Any more info available regarding the suspension of LHR-SJC next OCT? Is it seasonal or definite?

Heathrow takes a % of revenue I believe.

RyanairGuru wrote:

The general inconvenience of transiting through the US, and potentially needing a visa, including for citizens of most South American counties, is a very good reason to not connect there. That is, however, a different point to the one I was responding to.

Conceptually, yes.... but one real-world aspect of it all that people on this site constantly ignore or just plain don't know, is that the majority of South Americans with (1) significant personal wealth, and/or (2) compelling vocation reason, are going to have longterm visas for US travel, and thus the transit isn't anywhere near impediment that you imagine it to be.

If you're an oil or commercial exec in the likes of GIG or GRU, then (prior to the current system) you would've had a 10yr-visa in your passport, to where going through the likes of MIA, ATL, or JFK to get to Europe would be no big deal at all.

An annoyance? Inconvenience? Slight hassle? ...sure.
Anywhere near the obstruction that people here, who've likely never even done it, portray it to be? Not at all.

Vicenza wrote:

davidjohnson6 wrote:

It's not BA, and it's not just Heathrow. Airport. Pretty much every airport in the UK does this - except for small island and remote airports. Airports have heavy reliance on the money coming from passengers spending money in the departures area. The airports which don't do this typically have only 1 or 2 gates anyway.

Willing to be corrected if I'm wrong, but surely airports obtain their revenue from the (high) rents they charge the various stores and outlets, not directly from what passengers spend purchasing from them.

Correct, but if nobody shops in the stores, the stores will not pay the high rents.

Also, as someone else mentioned, the airports also get a percentage of the revenue.

ClassicLover wrote:

Vicenza wrote:

davidjohnson6 wrote:

It's not BA, and it's not just Heathrow. Airport. Pretty much every airport in the UK does this - except for small island and remote airports. Airports have heavy reliance on the money coming from passengers spending money in the departures area. The airports which don't do this typically have only 1 or 2 gates anyway.

Willing to be corrected if I'm wrong, but surely airports obtain their revenue from the (high) rents they charge the various stores and outlets, not directly from what passengers spend purchasing from them.

Correct, but if nobody shops in the stores, the stores will not pay the high rents.

Also, as someone else mentioned, the airports also get a percentage of the revenue.

Oh yes, I'm fully aware of that but yet that aspect of people shopping is not really the same as claiming direct revenue for the airports. The same could be said of any shopping centre in the world. People will still shop but to claim that is the primary reason for delaying gate times is, in my opinion, simply nonsense. Equally, I am not completely convinced about airports getting a percentage of profits.

Vicenza wrote:

ClassicLover wrote:

Vicenza wrote:

Willing to be corrected if I'm wrong, but surely airports obtain their revenue from the (high) rents they charge the various stores and outlets, not directly from what passengers spend purchasing from them.

Correct, but if nobody shops in the stores, the stores will not pay the high rents.

Also, as someone else mentioned, the airports also get a percentage of the revenue.

Oh yes, I'm fully aware of that but yet that aspect of people shopping is not really the same as claiming direct revenue for the airports. The same could be said of any shopping centre in the world. People will still shop but to claim that is the primary reason for delaying gate times is, in my opinion, simply nonsense. Equally, I am not completely convinced about airports getting a percentage of profits.

Even without the airport getting a revenue share, high sales turnover will factor into the rent for these units.

Anything that keeps people in the shops and bars must be a positive on that basis.

The exact ratio will depend on individual negotiations, but like many commercial landlords Heathrow charges its retail tenants a combined fixed rent and percentage of turnover.

Commercial landlords can be quite ruthless in ejecting tenants if they think someone else can generate higher turnover in the unit.

It would help BA if gates were called earlier, specifically for flights departing from the B & C satellites as the Galleries B lounge is always much quieter than the lounges in the main terminal.

Vicenza wrote:

Oh yes, I'm fully aware of that but yet that aspect of people shopping is not really the same as claiming direct revenue for the airports. The same could be said of any shopping centre in the world. People will still shop but to claim that is the primary reason for delaying gate times is, in my opinion, simply nonsense. Equally, I am not completely convinced about airports getting a percentage of profits.

Not convinced? Heathrow's website says - https://www.heathrow.com/company/doing-business-with-heathrow/commercial-concessions-team

"What sort of rent would my business be expected to pay?

A: This is our most popular question and the answer depends on a number of variables. Our retail contracts are concession agreements of at least three years in length and financial terms are a percentage of net sales or a guaranteed minimum sum, whichever is the greater. Retail concession fees can vary by product category and location."

I'll consider you convinced now

Vicenza wrote:

ClassicLover wrote:

Vicenza wrote:

Willing to be corrected if I'm wrong, but surely airports obtain their revenue from the (high) rents they charge the various stores and outlets, not directly from what passengers spend purchasing from them.

Correct, but if nobody shops in the stores, the stores will not pay the high rents.

Also, as someone else mentioned, the airports also get a percentage of the revenue.

