And VS lose another booking

Well I have just booked another 2 Business Class flights with BA. I have amassed a large amount of miles with both BA and VS and have been trying to redeem them. I looked online at VS, calling the call centre again to confirm and the only G seats they have during the entire month of Sept 2007 are on Tuesdays. Great. So I took a look online at BA. I can choose ANY day out and back in September 2007 using miles to get into Club Class.

So 2 tickets just booked and confirmed.

Come on VS, play the game. Don't allow people to continue earning miles and limit them to flying on Tuesdays! I will happily lose or give away my miles rather than be forced into flying Tuesdays.

So, to enforce the point. I have numerous flights booked for next year. At this time NONE of them are with VS. I have enough TPs for this year to requalify as Gold in December, but there is now no way I was remain Gold in December 2007. Thats all down the VS revenue management.

[V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V]

Paul

[HighFlyer]

I feel your pain, we had exactly the same problem when trying to get a G to MCO, and it was only the one to accompany a purchased an Upper fare!

Thanks,
Sarah

[Nottingham Nick]

I can't see this situation improving, without a change of policy from VS.

Despite its problems - a huge number of points are being given out with the VS Amex, so more and more people will be accumulating huge points balances - without having to leave the ground. [:?]

There was some talk of Golds being given priority access to reward seats.

IMHO This would make sense - give easier access to the G seats to the frequent fliers.

Nick

I know that BA fly 777's from LGW to MCO - having looked on their website, the only seating plan I can find for Club World on a 777 suggests that there are 48 Club seats available. (Seems a lot for B&S route to be honest).

If this plan is correct, then this is probably not a fair comparison between Flying Club & Executive Club redemtion, as BA have more seats available on the route each day. OK, VS have more daily flights from LGW to MCO, but when you take into account the size of the UC cabin on a LGW/MAN aircraft [and then take off the Virgin Holidays allocation of UC seats - even if it is only 2 per flight etc] BA still have more capacity.

A true test of how Flying Club compares to Executive Club on reward redemption would be on a good revenue route that both BA & VS fly, such as LHR to JFK or LAX. Has anyone got experience of this?

That said, it is not on for VS to restrict reward tickets to the extent the OP mentioned. Sure, if I want to travel on Bank Holiday weekends / the weeked schools break up, then I expect to find no freebies available. But to be hlghly flexible about when you fly [some 11 months in advance] and only be offered Tuesday flights is a joke.

James

On the MCO route I believe there are about 8 rows of Club. Not all 8 rows 8 seats so I guess 48 club seats would be about correct. But lets not forget that it was VS choice to only put one cabin of UCS of the B&S routes.
BA and VS do compete directly on this route, so each must find a way of filling premium seats.
James, you are correct on one thing. I was hugely flexible with my travel dates, but to maximise my away days without causing me to take more than necessary days off work I want to travel something other than a tuesday.
A flight back on a Friday or Saturday would have been fine. And as I have mentioned BA had flights on each and every day.

I always try to travel at non peak times, this time of year is after the long school holiday and away from half-term and booked long in advance.

Paul

Originally posted by Nottingham Nick
There was some talk of Golds being given priority access to reward seats.

IMHO This would make sense - give easier access to the G seats to the frequent fliers.

Agreed. I think that would be an excellent perk.

For example, what UA do for their premiers is to put you on a waitlist if there is no availability for an upgrade award. This is then cleared in order of status: UGS (United's high-revenue fliers), 1Ks, Premier Exec, Premier, as more reward seats become available.

In addition, UA distingish between 100% non-rev award (XC) and upgrade award from paid Y fare (NC) buckets. ISTR, they are usually a little more generous with NCs than XCs.

I'm having a similar dilemma for November - my expenses are paid and tickets booked for me for an SFO trip, but they'll only stretch to (full fare) Y - and I'd like to try and upgrade, either to PE or UC. Of course, there's next to no availability, so I'll just have to play the game of checking nearer the time for the seats to open up.

Cheers,
Mike

Originally posted by p17blo


Come on VS, play the game. Don't allow people to continue earning miles and limit them to flying on Tuesdays! I will happily lose or give away my miles rather than be forced into flying Tuesdays.
[V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V][V]

Paul

I feel your pain Paul but if you are really serious I can fly every Tuesday indefinitely - donations gratefully received.

Jilly

Originally posted by jilly

I feel your pain Paul but if you are really serious I can fly every Tuesday indefinitely - donations gratefully received.

Jilly

If it comes to it Jilly you will be top of my list...

Paul

I'm reading this with interest. Over the weekend we met up with an old school friend & his family, hadn't seen them for ages. I had no idea how much business travel he's been doing over the years, most of it on VS & BA. He invariably ends up travelling J & D (he didn't know anything about fare codes but said he always gets the limo) - commuting once a fortnight or so to US west coast, the sheer amount of money his company spends with VS makes my mind boggle!

He's been VS gold for 4 years and has accrued over a million FC miles. I wasn't entirely surprised when he said he's consistently tried to use them for UC mileage upgrades to Florida (and even LAX) but has never succeeded. Like Paul, they're off to MCO in Club next autumn on BA miles.

Last year when we booked UC G's for the trip we've just done (LAX & BOS) using miles (right on the 11 month threshold!) we still didn't get first choice of dates for LHR-LAX. It seems to be a lottery to say the least.

