So last week – for possibly the first time in the last 5 or 6 years – I flew BA.
Apart from 13 seconds of the near 13 hour flight, I wish I hadn’t.
I know that sounds makes me sound like a spolit little princess – especially as I didn’t pay for the flight [thank you Uncle Dan!] – but the experience was almost a case study in what not to do.
Maybe I’ve been spoilt by Singapore Airlines and Virgin Atlantic [thanks Steve & Lee], but from the moment I boarded the plane to the moment I got off, I was made to feel part of ‘their system’ and any personal needs, wants or requests had to go in the cargo hold.
Of course, the reality is whenever you fly with an airline, you are absolutely part of their system [read the book ‘Why I Hate Flying’ for greater clarification of what that system is] however whereas many other airlines do a great job in creating an illusion that’s not the case, BA don’t.
I know I’m not your typical business person – I work in advertising and wear birkenstocks – however I didn’t think I was that much of a freak until I boarded that flight.
In my opinion – and limited experience – the approach BA has adopted seems to have been lifted straight from the 1984 businessman cliche book.
Champagne on arrival.
Overcomplicated and complex food choices.
Minimal international exposure in chocie of reading matter and movies.
Maybe that’s the experience the ‘typical businessman’ wants at 38,000 feet but given the atrocious way it was executed, I doubt it – not unless they are BDM practioners or are conservative MP’s.
Seriously, when I was on the plane I just thought how horrible this client must be for those lovely guys at BBH, because it must be so hard to do work that finds a way to make the BA experience sound positive when its anything but. Though if my memory serves me, those canny black sheep have started doing campaigns that talk about the destination rather than the journey which makes a hell of a lot more sense I can tell you.
So what was wrong with the service?
Curt – or downright rude – hostesses/hosties who seemed to come from a starting position of not wanting to help and not wanting to like you through to food that was quite frankly a fucking joke.
Case in point?
Look at it.
LOOK AT IT.
Look I’m from Nottingham and my culinary pallete only extends to Sunday Roasts and kebabs – but even I wouldn’t eat that shit.
Apart from it looking about as appetising as a dog turd, why the hell is it swimming in the sort of liquid you see out of dodgy Chinese hotel taps?
And that was a business class meal.
Hahahahahahahaha!
Look, I don’t want to appear ungrateful – but this isn’t about getting to ponce in the front end of a plane [I never forget how fortunate I am for that] – this is about an airline not realising the times have changed, so unless they actually only want to appeal to passengers who carry briefcases or have approximately 13 years left to live, they should take a look at “what those little Asian fellows are doing over in the Far East” or face a future of decreased profits, relevance and hope.
Seriously, the food, the service, the seats [oh don’t get me started on the seats with their ridiculous configuration and quite frankly unintuitive controls] were representative of a company looking in the rear view mirror and all but guaranteed that if offered a choice, I would steer away from BA with as much determination as I do from their Antipodean, engine failing cousins, Qantas.
A national carrier [yes, I know BA isn’t really – but with a name like that, I would imagine many people in other countries don’t realise that] is like a tourism representative to the rest of the World.
Bad experience equals bad country and I think England – for all its faults – is an amazingly rich, historic, diverse, wonderful place and I’d hate to think that BA’s head-in-the-sand approach to flying experience could make people turn their back on visiting.
The good news is that people around the World probably have a good appreciation of what England offers compared to say Singapore or Dubai … but that shouldn’t mean BA can sit back and ignore their responsibility to tourism because like SIA and Emirates have shown, that early positive experience can lead to much more foreign interaction and investment at a later point.
Yes … yes … SIA and Emirates are Government backed organisations which certainly makes things easier interms of investment and management, but let’s be honest, with the way Britain’s finances are at the moment, BA should be grateful they haven’t got those buggers sticking their fingers in otherwise they’d be serving fish fingers and oven chips.
Mind you, I’d quite like that …
So did BA do anything right?
Well they didn’t crash or lose an engine so that’s a major positive however at the beginning of the post I said there were 13 seconds I especially liked and that was when the captain came on the PA when we landed and announced that one of the flight crew was leaving the airline after 10 years and wanted to wish them all the best … before adding that if we looked to our right, we’d see their new place of employment.
It was a carpark.
Classic British pisstaking humour which was rewarded with a plane full of passengers clapping and feeling good.
It was brilliantly timed too, because after a long flight, managing to have 300 people leave the plane with a smile on their face is a fantastic achievement. Pity for BA that was achieved by a comment from the pilot rather than something they have purposefully put in place to try and ensure.
Seriously, that 13 seconds made all the difference to me because it was a bit of banter that came from an individual, not the ‘BA customer interaction manual, circa 1984’ and so if they started to embrace that attitude a bit more – and found ways to extend that to the inflight experience – then BA might have a great future rather than simply a great past.