Oh yes, I'm fully aware of that but yet that aspect of people shopping is not really the same as claiming direct revenue for the airports. The same could be said of any shopping centre in the world. People will still shop but to claim that is the primary reason for delaying gate times is, in my opinion, simply nonsense. Equally, I am not completely convinced about airports getting a percentage of profits.

In most passenger services areas such as retail, food & beverage, bureaux de change, advertising and car rental, these services are operated on a concessionaire model where a third party is responsible for the front line provision of the service and Heathrow airport receives a concession fee based on a percentage of the concessionaire’s net sales turnover. In most cases the concession fee is underwritten by a minimum guaranteed rent. Incidentally car parking is different, being based on a management contract whereby Heathrow collects all of the revenue and the car park operator is paid a fee plus operating costs for providing car park services to the passenger.

I was told this is to prevent crowds from forming at the gate but the store theory holds more water to me.

I guess its horses for courses. I would rather go to the gate and straight on to the plane, than spend time waiting at the gate. But then I would rather shop than go to the lounge.

Slightly off topic, I'm just curious if the carbon footprint of aviation includes all the other activities like food, shopping, etc. as we see more and more airports expanding retail offers.

The carbon footprint of concessionaries is so small as to be immaterial. At Heathrow some 95% is from aircraft and the rest is due to ground operations and people travelling to and from the airport.

ClassicLover wrote:

chonetsao wrote:

I remember not that long ago, BA forbid staff traveller taking the business/first class amenity bags home if they travelled on non-rev.

This has been a policy for a very long time. I used to fly on staff travel in about 2011 and this was the case then. I see nothing wrong with it.

It's no longer policy, staff can now take the amenity packs. They realised this was part of the pathetic penny-pinching that was alienating staff (and little things like this add up with all the other stuff over the years). Staff only receive 1 (or 2 for longer service) staff travel tickets that have J or F priority and even then flights are often so full you end up down the back anyway. It's the same with lounge access. A passenger sat in J or F would use the lounge but when a staff passenger has a seat in J or F for their one or two trips they're prohibited.

Maybe there's a opening in management you can take?! then again, plenty of managers, just not enough loaders, TRMs, pilots or engineers!

BA777FO wrote:

ClassicLover wrote:

chonetsao wrote:

I remember not that long ago, BA forbid staff traveller taking the business/first class amenity bags home if they travelled on non-rev.

This has been a policy for a very long time. I used to fly on staff travel in about 2011 and this was the case then. I see nothing wrong with it.

It's no longer policy, staff can now take the amenity packs. They realised this was part of the pathetic penny-pinching that was alienating staff (and little things like this add up with all the other stuff over the years). Staff only receive 1 (or 2 for longer service) staff travel tickets that have J or F priority and even then flights are often so full you end up down the back anyway. It's the same with lounge access. A passenger sat in J or F would use the lounge but when a staff passenger has a seat in J or F for their one or two trips they're prohibited.

Maybe there's an opening in management you can take?! then again, plenty of managers, just not enough loaders, TRMs, pilots or engineers!

That’s not true.

The loads are there right in front of you on the website for any chosen flight.

The trick is to book the night before on a flight with club seats available. Then you automatically get put straight into club.

I’m flexible on destinations though, a holiday is a holiday, and I wouldn't try to go to Barbados in December etc etc

mustiturnright wrote:

BA777FO wrote:

ClassicLover wrote:

This has been a policy for a very long time. I used to fly on staff travel in about 2011 and this was the case then. I see nothing wrong with it.

It's no longer policy, staff can now take the amenity packs. They realised this was part of the pathetic penny-pinching that was alienating staff (and little things like this add up with all the other stuff over the years). Staff only receive 1 (or 2 for longer service) staff travel tickets that have J or F priority and even then flights are often so full you end up down the back anyway. It's the same with lounge access. A passenger sat in J or F would use the lounge but when a staff passenger has a seat in J or F for their one or two trips they're prohibited.

Maybe there's an opening in management you can take?! then again, plenty of managers, just not enough loaders, TRMs, pilots or engineers!

That’s not true.

The loads are there right in front of you on the website for any chosen flight.

The trick is to book the night before on a flight with club seats available. Then you automatically get put straight into club.

I’m flexible on destinations though, a holiday is a holiday, and I wouldn't try to go to Barbados in December etc etc

It is true. Literally everything in my post was true but rather than saying they're so full you end up down the back you might not even get on! Last time I operated home from MLE we left behind people that had been trying to get home for 3 days on staff travel. Look on the ops dashboard for flights to Florida today, it's nuts at the moment. I'd caution against your strategy because if others are already confirmed when you book your flight rather than waitlist they will trump you irrespective of whether your onload or cabin priority is higher. Second, it's great you're flexible, but many of us have kids and can't deal with the government prosecuting us for taking our kids out of school, we'd lose our airside IDs. My kids don't really want to go to Aberdeen in August for their summer holiday, neither do I.

BA777FO wrote:

mustiturnright wrote:

BA777FO wrote:

It's no longer policy, staff can now take the amenity packs. They realised this was part of the pathetic penny-pinching that was alienating staff (and little things like this add up with all the other stuff over the years). Staff only receive 1 (or 2 for longer service) staff travel tickets that have J or F priority and even then flights are often so full you end up down the back anyway. It's the same with lounge access. A passenger sat in J or F would use the lounge but when a staff passenger has a seat in J or F for their one or two trips they're prohibited.

