A letter to British Airways. Dear Cabin Crew....

This started as a letter to Willie Walsh, to complain about the fact that although British Airways never answered a complaint letter. So far hundreds of people have read it. But now I am changing the tack of this article to adress the British Airways Cabin crew who are going on strike at Christmas. I have kept my letter to Willie, as its important and should inform him, as a self made man, of feedback on his airline.

Dear BA Cabin Crew,

You are the difference between BA and every other European airline. You have a sense of humour and fun, and professionalism that cannot be found in Europe.

We have financial crisis.

You have a job.

Stop fucking about, keep working.

Thanks
Raf




We all have our pet hate airlines, and our favourite airlines. There are some things about some planes that are fantastic (like mood lighting on long haul flights) and some that are horrible (like bad legroom on a 6 hour flight). All of the major European airlines have now cut back on so much, that no matter how much you pay for a ticket, and no matter how long the European flight is (Amsterdam to Istanbul- 3 hrs) getting fed is an issue. In this day and age, no one is perfect. Even "5 star" Qatar airlines still have no entertainment systems on 5 hour flights to Asia from Doha. So we accept that, and we fly with who we can. Who we can afford, and who we can put up with.

My favourite to London is always Turkish Airlines... as long as you sit in the first 15 rows of the aircraft. The last 15 rows are uncomfortable, even if you paid for a full fare economy ticket. Ok, so they just pranged outside Schipol, but so does BA and Air France and the Turks have really cleaned up their act since the 1970's. I like the food and the films, but I know where NOT to sit.

Recently I have been flying alot with Swissair and Qatar. Qatar is fine, if you don't mind going round the houses to Doha, and swiss is fine, as long as you can put up with the utterly utterly tasteless food, and the small minded penny pinching of the swiss. Everything costs something, nothing is extra, and service is provided on sufferance. Recently taken over by Lufthansa, swissair has also simultaneously banned humour. But at the end of the day we need to tell ourselves: "its the recession stupid" and we need to get safely from a to b.

A while ago, I broke an oath made in 1994 and have been flying with British Airways. While BA does not have Turkish food, Arab hospitality or Asian service, it is without doubt a definite level above all European Airlines. BA feeds you inside Europe, (which is one up on the Dutch) and BA has a superb entertainment system. This draws on the quality of British institutions such as the BBC, and the Europeans simply cannot compete with a century of superlative broadcast history.

British Airways economy seats are OK, economy plus is sometimes affordable, the food is surprisingly edible. (ask for a muslim meal ex Heathrow and its like going out for a great curry. Its also worth the grins of the air stewardess when you ask for a Heineken to accompany it! The BA website is superbly easy to navigate, and a dream to use. You can do so in many languages and even change flights and pay for it. As long as you can get online, the ticket office is superfluous. But most of all, BA has a quirky level of service that can only be British. If you get them on a good day, the cabin crew are hilarious and hospitable. The real difference between BA and the rest of its Western European rivals is the quality of its cabin crew. No Dutch rudeness or Swiss minimalism for me. And heaven forbid that you fly with the racist Germans.. urgh. Trying being foreign on Lufthansa, no thanks.

So BA is the best in western Europe. We have established that. Why on earth would I want to complain about BA? Well….I have two bug bears with British Airways. The first is that if you fly with them, you need to pay mega bucks to get any meaningful frequent flyer points. This may seem minor, but we all have a choice of who we fly with.

So BA is the best airline in Europe yes? End of story, end of blog. Clap the Irishman Willy Walsh on back and its tea and medals all round? Well not quite:

British Airways has an infuriating side, when you write to BA telling them, that they have made a mess of something, they never write back, and you can bet your boots, they do nothing about it. You see I believe that feedback is useful, and so when I take the time to write a thoughtful letter, the least the bean counters could do is write back properly.

NO. That would not be possible. All we get is a computer generated reply saying:

“Thanks for writing to us, we will look into that area where you had an issue and solve it”.

