This is a Trip Report from the Premium Economy cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
As a nervous flier, I had already made a phone call to the special assistance team a few days before my flight, who told me they'd put a note on my booking to make sure the airport staff were aware in advance, and sure enough when I went to the bag drop desk it was flagged up, and a very friendly and helpful member of staff there asked how I was feeling, and then offered to escort me through to the gate nearer to the departure time. Just before 1100, I was met by the same member of staff at the agreed meeting point who then walked me through security channels and then straight to the gate where my boarding pass and passport were checked well in advance of the gate area being filled to avoid crowding/stress. Along the way he stopped to point out which aircraft we would be flying in today, G-VWOW - Cosmic Girl
I was then asked to take a seat in the gate area while he prepared everything on the computer to start letting passengers in, and it was after he'd finished doing this that he came over with my documents to ask if I'd like to move from 29a to 29k as the seat next to me would then be vacant in case I felt trapped and wanted to move about more easily.
After a fairly short wait, the ground staff started calling boarding in sections, and I was soon in my new seat. Pre flight drinks were handed out promptly be the friendly PE CC, along with newspapers to those who wanted them, and the cabin supervisor for my section came over to make sure I was ok and introduce herself, telling me just to ask if I had any problems at all or needed any help.
Not long after that, the FSM for the flight came back to do the same, just before the crew started preparing the cabin for pushback. The safety demonstration happened, and we had a fairly quick taxi to runway 27R, with just a few BA airbus in front of us for takeoff, and then a fairly smooth takeoff with quite low visibility below the cloud layer.
A few minutes after takeoff, a foot rest was brought round and the CC supervisor checked on me again before the drinks service commenced, and I enjoyed some rather tasty pretzels (I could rather easily get hooked on those!). There was some slight turbulence, but nothing serious enough to warrant the seat belt sign to come back, although it made me a little edgy, but otherwise the flight was fairly uneventful up until the meal service.
A couple of minutes prior to the meal service, the FSM came back to check how I was doing with the flight,and to ask a few questions to try and work out which parts I struggled with the most (in my case, take off and landings are the worst, with turbulence coming third) at which point she suggested that since they had sufficient crew on board, she would try and arrange for one of them to sit in the spare seat next to me for landing on the condition that they would have to go back to man their door once we reached the gate.
The food was of a good quality, and well presented - I had the Thai Green Vegetable Curry as the only dish without mushrooms, and finished it fairly quickly, but felt satisfied and full, and listened to some music on the IFE system while I waited for the trays to be cleared again.
After the meal service,the FSM popped back to let me know that everything was arranged for someone to sit with me for landing and that the PE supervisor knew about it as well, but to remind them if they forget since they can go into autopilot with the normal landing procedures etc as they're so used to doing it on a regular basis. Tea and coffee service brought around a few mins later as we flew parallel and below a United flight out of the window to our right. The liqueur service was brought round at 1606 (GMT) with top ups offered on their way back through the cabin a short while later.
(20:28 GMT)
The FSM came back to check on me, and I wasn't doing so well, so she offered to come and do her paperwork in the empty seat next to mine, and talked to me for a while to keep my mind off the flight while we went through some turbulence and for some time afterwards, and also obtained me a large supply of pretzels from the galley . She also got one of the other crew to pour a large brandy to calm my nerves a bit! We talked for quite a while about various things, our joint dislike of paperwork, thoughts on the economy etc before she eventually had to move around the cabin a bit more.
The PE crew checked on me frequently whilst they prepared the cabin for landing, making sure I was ok, and offering some encouragement, and discussed what would be happening for landing - and as promised, one of them came and sat with me once all the safety checks had been completed (It was one of the CC from upper who came back to sit with me in the end, who was equally as kind and pleasant as everyone else had been) and I was told to stay sat down once we landed while they found out what the arrangement for meeting me at MIA was. Landing is usually one of the worst parts of the flight for me, so I was very glad when it was over as I was extremely shaken by it.
As is usually predictable, the second the seat belt sign went on there was a mad crush of everyone throwing themselves into the isle and trying to squeeze to the doors first so I was very glad to be able to just stay in my seat patiently while Upper passengers were de-planed and then not long after that the CC called me to the door, where they had a member of the ground staff to walk a still very shaky me through to the arrivals area to where I was being picked up, not much detail to go into past here, but I was very well looked after, and the whole way through I have nothing but praise for the Virgin team from check-in up to the staff at MIA who even made sure I'd phoned the my lift at the other end and was in the right place to get picked up and was feeling ok after the flight.
Definitely reminded me why I used to travel with Virgin so much, to give a comparison, on another unnamed airline, after mentioning a fear of flying the response was "Well what do you expect us to do about it?" - not exactly encourging.
Also planning on passing on my thanks directly to VS as well.
Thanks for TR.