Maybe there's an opening in management you can take?! then again, plenty of managers, just not enough loaders, TRMs, pilots or engineers!

That’s not true.

The loads are there right in front of you on the website for any chosen flight.

The trick is to book the night before on a flight with club seats available. Then you automatically get put straight into club.

I’m flexible on destinations though, a holiday is a holiday, and I wouldn't try to go to Barbados in December etc etc

It is true. Literally everything in my post was true but rather than saying they're so full you end up down the back you might not even get on! Last time I operated home from MLE we left behind people that had been trying to get home for 3 days on staff travel. Look on the ops dashboard for flights to Florida today, it's nuts at the moment. I'd caution against your strategy because if others are already confirmed when you book your flight rather than waitlist they will trump you irrespective of whether your onload or cabin priority is higher. Second, it's great you're flexible, but many of us have kids and can't deal with the government prosecuting us for taking our kids out of school, we'd lose our airside IDs. My kids don't really want to go to Aberdeen in August for their summer holiday, neither do I.

No, I understand that.

Having kids on staff travel must be difficult because like you say, school holidays are the worst time to use staff travel.

My Mum and I ended up on jump seats from Mauritius to London, luckily it was a -400 but it was a bit of a nightmare.

Have you tried Bermuda ? Short-ish flight, not the end of the world down the back ?

Maybe you could all gather around the iPad the night before, check out the loads, anywhere long haul with the obvious exceptions is fun, might be exciting even ? Not knowing.

Easy to book hotels quickly these days. I always check out how many are above me but I never know whether they’ve already been added to the figures ?

Good God NO! All those midges in August.
https://www.smidgeup.com/midge-forecast/

Talking about BA staff travel, as former long haul crew, you would feel a bit sorry for ground staff because they really were not clued up on when not to go where ref demand or weather and all the rest of it, especially when you couldn’t see the loads.

I can remember walking through airports and thinking oh god they’ve got no chance after being told the loads.

chonetsao wrote:

I remember not that long ago, BA forbid staff traveller taking the business/first class amenity bags home if they travelled on non-rev. To me it was so petty and the level BA did go against its own staff members is no better than their counterpart Ryanair. And then talk about their policy of non-rev travel for its own staff has an expire date after retirement. That is just few examples I can think that BA do see its own staff as liabilities and thieves that is stealing company resource that cost them peanuts.

There is something that makes some former staff unhappy: their travel companions are compelled to be on the same flights as them, so no more travelling independently. I can't think of a good reason for this policy which is still in force after decades.

mustiturnright wrote:

BA777FO wrote:

mustiturnright wrote:

That’s not true.

The loads are there right in front of you on the website for any chosen flight.

The trick is to book the night before on a flight with club seats available. Then you automatically get put straight into club.

I’m flexible on destinations though, a holiday is a holiday, and I wouldn't try to go to Barbados in December etc etc

It is true. Literally everything in my post was true but rather than saying they're so full you end up down the back you might not even get on! Last time I operated home from MLE we left behind people that had been trying to get home for 3 days on staff travel. Look on the ops dashboard for flights to Florida today, it's nuts at the moment. I'd caution against your strategy because if others are already confirmed when you book your flight rather than waitlist they will trump you irrespective of whether your onload or cabin priority is higher. Second, it's great you're flexible, but many of us have kids and can't deal with the government prosecuting us for taking our kids out of school, we'd lose our airside IDs. My kids don't really want to go to Aberdeen in August for their summer holiday, neither do I.

No, I understand that.

Having kids on staff travel must be difficult because like you say, school holidays are the worst time to use staff travel.

My Mum and I ended up on jump seats from Mauritius to London, luckily it was a -400 but it was a bit of a nightmare.

Have you tried Bermuda ? Short-ish flight, not the end of the world down the back ?

Maybe you could all gather around the iPad the night before, check out the loads, anywhere long haul with the obvious exceptions is fun, might be exciting even ? Not knowing.

Easy to book hotels quickly these days. I always check out how many are above me but I never know whether they’ve already been added to the figures ?

I’ve stopped using my freebie from gatters to Caribbean, I go the long way around (JFK) always gonna get your seat ( mostly ) them JetBlue or AA on a standby , never not got on , and treated nicely …
Remember being “confirmed in club” coming back from ANU and we all ended up down the back!!! I’ll let you guess why…
As to wash bags, well we all probably have a million kicking about the house, as when it was policy not to hand out, half the crew couldn’t care less and gave you one , toothbrush I use for the dogs teeth and the socks I wear kicking about the house, sometimes I gift my mum with the moisturiser for her birthday, she’s very appreciative!!

Rudenko wrote:

mustiturnright wrote:

BA777FO wrote:

It is true. Literally everything in my post was true but rather than saying they're so full you end up down the back you might not even get on! Last time I operated home from MLE we left behind people that had been trying to get home for 3 days on staff travel. Look on the ops dashboard for flights to Florida today, it's nuts at the moment. I'd caution against your strategy because if others are already confirmed when you book your flight rather than waitlist they will trump you irrespective of whether your onload or cabin priority is higher. Second, it's great you're flexible, but many of us have kids and can't deal with the government prosecuting us for taking our kids out of school, we'd lose our airside IDs. My kids don't really want to go to Aberdeen in August for their summer holiday, neither do I.

