away, etc., during the main meal, etc.

Dinner wasn't too bad. The asian-style chicken salad reminded me of something from the Upper Class menu of days gone by - though the 'crispy wonton strips' weren't too crispy by the time it was served. The baked cod was fairly pleasant, and the beurre blanc was an improvement on the last time, but the green beans had that olive-green shade typical of frozen and overcooked vegetables. Fairly decent cheese plate, didn't have (and didn't get offered) dessert. Sadly, both my wine and water were allowed to go empty during the meal service, I was only given one glass of wine, and not offered a top-up.

It was among the better Virgin J food I've had in a while, though still far from what some of the competition might serve. Couple it with what I can only describe as 'bare minimum' service, and it seemed decidedly 'average', if you ask me.

IFE seemed to work mostly okay, but I think the choice of non-film entertainment (i.e. documentaries and comedy) seemed a bit narrow these days. Even the Inflight Trivia was working on FAB, which I thought was good. Now, just get it working on the rest of the v-port fleet, and I might be happier. Sadly, it couldn't have lasted, and the seat hardware eventually segfaulted and needed a reset. Also, the coiled cable is very short, so with the handset on the left (as it is in the A suites) you have to keep a lot of tension on the cable to hold it in your hands.

The crew also used the messaging function on the IFE system to good effect - using it to bark orders at us to close the window blinds, with recalcitrants like me (who like to look outside) getting a visit from a cabin crew member to reinforce the message. Of course, I didn't comply, and so got to see a lovely show of the Northern Lights somewhere over Manitoba.

The plane generally, including the loos, seemed cleaner than the one on the way out. Of course, the cynic in me thinks that G-VFAB probably got a good deep-clean before working the 25th birthday VS1, reinforcing the 'world smells like fresh paint to dignitaries' theory. There was some sticky marks (probably from a food or drink spill) around the cocktail table though. I also noticed some sort of painted metal fastener added to the leather divider side of the suite, this seemed to be some sort of new addition - presumably added so that the sides don't seperate and expose the wiring inside, as has been described on here.

Couldn't sleep very well, so I ended up self-medicating with a couple of glasses of wine at the bar, and had a chat with the FSM, the crew member working the opposite aisle in J, and one of the other pax. The FSM was a long-serving VS employee and seemed very pleasant and proficient.

Nodded off in my seat with some music on after the seatbelt sign popped on, so converted the seat to a bed and dozed for a bit, but I knew I wasn't going to get any proper sleep as it wouldn't be that long before landing - indeed, it didn't seem long before the lights came up. The people in the row in front opened their blinds and flooded the cabin with light. Where were the crew ordering them to keep the window shades down now for the pax who still wanted to rest? Sheesh!

Remember, I'd originally said to my crew member that I didn't want waking for breakfast?

Well, that also seemed to be equal 'No breakfast if you turn out to be awake' to the crew. I converted my bed back to seat, and sat in my seat reading, with no offer of breakfast forthcoming, and no eye contact from crew members working in the aisles.

Eventually, about 15-20 minutes before top of descent, I wandered up to the bar, as coffee is usually laid out up there for 'late risers', but there seemed to be nothing set up there. So, off to the galley, where I stood around for a minute before interrupting a crew member scarfing down something and asked if I might have a cup of coffee before we start down, as I've not been offered any breakfast.

The crew member's response was 'Oh, you said you didn't want anything.' I explained that I didn't want waking. She responded, 'Well, you should have asked'. I made it clear that I didn't think pax sat in Upper should need to ask - the crew should be offering.

She did look a bit shaken by what I said, as though it came as some sort of shock (or reality check), and she then tried to offer me various pieces of cake and bread - of which there seemed to be lots left over. I'm not surprised that VS say that they throw food away from each flight - it's because it's not offered by the crew and the pax don't know it's there. There's a lot to be said from the service from a small open-sided trolley that many other airlines do - you can see what's on offer.

Shame there weren't any croissants on the menu, as I'd have had one of those, but they have been taken off and replaced with some cheap, sickly 'breakfast bread'. Another fine mess, VS.

So I got my cup of coffee somewhere over Dublin, and before long we were descending into Heathrow, only a quick lap of Bovingdon standing between us and a positive landing on 27L shortly before 1020 local time. Quick taxi in to stand 327, however, there was no-one to operate the jetway. Once they had arrived, only L2 had a jetway attached. Off to IRIS, priority baggage seemed to work reasonably well, my bag being somewhere in the first two cans.

Overall assessment of the flight:

It was on time, and okay, and the crew would have scored much higher if they hadn't commited what I consider to be a couple of major service faux-pas in a business class cabin. I feel slightly bad for the good FSM and possibly other hard working crew on this flight, but a small handful of their colleagues let them down.

