This is a Trip Report from the Premium Economy cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
At about 9:30AM after finishing my first beer we saw that the board had changed and the flight was now delayed until 1PM therefore we settled into another couple of beers and then at 11:45AM headed to gate 31 as advised on the board. Shortly after getting there an announcement came over the system for all PE customers to go to Gate 32 in that moment I knew there must have been an aircraft change and they were downgrading people. Apparently the aircraft has gone Tech and as a result a new aircraft had to be used the older 747-400, and they therefore had downgraded 30 Upper Class pax to PE and now had to downgrade the majority of PE customers to Premium. Oh what fun!
A very nice gentleman for Virgin was honest with explaining the problem and I have to admit I was expecting the worst I had organised this holiday for me and a friend of mine to say thanks to him for his support and which is why I bought a full fare PE ticket for me (miles and TPs) and used the companion ticket for him. It was on the basis that I had a full fare ticket that we were one of the very lucky few that kept our seats in PE (so its not always the case that a Companion Ticket is bad!) well we were now in the bubble which was fine. All around me I could hear Virgin staff explaining that as they were travelling on low fare PE Tickets they were being downgraded I do think that if you are going to use that as a reason you need to make it clearer when purchasing your tickets what fare code it is and what it means as most people really didnt understand which I can understand why they wouldnt. There was a group of about 10 ladies as well celebrating someones 50th birthday who took it very badly and were saying they were going to write to Richard Branson as she was a Solicitor and her other friend were a Doctor I hate it when people use the do you know who, or what I am card.
Onboard the aircraft we settled into our new seats 79H&K (I think) and I felt sorry for the crew immediately. All around me I realised we were surrounded by everyone who was originally booked into Upper Class who had been downgraded one lady got very vocal explaining to the Stewardess how it simply wasnt good enough and that her husband works 24 hours a day my friends response that perhaps he should look for a better job then didnt go down very well. Then again another couple complained about the horrible seats and that they were going to write to Richard Branson also after about an hour of this my friend and I also concluded that we too were going to write to Richard Branson and complain about that fact that his company put us in the position of being surrounded by 30 down graded Upper Class Passengers and that was a very painful position as we had no Galley to hide in unlike the Cabin Crew who to their credit did their best to settle down those most vocal.
We eventually took off at about 1:45PM the flight was good, we made good time. All around me the complaints were still going on about the PE product now the food wasnt too bad to be honest, but it isnt great compared to Upper I admit but youre off to the Caribbean when much of the nation are still reeling from huge Job Losses lets get some perspective here people. Thats what I wanted to tell people anyway instead I kept quiet and just continued to do my best to drink VS29 dry of G&T and apparently my friend and I managed it as the stewardess told me they had none left by our 7th each. Not sure I believed her but I was just happy to be close to Barbados and getting off this aircraft and leaving behind those poor souls who obviously appeared to likening their experience to having lost a relative in the war. I thought the crew did a sterling job in a tough situation I just hope the return journey is a little easier on Thursday evening - now back to my Rum Punch.