No, I understand that.

Having kids on staff travel must be difficult because like you say, school holidays are the worst time to use staff travel.

My Mum and I ended up on jump seats from Mauritius to London, luckily it was a -400 but it was a bit of a nightmare.

Have you tried Bermuda ? Short-ish flight, not the end of the world down the back ?

Maybe you could all gather around the iPad the night before, check out the loads, anywhere long haul with the obvious exceptions is fun, might be exciting even ? Not knowing.

Easy to book hotels quickly these days. I always check out how many are above me but I never know whether they’ve already been added to the figures ?

I’ve stopped using my freebie from gatters to Caribbean, I go the long way around (JFK) always gonna get your seat ( mostly ) them JetBlue or AA on a standby , never not got on , and treated nicely …
Remember being “confirmed in club” coming back from ANU and we all ended up down the back!!! I’ll let you guess why…
As to wash bags, well we all probably have a million kicking about the house, as when it was policy not to hand out, half the crew couldn’t care less and gave you one , toothbrush I use for the dogs teeth and the socks I wear kicking about the house, sometimes I gift my mum with the moisturiser for her birthday, she’s very appreciative!!

You cheapskate ! Lol.

I think staff travel is a different experience for everyone.

I also like travelling alone and I don’t like planning anything.

When the mood takes me and I can afford it I go on staff travel the night before. If all the flights to JFK and LAX look dodgy I soon forget about it, try again another time.

My favourite places are NYC the Santa Monica to Redondo stretch which is 20 minutes in a cab from LAX and Bermuda.

I will not take the slightest chance of ending up in economy. I would rather not go. I’m too tall, I don’t sleep on planes no matter where I sit, and Hollywood has been churning out some real crap lately so the IFE is off too.

I did sit next to a porn star once called Penelope Pumpkins coming back from LA, I was down the back of a 400, she got on late and practically every man’s head turned around as she walked down the aisle, I was with my Mum and I actually fell asleep on one of her enormous boobs. Gods honest, and I’m gay, that was the funny thing.

She had the entire cabin laughing, standing up and loving it, crew were bringing her First class brandy
I just remember my Mum and I looking at each other in bewilderment and smiling as she looked at the window seat next to us. ABC seats in E zone

BA will add service to Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen from the LHR hub, effective 1JUN, 4x w with A320 aircraft.

https://www.aeroroutes.com/eng/230404-basaw

dcajet wrote:

BA will add service to Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen from the LHR hub, effective 1JUN, 4x w with A320 aircraft.

https://www.aeroroutes.com/eng/230404-basaw

Long overdue. Might be better for BA to move all of it's Istanbul flights to SAW.

Galwayman wrote:

dcajet wrote:

BA will add service to Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen from the LHR hub, effective 1JUN, 4x w with A320 aircraft.
https://www.aeroroutes.com/eng/230404-basaw

Long overdue. Might be better for BA to move all of it's Istanbul flights to SAW.

No. I imagine there will be a fair number of people self-connecting from Turkish domestic to BA.
Five or ten years ago, TK was cheap between IST and London. Not any more

Also the business and tourism heart of Istanbul is on the European side so IST is more attractive. Asian side is more residential and industrial and as such SAW developed as the secondary LCC airport.

BA also resuming Sharm el Sheik (SSH) from Gatwick, from the 3rd November.

https://www.turningleftforless.com/news ... ike-at-t5/

https://www.aeroroutes.com/eng/230405-bassh?format=amp

Here’s further confirmation of BA’s return to SSH.

gunnerman wrote:

The carbon footprint of concessionaries is so small as to be immaterial. At Heathrow some 95% is from aircraft and the rest is due to ground operations and people travelling to and from the airport.

If you have any references about this, I'm interested. Thank you.

SAW is operating with one runaway and is slot restricted. BA will not leave IST completely but kudos to BA for launching LHR SAW that emerged due to TK's policy of allocating all LHR slots to IST exclusively and not to any other airport in Turkey. TK has been dragging their feet not to launch LHR ESB for years due to lack of LHR slots and that is not true as now they got over 34 slots from PIA and all of them were also allocated for IST zero to SAW, AYT or ESB. I hope BA launches LHR ESB and that will be a great response to TK.
I am sure LHR SAW will do very good as this is very much needed particularly for those living in the Asian side in Istanbul. If BA changes the schedule and leaves early morning from SAW they can also secure lots of North American connections and can step into SAW North America market too, which can see this flight operate daily. Likewise, for ESB that is very much needed...

Galwayman wrote:

dcajet wrote:

BA will add service to Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen from the LHR hub, effective 1JUN, 4x w with A320 aircraft.

https://www.aeroroutes.com/eng/230404-basaw

Long overdue. Might be better for BA to move all of it's Istanbul flights to SAW.

ro1960 wrote:

gunnerman wrote:

The carbon footprint of concessionaries is so small as to be immaterial. At Heathrow some 95% is from aircraft and the rest is due to ground operations and people travelling to and from the airport.

