UA923 LHR-IAD 21st Feb 2010 (Biz)

Really quick TR from the first UA sector on my current US trip.

I changed the flight from leaving on Friday afternoon to depart Sunday morning because I was sick on Friday. Didn't manage to clear my upgrade at rebooking, and it also seemed stuck in limbo on the waitlist 24h before the flight, despite there being space available on the plane.

Got a good deal on parking in Car Park 1A at Heathrow (only 10 more than the 'business parking'), so that made life very easy being at T1 at 5.30am on Sunday morning!

Had to wait about a minute to see a very professional and friendly agent at the UA check-in, who confirmed my upgrade and 'cleaned up' the booking - apparently, the call-centre agent that had processed the itinerary changes for me had left a bit of a mess, which is why my upgrade wasn't clearing automatically.

The agent also reminded me that I shouldn't go down to the gate too early - they don't call flights in the *A lounge - apparently, there were a number of complaints from people leaving the lounge too early to find boarding scrums. UA are handing out letters to their premium pax at check-in, asking for direct feedback to the UA LHR ops managers regarding ideas in how to improve the process.

It's a shame that they are suffering since the move to T1 in this respect, as they had the process at T3 perfected, but good on them for trying to get pax feedback.

Very good to see a helpful, friendly and professional member of staff at such an early hour.

Security was a doddle (apart from almost forgetting to take my laptop out of the bag) and off to the *A lounge for bacon rolls, cereals and a shower. The *A lounge refit kept the same shower suite from the old BA F lounge in T1 (with '*A' signs stuck over where it used to say 'BA'!). Good to see there is no wanton spending of money... [}:)]

We were departing from gate 49 - which is one of the new gates in the new pier tacked onto the end of the former 'Europier' - it's the first bit of the new Terminal 2 (Heathrow East) development. Wow. What a trek. However, it's equipped to a high standard, and if that's a taster of what we're getting with the Heathrow East deveopment, it's going to be good.

I think I was among one of the last pax to board 767-300 N641UA, and the crew joked with me about what had held me up, at the jetway on boarding. I replied I was getting a shower because I didn't want to stink up their plane! No scrum, and straight on to sit in 9A. Menu and drink offered straight away.

The purser was the same one I had flown with on a few occasions previously, he must be a long-serving UA crew member at Heathrow, as he has a very smooth patter over the PA and did lots of pax interaction. He regonised me pretty much straight away too!

New amentity kit - the drawstring washbag has been replaced with a small 'mesh' zipper bag (quite shiny 'high tech' industrial look and feel), which I actually found useful to collect all the guff that starts out in your pockets when you leave home for an international trip - car keys, oyster card, British money - and you won't need again until you get home again.

Pushed back on time, smoky engine start because of the low temperature outside, and a taxi off to 27L for takeoff. Channel 9 - the air-to-ground radio feature allowed me to follow our progress in the queue and once we were airborne as we headed over Wales and Ireland.

Meal service was a breakfast after takeoff, with fresh fruit, croissants, three choices of dish (omelette with sausage, potatoes and bacon; waffle with blueberry compote, maple syrup and kassler ham; or a cold meat and cheese plate) and lots of fresh coffee.

There was then a full lunch served before our arrival, really tasty appetiser of a smoked salmon ballotine with a delicious citrus cous-cous, with a good fresh green salad, followed by a choice of three dishes, of which I chose the mozzarella and herb stuffed chicken breast with green beans, balsamic gravy and a polenta and spring onion cake. All washed down with a nice South African Sauv Blanc.

Other choices were a fillet steak or an Indian vegetarian curry. The purser came around to take the meal orders, and introduced the food to each passenger - not just 'do you want beef, chicken or veg', but what is in each dish and how it's served.

Very good for airline food. Tasty and fresh, without being too heavy. I want the recipe for the cous cous! The purser said I should write to UA HQ in Chicago, or to the Alpha flight kitchen in London and ask for it.[;)]

We landed over an hour early in IAD thanks to the lack of strong headwinds, and the purser came to say goodbye before landing in IAD.