What worked well:
* Check-in (apart from handling reward upgrade)
* SFO Clubhouse (apart from boarding call being early)
* Flight (almost) on time
* Priority Boarding at SFO (once boarding started)
* Greeted by name on boarding - but that was the only time it was used. Was not even used when ordering dinner.
* Priority Baggage.
* Pleasant and visible FSM.

What could have been better:
* Communication from the gate to Clubhouse about boarding delay.
* Having a jetway operator ready at LHR to receive the flight.
* The IFE.
* The food - those sad looking green beans, and 'wot, no croissants?'
* Being addressed by name.

What was poor and needed improvement:
* Handling of reward upgrades at check-in.
* The crew offering service - e.g. drink top-ups, and breakfast in my case.
* The pace of service.

Lovely shower and some real breakfast in Revivals, and a very pleasant agent there unfortunately got an outpouring about my current frustration with VS - the unforgivably dirty toilets on many flights, general dirt and grime elsewhere on some planes, the scrappy cutback service (not being offered a meal service, crew members arguing with me about their mistakes), the dirty service items, sketchy food, and the flight delays (like 3 hours on VS19 back in June).

So many of them are small things, but when they build up, it's almost like a loose thread. Human nature makes you want to pick at it and see what unravels. I hope some readers here agree that my expectations aren't unusually or unrealistically high?

She said that she would get in touch with someone in Crawley. I hope that I don't get the average follow-up - making light of the concerns, refutal with boilerplate spin, and bribery with bonus miles. I explained that I'm no longer even convinced that the feedback reaches those responsible, certainly not without considerable persistance and escalation.

She explained that at least I was saying something, rather than walking away silently, which is worse for VS. I wonder what I'll hear back, if anything.

This was likely to be one of my last flights with VS this year, as I currently don't plan on visiting a destination served by VS again until next year.

I'll be travelling with some of the competition in the coming months, and it will be interesting to see what they have to offer by way of comparison, and how this influences my choices in 2010.

Mike

Thanks Mike. [y][y]

As always, your TR is detailed, objective, and a great read.

I hope that your feedback ( and your TR) is read, digested and acted upon by the powers that be at VS.

Nick

quote:Originally posted by mike-smashing
I hope some readers here agree that my expectations aren't unusually or unrealistically high?


No, I for one don't (and there will doubtless be many others who feel the same). Whilst it's good to hear that the food was palatable, the attitude of the cabin crew is one of the constant themes still being reported (including by myself).The bottom line is that it's simply unacceptable and something has to be done .How this could be done I don't know, but maybe all pax should be offered a feedback option?.
Personally I think the reduction of staffing in the UC cabin (by one) makes a BIG difference in terms of waiting for things ie food and drink.
Thre are some fab crew and FSMs, and some rotten crew and FSMs. The rotten ones need to go. Simple as.
It'll be interesting to see how your trips on other carriers fare.

DL

quote:Originally posted by DragonLady

Personally I think the reduction of staffing in the UC cabin (by one) makes a BIG difference in terms of waiting for things ie food and drink.



The reduction on the 747s was I think in the PE cabin, not UC, so unless the crew were down on Mike's flight, he should not have noticed slow service. That said, DL I absolutely agree with you on the 346s where the crew down service effect is really noticed.

So - an average flight, not a star but not a disaster. Is that all we can hope for nowadays ... shame NZ do not fly to SFO.

Thanks Mike,

As always your TR's are realistic and detailed. I admit I am purely a less FF with VS, but still endear to what they once had as values. Money I spend in UC is from my own pocket and I expect the service I pay for. They have some terrific CC and staff, just a pity it seemed a bit lacking on this flight. No excuses.

quote:Originally posted by DragonLady
quote:Originally posted by mike-smashing
I hope some readers here agree that my expectations aren't unusually or unrealistically high?



Personally I think the reduction of staffing in the UC cabin (by one) makes a BIG difference in terms of waiting for things ie food and drink.



I agree with you - on my recent flights when service has not been as sharp as expected I get the excuse from either the FSM/SCC that 'due to being one member of CC down in Upper it can only be expected'. Well it is NOT expected by a paying PAX so I complain to VS - everytime, in the (vain) hope that someone will listen and correct their mistake of taking away a valuable crew member in their top tier cabin.

HG

There have been lots of comments before on system gaps for Virgin when it comes to upgrades, and general booking management. You are spot on, there is absolutely no question that the upgrade process on United or AA is leagues ahead. More to the point ... I've never had to pay any extra taxes when I have upgraded a UA ticket. Not entirely sure why ...

Let's not forget VS are also giving Gold to anyone who is a centurion card holder in the UK, which as I understand is rather easier to obtain that in the US. So on the whole we do have maybe a little bit of Gold inflation one way or the other in the US.

