Little Red - Closing down

[mitchja]

Looks like VS are already crediting FC accounts for anyone with future VLR reward bookings as per the VLR special offer (I have a return reward booked for Dec/Jan):

07 Oct 2014 Silver Little Red Reward Rebate 1250 0

[mitchja]

New VS e-ticket received here for my domestic flight next year now on BA.

For info, you can find out your new BA PNR by entering your old VS PNR into this page on BA.com along with all the other info. That will then bring up your booking showing your new BA PNR and where you can also add your contact details and/or BA Exec/Avios FF number etc.

They could have improved their iPhone app.

;-)

A colleague of mine flies regularly on BA (gold card).
He looked at switching to VS for some of his travel, especially with the status match offer, but didn't bother when he looked at the VS app. He likes the BA app for booking/checking in/account management, and when he saw the mess that is the VS app, that put him off any more thought about flying VS!

A poor reason for not trying a different airline, I grant you.. but that's one business pax who didn't switch.

Everything is going mobile and particularly for the savvy and (often wealthy) biz traveller. For VS to be this glaringly behind even low cost and far less known national carriers is very bad in my opinion.

Granted, they've made good strides in making their mobile website, but they could even wrap their mobile site in an iOS and Android package and it would be better than what they have!

They could have improved their iPhone app.

;-)

A colleague of mine flies regularly on BA (gold card).
He looked at switching to VS for some of his travel, especially with the status match offer, but didn't bother when he looked at the VS app. He likes the BA app for booking/checking in/account management, and when he saw the mess that is the VS app, that put him off any more thought about flying VS!

A poor reason for not trying a different airline, I grant you.. but that's one business pax who didn't switch.

Everything is going mobile and particularly for the savvy and (often wealthy) biz traveller. For VS to be this glaringly behind even low cost and far less known national carriers is very bad in my opinion.

Granted, they've made good strides in making their mobile website, but they could even wrap their mobile site in an iOS and Android package and it would be better than what they have!

Sorry - I have to disagree. I travel a little for work, perhaps more than some others and I never, ever use apps to check-in.
I like the old fashion action of walking up to a check-in desk. I will also add that a majority of my work colleagues are the same as me (we are talking hundreds, not thousands). We use the web to select seats but that's as far as it goes, we very rarely even check-in on-line.
What may seem bad to you is the not even in some peoples vision. If people are willing to exchange possible standards for the ability to play with their Smartphone then that is down to them, not this business traveler tho. Unless that App gives me free travel

They could have improved their iPhone app.

;-)

A colleague of mine flies regularly on BA (gold card).
He looked at switching to VS for some of his travel, especially with the status match offer, but didn't bother when he looked at the VS app. He likes the BA app for booking/checking in/account management, and when he saw the mess that is the VS app, that put him off any more thought about flying VS!

A poor reason for not trying a different airline, I grant you.. but that's one business pax who didn't switch.

Everything is going mobile and particularly for the savvy and (often wealthy) biz traveller. For VS to be this glaringly behind even low cost and far less known national carriers is very bad in my opinion.

Granted, they've made good strides in making their mobile website, but they could even wrap their mobile site in an iOS and Android package and it would be better than what they have!

Sorry - I have to disagree. I travel a little for work, perhaps more than some others and I never, ever use apps to check-in.
I like the old fashion action of walking up to a check-in desk. I will also add that a majority of my work colleagues are the same as me (we are talking hundreds, not thousands). We use the web to select seats but that's as far as it goes, we very rarely even check-in on-line.
What may seem bad to you is the not even in some peoples vision. If people are willing to exchange possible standards for the ability to play with their Smartphone then that is down to them, not this business traveler tho. Unless that App gives me free travel

I'm not saying that it's the standard right now, but the industry (demonstrated by BA, UA and even DL with good to great mobile apps) is heading that way. If VS wants to label itself at the forefront of the industry, they have much ground to make up in this regard. That's what I was saying.

It's not one or the other. Surely the demand for such an app is there, and normal checkin and boarding passes as we all enjoy them shall remain.

But to me, being able to purchase ELR seats, boost miles or things that you'd otherwise have to phone them for, saves me time.

I'd personally always avoid the type of mechanism which relies on me having charged up my phone beforehand (ie: boarding passes, tickets). It isn't always possible, adaptors are forgotten, left at hotel, long journeys taken, refused entry to lounge to charge it up, connecting flights.

I feel concerned that some people are so quick to leap on some technologies because it exists (to the detriment of normal stuff such as paper), that they don't think about the practicalities of such passes.

As for the rest of managing their accounts via apps etc, yes please, but since VS's IT department falls far short with this in the web, I doubt the app will get a whole lot better.

Little Red is going to be disbanded, had to to ring customer services as booked on flight from Manchester next April with connections, rebooked onto another airline, very sad to see it go...

I thought I was giving news out about Little Red closing down (as previous post), I have used it several times in the past and all the flights were full, even arriving at LHR at 10.30 from Miami and had to wait while 17.00 ish so could still fly on this service, shame because the staff were brilliant, now been booked on the rival BA, this is the first time on BA will have to see what the service is like, looks like we will have to fly from Manchester to Orlando and then drive.......

Customer service not very helpful, having had the disappointment of having to fly with BA, We have sent several emails to enquire what the procedure is at Heathrow, as on previous flights we have checked in at Manchester and luggage was checked through to Miami, we were also transferred internally to the other terminal at Heathrow, the service was great, several emails later we have been informed that we will have to make our own way between terminals and the luggage MAY be checked through, to check with BA, tried this worse service than Virgin have given us, all this and not our fault........

Customer service not very helpful, having had the disappointment of having to fly with BA, We have sent several emails to enquire what the procedure is at Heathrow, as on previous flights we have checked in at Manchester and luggage was checked through to Miami, we were also transferred internally to the other terminal at Heathrow, the service was great, several emails later we have been informed that we will have to make our own way between terminals and the luggage MAY be checked through, to check with BA, tried this worse service than Virgin have given us, all this and not our fault........

On a single ticket it's highly likely (as in 9.5/10) that BA will check your bags through to MIA from MAN.

To get from T5-T3 follow the purple flight connections signs for T3 and hop on the next bus there, clear security if required and make your way to the CH/T3 departures.

Thank you for that clarkeysntfc, you have been more reassuring than either Virgin or BA.
Cheers
Auto Pilot

Virgin to lease out Little Red slots (that don't belong to BA

VS say that the timings are not good for transatlantic services.
Other non-USA destinations seems to be out of the question.
Other slots going back to BA, who have, again, played a blinder.

If they don't have enough aircraft then surely DL could operate some the the earlier west bound slots freeing up aircraft to use the two later slots. I think the truth of the matter is that VS will eventually only be flying to the US and Caribbean

If they were serious about expansion they could defer the retirement of some of the LHR B747/A346 frames and use them for these slots.

I believe that BA has slowed its 747 retirement schedule as a result of their expansion.

Instead VS is downsizing the airline by bringing in more aircraft with a lower capacity than the ones they replaced.

Without knowing what time of day they are, it's hard to say which routes the slots would be suited to.

I think it is all down to cost of 4 engine aircraft over 2. VA will soon be all 2 engines

[Darren Wheeler]

Once the initial ten 787's are delivered, I can see expansion.