If you have any references about this, I'm interested. Thank you.

See the foreword of the Net Zero Plan.
https://www.heathrow.com/content/dam/heathrow/web/common/documents/company/heathrow-2-0-sustainability/futher-reading/Heathrow_Net%20Zero%20Carbon%20Strategy_v13.pdf

BA777FO wrote:

BealineV953 wrote:

With the longhaul fleet sixteen aircraft smaller than pre-Covid, a fair bit of current A320 family flying must be to hold slots until the longhaul fleet is up to strength.

With 80/20 rule back in effect that's not the case.

And ....more aircraft could be wet-leased in.

And that's what they've had to resort to. What a waste of money.

Hello.

Looking at speedbird online, flightradar24 and other sources I reckon:
At Heathrow there are 6 more shorthaul aircraft operating than in March ’20.
At Gatwick there are 15 fewer shorthaul aircraft operating than in Summer ’19.

The breakdown:

BA, added since April ’20:
7x A320neo delivered
1x A321neo delivered
4x A320s on wet-lease

BA, disposed of since April ‘20:
5x A319

BA, stored since April ‘20:
8x A319
3x A320
5x A321 (not including x3 ‘mid-haul’ A321s).

So, overall BA has 9 fewer shorthaul aircraft operating that in March’20.

Gatwick, operating at this time:
15x A320s
5x A321

In posts last year, reliable contributors said that pre-pandemic there were up to 35 Airbuses in the Gatwick shorthaul fleet before the pandemic.
That being the case, Gatwick has 15 fewer shorthaul aircraft now than in Summer ’19.

So, BA has transferred 15 A319s / A320s to Heathrow from Gatwick.
This gives a net change in the fleet at Heathrow of plus 6.
That is, the Heathrow shorthaul fleet is larger than it was pre-pandemic.

I said that a fair bit of current A320 flying at Heathrow is likely to be to hold slots.
I say that precisely because the 80 / 20 slots rule is back in effect; the airline must now use the slots.

My guess is that BA has grown the Heathrow shorthaul fleet primarily to use and protect slots that will in time be used for longhaul services as and when further B787-10s and A350s are delivered.

It is unfortunate that BA does not have enough A320 pilots to operate aircraft it has in store.

Wet-leasing is a small price to pay to protect slots worth £millions.
It is far from being “a waste of money”.

A year ago you claimed that BA wanted to close Gatwick shorthaul to make aircraft available to sit on slots at Heathrow.

You must be delighted that BA Network Planning has come up with a schedule that protects slots at Heathrow and maintains a presence at Gatwick.

BA777FO wrote:

BealineV953 wrote:

If the airline wanted to do more longhaul flying, then well ahead of the aircraft being delivered the excellent Flight Operations Manpower Planning team would have kicked off the process of offering flight crew on the Airbus A320 family fleet positions on the B777 and B787.

Excellent? Haha.
Austin Knight was so bad he was effectively sacked.
They're having to offer leave buyback, no TASS offset and enhances rates of NCP to regularly crew flights and the training capacity simply doesn't exist to satisfy requirements, hence the wetleases this summer.
They've been offering as many conversions from the A320 as they can but the capacity to increase it simply doesn't exist.
They can't crew the A320 operation either and T&Cs at Euroflyer are now so poor they're struggling to recruit.
If only the excellent manpower planning team got the numbers right...

I said that had Boeing delivered the ‘late’ 787-10s and 777-9s, then well ahead of the aircraft arriving BA’s Flight Operations Manpower Planning team would have initiated the process of offering flight crew on the Airbus A320 family positions on the B777 and B787.

Where I said the ‘Manpower Planning’ team, I was referring to a specific team who are responsible for a very specific task.

The Manpower Planning team takes the BA schedule from five years out and determines how many flight and cabin crew will be needed for each fleet.
The BA schedule evolves and changes, and as it does, the team revises the requirement.
Their calculations take account of CAA rules. From time to time CAA rules change, and this will trigger a replan.
Their calculations take account of BA Industrial Rules. From time to time these rules change, and this will trigger a replan.
As well as the ongoing ‘master’ plan, the team is also tasked with ad hoc work to determine the effect on headcount of proposed changes to industrial rules.
The team forecasts the rate at which flight and cabin crew will retire.
They forecast the rate at which flight and cabin crew will leave the company.
They forecast sickness levels.
They forecast maternity rates.
Over time, the number of aircraft in some fleets reduce, while others grow. This leads to a requirement for crew to retrain from one fleet to another, and the team determines how many need to be trained. This number drives the training plans put together by other teams in Flight Operations.
The Manpower Planning team determines the number of heads to be recruited to cover any growth in the schedule and to compensate for crew retiring and leaving the company. This number drives the recruitment process, and the new entrant training programme put together by other parts of Flight Ops.

Pre-pandemic, the Manpower Planning team was able to consistently determine the number of cabin crew required to an accuracy of 0.2%. This figure was benchmarked, and represented a far greater level of accuracy than achieved by other comparable airlines.

