VS008 LAX-LHR 19 OCT 11 (Upper Class)

This is a Trip Report from the Upper Class cabin

Ground Staff

Food & Drink

Entertainment

Seat

Cabin Crew

LAX-LHR VS8 Upper Class,
Very friendly staff in Air New Zealand lounge, Boarding was the usual scrum so common with LAX, called from the lounge very early and couldnt board as upper class cabin had no power so seats couldnt be raised, this took 30mins to fix. Once on board we were told, no IFE at all, no reading lights, no call bells, no menus, no IFS just a stand in, short staffed. Had we known we could have got books etc, or flown on later flight
After much protesting about the IFE was offered 4000 miles as compensation, handed a sorry form, was also told IFE didnt work at all on the inbound and LAX ground crew knew and should have conveyed at check-in, also told aircraft was dogged with faults IFE very unreliable hence they carried 300 plus sorry letters, only thing good about the flight was we got there safely, good landing and fast exit from LHR.
wrote to Virgin and was told very sorry about flight, and offered another 4000miles since found out 8000 is the norm for upper IFE problems, still fighting with customer relations, have another upper flight booked 14th Dec VS7 dreading it, what has happened to Virgin

I have yet to write my TR from mondays flight but my seat was broken on the sfo flight returning to london, and my dad on the 11th nov had no IFE and a broken seat leaving from lhr!!!!!

It seems to me something is horribly wrong somewhere in the vs chain of command that these issues are not being dealt with straight away, there is absolutely no excuse for it departing with so many services not working, worst thing is compensation should reflect the issues when spending £2000-£4000 for a seat.

Atleast like you said you returned safe, such a shame you flight was naff.

cheers

alex

This is unfortunate and disappointing for you ......also a little worrying as the VS service continues to be inconsistent Let's hope customer relations produces a rabbit out of the hat

Welcome to v-flyer

Sounds like a bit of a nightmare flight! I do hope your return is much better on the VS7.

Thank you for your TR. Sorry to read about the issues that you had.

When you say no in flight service, what did you receive ... was power out to the galley too?

Sounds like a long flight ... and I know LAX is a scrum, it's too cramped but not a lot VS can do about that.

[Darren Wheeler]

Sorry, bit confused when you say

upper class cabin had no power so seats couldnt be raised

.

You mean they were in bed mode?

I didnt see how the beds were but i was told by the ground crew that they were in bed mode from cleaning and they were having to wind them by hand into the seat position as there was no power, when i got on the seats were in the regular take off position, the delay boarding was the seats being hand wound into position, all the UC passengers were last to board, we were left at the gate a good half hour - the engineers restored the power to the seats before we took off, all the other power was off, so no reading lights, call bells or IFE this was the whole aircraft all classes, after dinner was servered they turned the cabin lights off and it was very dark, if you wanted to read you couldnt.
Food and drink was ok, this wasnt affected just the service due to so few staff, if you wanted it you had to go and get it

Uh oh, VS11 to BOS just delayed while sitting in lounge due to no onboard power ... now this is a real problem because a) I have a shedload of work to do and need in seat power and b) as I wait in the lounge and drink champers the likelihood of working diminished and I need IFE.

Wonder if the same plane ...

[Darren Wheeler]

Nope.

OP was on Sleeping Beauty and the 11 is showing as Mystic Maiden.

That's pretty bad - in fact, that sounds close to appalling.

Are you serious, drinks/dinner service was not at seat?

They must have had minimum CC onboard otherwise it would have been an illegal flight...

I had a Y return from MCO a few years ago, short staffed, minimum crew as they had to go draft someone off another flight to make the flight legal. That crew worked their a*ses off, and it was one of the best inflight services I've had in Y with VS.

Short staffed means they work harder, not make it the passenger's problem...

As for customer relations, they need to get their act together - two lots of 4k miles doesn't come close to making good on that shoddy performance...

Yup no IFE, no power, no lights, no seat movement ... This is not Upper Class! Well at least we're aboard and the nice CC say there's power in premium if I want to downgrade myself .

there's power in premium if I want to downgrade myself .

. Well, did you ?

That's not service, it's appalling! I did experience something similar though with the IFE, also LAX to LHR, in September. Again, apparently the IFE hadn't been working on the way out and again, ground staff should have told passengers but didnt. At least we didn't have to mass complain to get the sorry letter - but honestly, it's no way to run an airline, let alone an UC service. Surely it should be fixed? I'd thought my experience was a one-off, but it's enough to drive a sane person to the dark side....

[Darren Wheeler]

Depends what the cause is.

If the fault requires parts that are not immediately available, what do you do?

Cancel the flight and throw the 300+ passengers plans out because there is no IFE? Run the flight without IFE but at least everyone gets to their destination?

I don't know what the answer is, I don't run an airline! BUT - it does seem that IFE failing isn't or wasn't an isolated event. I know how hacked off I was about it and I didn't have the additional aggravation Danny did.

Also - sorry, earlier post seems to have arrived here twice. No idea why or how... I don't recall hitting submit more than once

[honey lamb]

Also - sorry, earlier post seems to have arrived here twice. No idea why or how... I don't recall hitting submit more than once

I've removed one of them for you. It posts twice if you hit the back button after posting instead of one such as View active topics or View new posts etc

there's power in premium if I want to downgrade myself .

. Well, did you ?

I managed three hours of laptop work before my battery died ... was getting panicky as I'm speaking at a conference today and needed the time to work.

I do feel sorry for the crew though (and we had an exceptional crew), running up and down the aisles with their 'monkey wrench' to wind seats up and down is not fun for them, nor is it right. VS seems to me to be getting slipshod on cabin maintenance.

Have to say in addition, the new menu was lovely, a big thumbs up .

Also - sorry, earlier post seems to have arrived here twice. No idea why or how... I don't recall hitting submit more than once

I've removed one of them for you. It posts twice if you hit the back button after posting instead of one such as View active topics or View new posts etc

Thanks DL!

[honey lamb]

Also - sorry, earlier post seems to have arrived here twice. No idea why or how... I don't recall hitting submit more than once

I've removed one of them for you. It posts twice if you hit the back button after posting instead of one such as View active topics or View new posts etc

Thanks DL!

Erm, if you wish to abbreviate it's HL, not DL

Have heard back from exec office and they have increased offer of miles to 16'000 with lots of sorrys in the letter, they did say this is very rare (happened to me 3 times now) maybe i should buy a lottery ticket, flying Upper to LAX again tomorrow with my dog (Winnie)shes in the front hold, no IFE or food for her,i will be composing my 3rd letter to the exec office.