Transferring between UA flights in IAD means you don't have to take the mobile lounge to the main CBP arrivals facility - the UA mid-field terminal has it's own facility for use by connecting pax only. Didn't have to wait long to see a CBP officer, and my bag was also ready for collection at the side of the belt in the baggage hall - they take premier baggage off the carousel and put it on the floor.

Shame that I didn't realise this for about 2 minutes. Duh!

Back through TSA security and up the escalator into the terminal to go and make use of those Red Carpet Club free booze vouchers I'd saved from my last trip, while waiting for my connecting flight.[8D]

Not a bad flight at all.

Check-In: Full marks. Can't fault it.

IFE: Good AVOD system (Panasonic) provided in Biz and F class on the 767. Limited (and slightly staid) choice when compared to Air NZ or VS. Crashed once and needed a reset. I think they have doctored the skymap to be less specific about aircraft location since the 'underpant bomber' too. Of course, Channel 9 is great for an aviation geek like me.

Seats/Aircraft: The new UA biz seat is very good, pretty well thought out, though I think it could do with more of a 'sit-up' position for eating and working. The base seat is a distant relative of the BA NGCW seat. The aircraft was *very* clean inside. UA seem to take aircraft cleanliness seriously these days.

Food: Great. The only downer is that UA have cut the midflight snacks they used to have available on these flights (e.g. crisps, chocolates, fruit, etc.). Economy pretzels for midflight snacks or nothing.

Cabin Crew: Very good level of service. Very professional Purser.

Shows that UA can provide a stable and consistent product on their international service.

Mike

Thanks Mike for the TR, United would be a distant choice for me transatlantic, but your TR makes me reconsider.

Thanks for writing this up. Been meaning to write one up myself, as I've been flying UA a fair bit recently and done a few TATL segments on the 767s out of ORD since the went to one flight a day SFO-LHR. The experience in the new cabin is amazingly different, and very positive, I agree. Just did a flight ORD-MUC this weekend on the old 777 configs and it was a throwback moment. Agree on the AVOD selection, which is perplexing, apparently they have space for much more content but aren't going overboard right now, might change once the refit is complete for the 777s. As for the snacks, they have remained on the very long haul flights to APAC and west coast to Europe, but gone on the shorter flights from my recent experience.

To be honest, making connections through ORD from or to F internal flights to the west coast I've found myself so stuffed recently that I have had to skip the second meal on the international flights more often than not, so I don't quite miss the snacks. In the last few months the food offering on UA has shown significant improvement IMO, with the occasional dud. The internal lunch service is more food I've ever had on any flight, and quality is decent. Wine service is still suspect, but last weekend they did have a Pedroncelli wine on board, which is an imaginative selection from one of my favorite Sonoma wineries, if not exactly top of the range. For an airline with such a strong presence on the US West Coast, there's no excuse for not carrying good quality $20 a bottle wines on board from that area.

Been said so many times before, but I love these kinds of seats, I like to sleep with the back part of the recliner slightly raised (in fact I like sitting on the rear facing seats as you have a very slight angle in my preferred direction to begin with) and the control I can exercise with these seats is very good. I really miss the clubhouses (who wouldn't???) but otherwise am quite happy being forced to fly UA these days.

Thanks for the TR, sounds like you had a great journey.

I love Channel 9 as well.[:I]

Thanks for the TR UA sound good. What have *A done with the old BA T1 F lounge is the circular bar still there at the back?