As we all began to understand how serious the pandemic would be, in early Summer 2020 the carefully developed manpower plans the airline had going out to 2025 went out of the window.

As the pandemic went on, we all hoped for a recovery in air travel. However, a feature of the pandemic was uncertainty and unknown timescales. Nobody knew when the recovery would start. Nobody knew how long recovery would take. Even now, nobody knows how strong the recovery will be.
The recovery came later than a number of commentators anticipated. And, once it began, it came more quickly and strongly than a number of commentators anticipated.

The issues you list were NOT caused by poor manpower planning.

Recovering from near shutdown with resources, for example the number of simulators, designed around steady change is not as straightforward as you appear to think.

It's still very early going but how are things looking as respects Georgetown, Guyana? Are the loads as expected?

And Port of Spain has its own dedicated flight from Gatwick now. Previously I think it was shared with Antigua or was it St. Lucia? Either way, was BA seeing serious competition from the KLM Amsterdam flight and decided to add more direct capacity as a competitive response?

BealineV953 wrote:

BA777FO wrote:

BealineV953 wrote:

If the airline wanted to do more longhaul flying, then well ahead of the aircraft being delivered the excellent Flight Operations Manpower Planning team would have kicked off the process of offering flight crew on the Airbus A320 family fleet positions on the B777 and B787.

Where I said the ‘Manpower Planning’ team, I was referring to a specific team who are responsible for a very specific task.

The Manpower Planning team takes the BA schedule from five years out and determines how many flight and cabin crew will be needed for each fleet.
The BA schedule evolves and changes, and as it does, the team revises the requirement.
Their calculations take account of CAA rules. From time to time CAA rules change, and this will trigger a replan.
Their calculations take account of BA Industrial Rules. From time to time these rules change, and this will trigger a replan.
As well as the ongoing ‘master’ plan, the team is also tasked with ad hoc work to determine the effect on headcount of proposed changes to industrial rules.
The team forecasts the rate at which flight and cabin crew will retire.
They forecast the rate at which flight and cabin crew will leave the company.
They forecast sickness levels.
They forecast maternity rates.
Over time, the number of aircraft in some fleets reduce, while others grow. This leads to a requirement for crew to retrain from one fleet to another, and the team determines how many need to be trained. This number drives the training plans put together by other teams in Flight Operations.
The Manpower Planning team determines the number of heads to be recruited to cover any growth in the schedule and to compensate for crew retiring and leaving the company. This number drives the recruitment process, and the new entrant training programme put together by other parts of Flight Ops.

Pre-pandemic, the Manpower Planning team was able to consistently determine the number of cabin crew required to an accuracy of 0.2%. This figure was benchmarked, and represented a far greater level of accuracy than achieved by other comparable airlines.

As we all began to understand how serious the pandemic would be, in early Summer 2020 the carefully developed manpower plans the airline had going out to 2025 went out of the window.

As the pandemic went on, we all hoped for a recovery in air travel. However, a feature of the pandemic was uncertainty and unknown timescales. Nobody knew when the recovery would start. Nobody knew how long recovery would take. Even now, nobody knows how strong the recovery will be.
The recovery came later than a number of commentators anticipated. And, once it began, it came more quickly and strongly than a number of commentators anticipated.

The issues you list were NOT caused by poor manpower planning.

Recovering from near shutdown with resources, for example the number of simulators, designed around steady change is not as straightforward as you appear to think.

Do you know how many cabin crew there are currently at LHR?

BealineV953 wrote:

In posts last year, reliable contributors said that pre-pandemic there were up to 35 Airbuses in the Gatwick shorthaul fleet before the pandemic.
That being the case, Gatwick has 15 fewer shorthaul aircraft now than in Summer ’19.

Gatwick hasn't had a short haul fleet of 35 aircraft since the days of the 737-3/4/500s. It was about 22-25 ever since.

Wet-leasing is a small price to pay to protect slots worth £millions.
It is far from being “a waste of money”.

It's a waste of money because if that "excellent manpower planning team" had got its numbers anywhere near right it wouldn't need to wetlease in. Additionally it'd be able to stand up more narrowbody Airbus frames from storage if it had sufficient numbers of engineers and paid the going rate rather than 50% less than United.

This is typical of BA and its silo mentality though. One department saves the airline a few million pounds and it's backslaps all around because its saved slots it can't fly while another department's mistakes have cost tens of millions in order to make a saving. Penny smart, pound stupid sums it up.

A year ago you claimed that BA wanted to close Gatwick shorthaul to make aircraft available to sit on slots at Heathrow.

You must be delighted that BA Network Planning has come up with a schedule that protects slots at Heathrow and maintains a presence at Gatwick.

That was because they cut too deep during covid. BALPA told them so and so it's proven to be the case. The COO at the time is no longer in post because of the monumental mess he created. Only because od BALPA coming up with the CRS has this been possible. BA really owes BALPA a huge debt of gratitude.

BealineV953 wrote:

I said that had Boeing delivered the ‘late’ 787-10s and 777-9s, then well ahead of the aircraft arriving BA’s Flight Operations Manpower Planning team would have initiated the process of offering flight crew on the Airbus A320 family positions on the B777 and B787.