Which we all know is utter balderdash. They are not going to send a "please explain letter" to anyone, they are going to ignore you. I confess I have written and written and written and received nothing in reply. So rather than have a whine about it, I have decided to list my issues here. Its so much easier, and when I last checked the stats, over 200 potential BA clients had read this. So here is my living, changing online complaint letter, its called "Dear Willie"


Dear Willie,

Here are some pointers raised to your staff who told me or my clients to get stuffed. So just to remind myself of the points I have put them in note form with your company's response and my response to your man's response. I hope you enjoy the list, because you have a great team, but no one to write letters:

1. BA serves a snack with Pork products on the London to Amsterdam leg. Flights between Europe’s largest muslim city and one of Europe’s largest jewish cities. Order a special meal? Not possible on the short sector.

BA response: Tough luck buddy!

My response: Thanks Willie!

2. The BA 737-500 to Jersey is a disgrace. It would be a disgrace to Air Tanzania and so its definately a disgrace to British Airways. Its seats are stuffed. When the captain lands hard the entire row (20 odd) twists sideways. When a fatman sits on them, they twist the other way. It cannot be safe to have rows of seats moving around.

BA Response: Oooh, we’ll look into that.

My response: why advertise “upgrade to British Airways,” when the planes are old and knackered on the inside? If the seats are stuffed, how do we know that the same attention to detail has not been applied to the engines?

3. Breakfast. You fly from Los Angeles to London for up to 12 hours, and get a superb BA dinner. You then end up with a horrible cardboard box on the approach to London and its called Breakfast. 12 hours on a plane is no joke and the cardboard box is!

BA response: This is due to customer Demand. (ie if you want more- fly club)

My response: No worries Willie, my next flight is on United, awful food, but its way cheaper and at least I know what I am getting!

4. The tuckbox. This has to be the best invention since sliced bread. You get on a long haul flight and they have a box full of goodies such as mars bars and buiscuits available throughout the flight. Human being bodies change and this is such a splendid way of beating jetlag. But on a 7-8 hour flight to New York, you don’t get the box as its too short. This is ridiculous, why have such a brilliant idea to not use it on half of the flights.


BA response: NIL

My response: Come on Willie, you've got a good idea, stop messing about, and lets all have some!

5. Buses. You fly to dar es Salaam and are bussed to the aircraft. But the dopey ground crew board you onto the Bus as though it were the London tube. We spent 45 minutes standing in a bus waiting for another passenger to arrive. A mother and child had to sit in the luggage rack waiting for the departure. In Dubai or Qatar, buses leave every 10 minutes. Waiting 45minutes standing up is surely not an upgrade!

BA: No idea this happened.

My response: Ok willie, no more busses for me, now I fly to Dar es Salaam on Egypt air or Swiss air. Neither perfect, but at least the Egyptians know how to treat young mothers.



6. Upgrade to British Airways. So says the advert, but have you tried it? Two of my customers booked BA to Tanzania and one managed to get into world traveller plus. The other could not book it online due to issues with the website accepting the phone number. The BA crew in Jersey said they could not upgrade for payment at the airport, but this could be done at Heathrow. The crew at Heathrow would not do it, saying that all upgrades had to be paid for 24 hours in advance. The passenger tried to explain that he was trying to rectify an issue that was a BA website problem. He also explained that uniformed BA staff had told him he could do this in Heathrow. Finally he explained that he was trying to part with £180 and that BA would do well to accept it. He was ignored, BA lost the money and two thoroughly pissed off people got on the flight.

BA response: Ooh so sorry we'll look into it.

My response: Come on Willie, this is beyond me! During a recession you should make it a sackable offence to refuse money. An airline seat is not a second hand car. You cannot sell it tomorrow. If someone is offering cash on the eve of a departure, take it!!!

Thanks for listening Willie, May the road rise up and meet you. (but not at more than 800ft per minute!)
Yours Sincerely

Farhat Jah



MY PARTING COMMENT: You get no miles in economy.... we have a choice with whom we fly, so at least give us tier miles when we fly cheaply. We are not all made of money and there is a recession on you know willie! (rumour tells me this has changed)


And so I end this as I started, by saying that British Airways is leaps and bounds ahead of all the other European Trash, so you can keep flying them. (indeed I would encourage you to do so) But if something needs changing or congratulating, send willie a letter:

"Dear Willie......."

See its easy!

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