In practice, while it is true the Amex card in the US helps get Gold, there is little point in spending so much money on it if you don't fly VS somewhat regularly. Even if you spend in excess of 60k a year on it, you'd still need to take at least a PE flight to get Gold. That would put you with well over 100k miles in your FC account - and what exactly are we going to do with this unless we regularly fly VS? I have it, and it's allowed me to make PremExec on UA much quicker this year, and maybe hit 1K, since I need fewer VS flights, but all this has really done is make me wonder whether I shouldn't just switch to UA completely [:)]

Thanks for the TRs, good reads.

The crew member comment 'Oh, you said you didn't want anything.' is so unnecessary. There is no need for a crew member, shop assistant, waiter etc. to go on the defensive - as a customer you're allowed to change your mind, and that one misguided sentence I think cast more of a cloud on your flight than the incident deserved. Imagine if he/she had simply said 'Certainly, Sir!' and left it at that. But no, the onus is thrown back on you: you should have known that you might feel like a bit of breakfast ten hours earlier! I wish people would realize the affect that their words have on customers.

Now, in their defence, the Revivals agent said the right things - 'She explained that at least I was saying something, rather than walking away silently, which is worse for VS.' - I will put this in bold: someone who complains is someone prepared to give you a second chance - see it as the positive it is, apologise if necessary but pick it up and run with it. That's what I say.

Again its the BASICS that went wrong rather than any 'extra specials'.

Get the basics right and VS would have many. many more happy pax.

Whilst there are obviously several excellent CC and FSMs there needs to be a raising sf standards of the many.

Will compare and contrast your flight and mine next month.

quote:Originally posted by Sealink
Now, in their defence, the Revivals agent said the right things - see it as the positive it is, apologise if necessary but pick it up and run with it. That's what I say.


Agree 100%.

The Revivals agent signified everything which is VS when on top form, and her attitude of listening and offering to relay my frustration into hopefully similarly receptive ears at HQ, is the sort of attitude that makes me want to give VS another chance. However, right now, I feel they will just blow it again with the usual dirt and laxadaisical attitude.

Mike

The Revivals crew is largely unchanged over the last very many years, afaik. The ladies at the entry point are great, have helped me many a time over the years, and have certainly moved me on more than one occasion to drop the obligatory note to HQ. From retrieving a lost jacket, to helping with special arrangements, and many more things, they make the stop a must for me every time I disembark from a flight.

While anecdotal, this does not seem to be the norm all around. Especially in the air, lots of frustration. I'll bet they blow it, too.

Thanks for the TR another 'could do better' experience in areas that should be a given.

I've just spent the weekend with friends who fly BA and whilst previously I have pushed the VS product this time I was keen to know more. I came away thinking the unthinkable - maybe I should try it.

Thank you for the TR! Shame about the CC, I don't think your expectations were high.

Brilliant and very detailed indeed! how frustrating it is to make 1 step forward and then 2 backwards, oh well mike im sure your upcoming flights with other carriers will more than likely kill off any future VS plans.

cheers

alex

Excellent TR. It would be great if there was a V-Flyer panel put forward to VS QA. As I've said before; the UC experience relies very heavily on the onboard staff to provide a great product. If they're having an off day, or are just disinterested in providing good service - work down the back where the service concentrates on physical aspects like IFE, handing out ice cream and KiDS packs and providing 3 choices of food at regulated times.

quote:Originally posted by jafleming
Excellent TR. It would be great if there was a V-Flyer panel put forward to VS QA.


VS would likely benefit from running a Passenger Advisory Council, drawn from a reasonable cross-section of their customer base, with some baseline requirement of how often the panel member flies VS, and possibly a percentage also need to fly with competitors in addition.

BAA have such a panel for Heathrow for which they recently had a recruitment cycle - I thought about it but didn't apply as I had a fairly immobile clash between the meeting BAA wanted successful applicants to attend and an appointment in my day-job.

Among the things I do as part of my job is sit on (and sometimes chair) focus groups, working groups, and the advisory council of one of my company's suppliers, and it provides that supplier's decision makers and policy setters with an important rapport with a portion of it's customer base, often resulting in a competitive advantage when they make changes or additions to their product ranges, because they can verify their proposals against the advisory council members, using them like a litmus paper.

If VS ran such a thing, I'd certainly put myself forward.

Mike

Thanks for the great TR. I find it appalling that a FA argued with about breakfast. How I wish VS had mystery shoppers and they spoke to them like that!

Dominic

Nice TR.

FYI, mostly myself and colleagues travel in PE, and as we are Gold, we dov use the SFO lounge a fair bit.

Only recently have I had to pay for an upgrade (tax/whatever) from the US. Normally it was no cost.

Mark