With what crew? They can't crew the A320 as it is, how are they going to offer positions up?

Where I said the ‘Manpower Planning’ team, I was referring to a specific team who are responsible for a very specific task.

I'm aware, having been through the process myself.

Pre-pandemic, the Manpower Planning team was able to consistently determine the number of cabin crew required to an accuracy of 0.2%. This figure was benchmarked, and represented a far greater level of accuracy than achieved by other comparable airlines.

Shame they couldn't do that with flight crew. Already leave buyback, working in part time weeks and duty free weeks, no TASS offset and enhanced overtime rates are being offered to crew trips on multiple fleets and even then it's sometimes still not enough. And we're not even in August yet.

As the pandemic went on, we all hoped for a recovery in air travel. However, a feature of the pandemic was uncertainty and unknown timescales. Nobody knew when the recovery would start. Nobody knew how long recovery would take. Even now, nobody knows how strong the recovery will be.
The recovery came later than a number of commentators anticipated. And, once it began, it came more quickly and strongly than a number of commentators anticipated.

It didn't come later. BA suggested it wouldn't make a profit again until 2024. They delivered 2 years early in half the time frame. Second, BA were offered zero-cost options to retain crew by the unions and they refused. So...

The issues you list were NOT caused by poor manpower planning.

It absolutely was. If you can't crew your aircraft then that's a failure of manpower planning. How can it ve otherwise?

Recovering from near shutdown with resources, for example the number of simulators, designed around steady change is not as straightforward as you appear to think.

It would have been a lot more straight forward if the COO at the time had listened to unions and wasn't trying to play a bully. His mess will take years to recover from. Morale may never.

maverick4002 wrote:

It's still very early going but how are things looking as respects Georgetown, Guyana? Are the loads as expected?

And Port of Spain has its own dedicated flight from Gatwick now. Previously I think it was shared with Antigua or was it St. Lucia? Either way, was BA seeing serious competition from the KLM Amsterdam flight and decided to add more direct capacity as a competitive response?

POS was a shuttle from UVF.

Appreciate it's anecdotal, and this is high season at Easter, but POS is pretty full both ways this weekend. GEO is basically full on Monday. Aruba not so much, but that's a shuttle from Antigua which does have strong loads.

Seems the BEA heritage jet G-EUPJ has been retired. It's been in storage at MAD since November 2022.

The A380s seem like they will be used differently this winter. MIA gets 2x daily and BOS gets it 3x weekly. So which cities are losing them to make room for this?

gunnerman wrote:

ro1960 wrote:

gunnerman wrote:

The carbon footprint of concessionaries is so small as to be immaterial. At Heathrow some 95% is from aircraft and the rest is due to ground operations and people travelling to and from the airport.

If you have any references about this, I'm interested. Thank you.

See the foreword of the Net Zero Plan.
https://www.heathrow.com/content/dam/heathrow/web/common/documents/company/heathrow-2-0-sustainability/futher-reading/Heathrow_Net%20Zero%20Carbon%20Strategy_v13.pdf

Thanks!

chrisnh wrote:

The A380s seem like they will be used differently this winter. MIA gets 2x daily and BOS gets it 3x weekly. So which cities are losing them to make room for this?

As it stands, the main differences are ORD loses its A380 service and one of the 2 daily JNB instead now going on a 789 i believe instead of double daily A380.

The suprising thing for me is Dubai continuing on the A380. I know BA can fill them, but i guess its more that it fits into the schedule in the best way for good utilisation.

So for the majority of winter;
Boston: 3x Weekly (new for winter)
Dallas Fort Worth: Daily
Dubai: Daily
Johannesburg: Daily (down from the previously scheduled double daily)
Los Angeles: Daily
Miami: 2x Daily (up from the previously planned 1 daily)
San Francisco: Daily
Washington Dulles: Daily

So 9 to 10 will be required to be in daily service... Most likely leaving way for the cabin refits to begin during this time.

aidoair wrote:

chrisnh wrote:

The A380s seem like they will be used differently this winter. MIA gets 2x daily and BOS gets it 3x weekly. So which cities are losing them to make room for this?

As it stands, the main differences are ORD loses its A380 service and one of the 2 daily JNB instead now going on a 789 i believe instead of double daily A380.

The suprising thing for me is Dubai continuing on the A380. I know BA can fill them, but i guess its more that it fits into the schedule in the best way for good utilisation.

So for the majority of winter;
Boston: 3x Weekly (new for winter)
Dallas Fort Worth: Daily
Dubai: Daily
Johannesburg: Daily (down from the previously scheduled double daily)
Los Angeles: Daily
Miami: 2x Daily (up from the previously planned 1 daily)
San Francisco: Daily
Washington Dulles: Daily

So 9 to 10 will be required to be in daily service... Most likely leaving way for the cabin refits to begin during this time.

Also Dubai is a very good winter sun destination especially for BA holidays.

aidoair wrote:

chrisnh wrote:

The A380s seem like they will be used differently this winter. MIA gets 2x daily and BOS gets it 3x weekly. So which cities are losing them to make room for this?