Despite my raving about VS unfortunately my friend (and it seems his business colleagues) are veering more & more to BA. I can't blame them though, their rewards are useless if they can't be used on a route of their choice and, in all honesty, my friend isn't interested in becoming a professor of "managing to use your miles for UC upgrades"!

Ending on a positive though, no problem with DXB - when we booked G's for our trip next spring we were offered any date in April [y]

[HighFlyer]

Originally posted by Vegascrazy
Ending on a positive though, no problem with DXB - when we booked G's for our trip next spring we were offered any date in April [y]

This is the real inconcistency with VS revenue management. We try to get one G on any Saturday departure in September or October to MCO - no can do. We end up flying on a Friday and home from MAN - on two flights that were completely empty. There were 2 passengers besides us in J on the MCO-MAN flight home!

But, ask for NRT - G's a plenty on a wide variety of dates. How many did we want? Oh we'll have half the cabin! (and we did!)

We were looking at BA for MCO, and i'll happily look at BA in the future if this situation crops up again. As much as i love VS as a brand, i'm not bending over backwards and flying on silly days of the week when i can fly another decent carrier for the same price but with a lot less hassle.

Thanks,
Sarah

[fozzyo]

Originally posted by Vegascrazy
He's been VS gold for 4 years and has accrued over a million FC miles. I wasn't entirely surprised when he said he's consistently tried to use them for UC mileage upgrades to Florida (and even LAX) but has never succeeded. Like Paul, they're off to MCO in Club next autumn on BA miles.

Someone who is earning on average 250,000 miles a year - the kind of customer I would have thought they would be falling over themselves to keep and they can't find some G seats? That is shocking.

Maybe VS need to realise there is a large middle ground between those who just qualify for Gold each year, and those who attain VS50. They really need to sort out their account management for this level of passenger. As we can see, people aren't happy and they are leaving - this can't be good news.

Virgin's allocation of G's does seem completely random. We're on a flight to Tokyo next year where 7 G's were available at booking and yet I hear all too often stories, like the above, of no reward availability for places like MCO and LAS for months at a time.

Surely with high spend/useage accounts they could find the odd one now and then. Sure, the G seat could have been allocated to a revenue customer. But if constant non allocation means a high yield customer moves their business elsewhere then ultimately VS will loose money.

Dean

Originally posted by Wolves27
We're on a flight to Tokyo next year where 7 G's were available at booking and yet I hear all too often stories, like the above, of no reward availability for places like MCO and LAS for months at a time.

Hey Dean, are you partaking on Sarah's bitches tour to Tokyo? Just noticed both you & Matt are off there the day after Sarah. Sorry if I'm behind the times and this is old news

The "bitches tour" group is Sarah, Richard, Mat, Dean, James, Andrew and I - I feel sorry for the cabin crew[}:)]

Originally posted by Mrs Decker
The "bitches tour" group is Sarah, Richard, Mat, Dean, James, Andrew and I - I feel sorry for the cabin crew[}:)]

I'm sure we'll all just have our pre flight champagne and then settle down to sleep [:w]

Dean

[HighFlyer]

Yes we are all on the same flight! - my countdown looks earlier as its counting to CH time, not flight depature time! I have my priorities set - the trip begins at the CH!

This will be a mad trip away, and yes we will post a few piccies of our jaunt. V-Flyers do Kareoke perhaps ...

Thanks,
Sarah

Sounds like an awesome trip, I'll be interested to hear about Tokyo on your return. It's possible we'll stop off there en route back from AKL next autumn. Currently in the process of evaluating Great Escape versus ANZ's new business class RTW offering (partnering with VS and a grand less than GE!) - a project in its own right, we keep changing our minds re stopovers!

Another reason why LGW should use a LHR 744 to LAS, even if on certain days. With the exception of Vegas, i've never had any major problems booking 'G''s

[RichardMannion]

Just for reference, Tokyo was actually showing 12G's over Easter next year.... on various days there and back.

Thanks,
Richard

I've just been looking at SFO in May/June 2007 for 2 Gs. Only a handful of dates mid-week. Not happy -- have buzzed a letter of complaint off to VS since this is probably the biggest factor in my flying more with BA these days.

BC

Originally posted by BlackCat
I've just been looking at SFO in May/June 2007 for 2 Gs. Only a handful of dates mid-week. Not happy -- have buzzed a letter of complaint off to VS since this is probably the biggest factor in my flying more with BA these days.

BC

And from what I gether BlackCat you fly with VS rather often. Surely they would see this and be able to find a couple of spare G's down the back of a sofa at Crawley or something...

dean

I got a couple of Gs to BOS next May couple of weeks ago no problem.

IMHO the LHR to HKG is near impossible to get a G ticket. As a regular traveller on this route have tried many times to book G.
Have had two years of Gold renewal and hence two free companion and never been able to take the other half.

Have just renewed AU after 5 months so guess number three will become due but doubt I'll get chance to use.

Also AU membership seems to provide little extra value above silver excpet Clubhouse use and for anyone flying to SYD this is not much use due to poor facilities.
Flew in W (paid for myself) last month from HKG to SYD and could not even get an upgrade either way even though J only 25% full and that was trying to use my miles.
Even my J back to LDN a week later had seats not that this mattered.

Anyway UC in J is my preferred choice for my company bookings but with a burgeoing mileage bank not sure how I will spend plus all new TP's for next 6 months are wasted as they cant be carried fwd.
It does make me feel tempted to go back to the other carrier with extra capacity and easier / more frequent upgrades.