Oh ... if only. No circular bar. There's a dungeon-like feel to the place for the most part, due to the ceilings having been lowered as far as I can recollect, and there was never much in the way of natural light in the place to begin with. I'm half wondering if the setup is somewhat temporary until the new building is put in place. The only area that has decent sized windows overlooks the building site, so curtains are always drawn. Food is abundant, but basic. Better than what you used to get in the BA Terraces lounge, not as good as what you get in Galleries (less variety), and not much better in the F side than in the regular lounge. The layout has been inverted, so the F lounge is accessed on the right when you walk in, along the back right end that used to be biz area + smoking lounge in the old Galleries layout, IIRC. It seems to me that the old F space is not really in use right now, not sure though. I do like the fried indian spice flavored snacks they serve from lunch onwards, quite addictive.

Overall, they have a space/lighting issue, food is tasty enough even if basic, but there's nothing there to really want to make you arrive two or three hours early. Good place to pop in, check some email/clear up some work stuff and grab a quick snack/drink before you leave.

quote:Originally posted by MarkedMan
Overall, they have a space/lighting issue, food is tasty enough even if basic, but there's nothing there to really want to make you arrive two or three hours early. Good place to pop in, check some email/clear up some work stuff and grab a quick snack/drink before you leave.


Indeed. It's basic, and obviously done on a tight budget bearing in mind it's going to have a shortish lifespan.

It can get very cramped, and the space isn't that well laid out, if you ask me.

The BMI lounge (again in ex-BA space) is probably more pleasant and better thought out.

Mike

quote:Originally posted by mike-smashing


The BMI lounge (again in ex-BA space) is probably more pleasant and better thought out.

Mike


Which old BA lounge are BMI in?

quote:Originally posted by jaguarpig
Which old BA lounge are BMI in?


They occupy the upstairs space which used to have T1 domestic Terraces in it. They have left the loos pretty much untouched in terms of sanitaryware and decor.

The old BA domestic gates at T1 are now *A international gates.

Mike

I see, never made it to the domestic lounge, I couldn't think of another BA lounge in T1.Hope you get home Ok have a good flight fingers crossed.

quote:Originally posted by MarkedMan
Agree on the AVOD selection, which is perplexing, apparently they have space for much more content but aren't going overboard right now, might change once the refit is complete for the 777s.

Right, I'm guessing the extra programming isn't as easy to justify when it's for <50% of the seats on the plane, however premium they area. At least when the 777 refits roll out it becomes easier to justify, as AVOD will be available throughout all cabins.

Out of interest, the first 777, N794UA, has gone in for refit at UAL maintenance in SFO, and is due back in service around April. The aircraft will feature the same F and C seats as the 763 and 744, totally new Y cabin seats (3-3-3 layout rumoured to be replacing the 2-5-2 config), with AVOD throughout.

Hopefully, the throughput rate will increase once the first aircraft has finished snagging, as 32 of the 777s to be refitted at the SFO maintenance base, as standalone visits for interior refit only, currently planned at around one every 3-4 weeks, while the other 14 of the 46-strong UA fleet are being refitted during scheduled heavy airframe maintenance (likely to be somewhere like Ameco Beijing, Xiamen TAECO or one of the other Asian MOC facilities UA contracts out to), which may speed up the rate of rollout.

quote:As for the snacks, they have remained on the very long haul flights to APAC and west coast to Europe, but gone on the shorter flights from my recent experience.

To be honest, making connections through ORD from or to F internal flights to the west coast I've found myself so stuffed recently that I have had to skip the second meal on the international flights more often than not, so I don't quite miss the snacks.

I think if I'd eaten the substantial lunch first, I wouldn't have felt peckish midflight. However, with the 'smaller' service (breakfast) being first on 923, something to nibble on would have been welcomed. (Sort of like VS17 has 'light bites' but no afternoon tea...)

As it was, the generous lunch on 923, served at around 9am Washington DC time, 2pm UK time, and 8am Austin, TX (my destination) time, held me over until I checked into to the hotel mid-afternoon in AUS.

(Beware if you're in the back of the bus on 922/923, as Breakfast is your main meal, and the second meal is a warm snack only. Bring food parcels in Y!)

Mike