As it stands, the main differences are ORD loses its A380 service and one of the 2 daily JNB instead now going on a 789 i believe instead of double daily A380.

The suprising thing for me is Dubai continuing on the A380. I know BA can fill them, but i guess its more that it fits into the schedule in the best way for good utilisation.

So for the majority of winter;
Boston: 3x Weekly (new for winter)
Dallas Fort Worth: Daily
Dubai: Daily
Johannesburg: Daily (down from the previously scheduled double daily)
Los Angeles: Daily
Miami: 2x Daily (up from the previously planned 1 daily)
San Francisco: Daily
Washington Dulles: Daily

So 9 to 10 will be required to be in daily service... Most likely leaving way for the cabin refits to begin during this time.

If EK can fill 6 daily to LHR why not BA, good luck for them .. although i wish VS can come back again and make it more competitive

What are BA's plans for re-fitting the A380s? I flew them a lot last year and the cabins were getting tired, although I was never in anything more premium than World Traveller Plus. The IFE is also pretty awful and unreliable. My last trip (ORD-LHR at New Year's) the IFE would repeatedly freeze and hang for 5 minutes. One of the FAs on one of those flights said that the new cabin layout will not have any Y upstairs, which I would definitely miss! The window seat pairs are great. Of course though the flight attendant rumour mill is not always the most accurate!

aidoair wrote:

chrisnh wrote:

The A380s seem like they will be used differently this winter. MIA gets 2x daily and BOS gets it 3x weekly. So which cities are losing them to make room for this?

As it stands, the main differences are ORD loses its A380 service and one of the 2 daily JNB instead now going on a 789 i believe instead of double daily A380.

The suprising thing for me is Dubai continuing on the A380. I know BA can fill them, but i guess its more that it fits into the schedule in the best way for good utilisation.

So for the majority of winter;
Boston: 3x Weekly (new for winter)
Dallas Fort Worth: Daily
Dubai: Daily
Johannesburg: Daily (down from the previously scheduled double daily)
Los Angeles: Daily
Miami: 2x Daily (up from the previously planned 1 daily)
San Francisco: Daily
Washington Dulles: Daily

So 9 to 10 will be required to be in daily service... Most likely leaving way for the cabin refits to begin during this time.

Surprised at JNB, given how busy that route is, with the B789 a big capacity cut from the A380. Perhaps they’ll introduce a third daily, although lack of aircraft might be an issue.

BA777FO. During peak summer 2019 BA did have 31 to 32 A320/A319 aircraft flying from Gatwick. It reduced to 20 to 24 during the winter. Then of course came Covid
which has seriously impacted and stalled BA developments at Gatwick.

fjhc wrote:

What are BA's plans for re-fitting the A380s? I flew them a lot last year and the cabins were getting tired, although I was never in anything more premium than World Traveller Plus. The IFE is also pretty awful and unreliable. My last trip (ORD-LHR at New Year's) the IFE would repeatedly freeze and hang for 5 minutes. One of the FAs on one of those flights said that the new cabin layout will not have any Y upstairs, which I would definitely miss! The window seat pairs are great. Of course though the flight attendant rumour mill is not always the most accurate!

I flex to DXB in WTP and back in CW upstairs last year and on both occasions the crew had to break out a crow bar multiple times to open up the cabinets beside the seats, all I can say is whatever the new layout those latches(or entire cabinets) need to be replaced.

TheLion wrote:

Surprised at JNB, given how busy that route is, with the B789 a big capacity cut from the A380. Perhaps they’ll introduce a third daily, although lack of aircraft might be an issue.

It might be that they can make more money elsewhere, even if they could happily fill an A380.

And @Alancostello- the one next to me on one flight ORD-LHR was stuck closed, couldn't open it. Made a nice shelf though!

fjhc wrote:

What are BA's plans for re-fitting the A380s? I flew them a lot last year and the cabins were getting tired, although I was never in anything more premium than World Traveller Plus. The IFE is also pretty awful and unreliable. My last trip (ORD-LHR at New Year's) the IFE would repeatedly freeze and hang for 5 minutes. One of the FAs on one of those flights said that the new cabin layout will not have any Y upstairs, which I would definitely miss! The window seat pairs are great. Of course though the flight attendant rumour mill is not always the most accurate!

There's been a number of proposals in terms of layouts put forward... One option includes First being re-located on the upper deck to 8F in the forward section, with the remainder being Club World. This gives an overall increase of seats on the aircraft, as World Traveller Plus cabin moves to the forward main deck section with 56 seats and the remainder of the main deck becomes World Traveller. This is personally my favourite layout and from an onboard service perspective would work best on this aircraft. However, there were allegedly some cost issues to do with the First cabin refit on the upper deck

Another proposal is for CW only on the upper deck and the main deck to be First, WTP and WT. This option will reduce overall seating capacity on the aircraft, but allow for the CW cabin capacity to remain largely the same. I believe this is to be the chosen design, but nothing has yet been officially confirmed or signed off. So in true British Airways fashion, we will have to wait and see if or how much of it actually materialises.

Additionally, on top of the revised configuration, the seats will be refreshed and upgraded IFE is also in the pipeline.