LGW 744 UCS Update

Ok then, it's official! The LGW based 744s will be in a 14J/58W/379Y config, the A zone including a 2 seat bar but no IFBT position. It is intended to complete the re-fits by the end of Feb 2005.

Whilst the LGW 744s are away for re-fits, a LHR based 744 (44/32/310 config) will operate LGW services. This a/c (currently G-VFAB) will mainly operate BGI and UVF services, although it will still be sold as 14J in order to avoid any major downgrading should there be any a/c swaps. Therefore it should be fairly easy to get an upgrade on the flts that VFAB does as there will be 30 unsold J seats! ;)

Cheers
Alan

[mitchja]

Thanks for the update Alan

Regards

Thank's for that alan, The new seat config explain's why all the UC seat's were book'd up on the dates i go to Las.

So were ret from SFO UCS:)

Cheers

Phil

[buns]

alan

Thanks for the update.

you will know that there are many who just cannot wait for the suites to arrive on the LGW fleet so your news is all the more useful in bringing that "christmas present" that little closer[8D]

Thanks once again

Not only am I flying out to MCO on Xmas Day, but today had it confirmed by FC that I'm on a UCS flight. Soooo exciting.

Leaving the riff-raff (rest of the family travelling) down the back[:p][:p]

Matt

I know it may sound a silly question but with the increase in PE what type of seat are they going to have. Does vs have a stash of the old stle seats like on the LGW now or are there going to be a mixture of old and WASH seats?

[buns]

Pix

quote:Ok then, it's official! The LGW based 744s will be in a 14J/58W/379Y config

Thanks for your seat map on the site some time ago which of course pre-empted the official announcement;);)

Buns

P.S. can you post (better still, PM me direct;)) the lottery numbers before the roll over on Wednesday[:o)][:o)]

quote:Originally posted by ade99
I know it may sound a silly question but with the increase in PE what type of seat are they going to have. Does vs have a stash of the old stle seats like on the LGW now or are there going to be a mixture of old and WASH seats?

Well, there's going to be the old PE seats which came out of AB (Lady Penelope) and OT (Tubular Belle) somewhere. Maybe they will be refurbished, fitted with Nova screens and controllers, and divvied up among the LGW birds.

Cheers,
Mike

I have heard that PE seat on the main deck on LGW 400 will be the new style PE seats.

but the upper deck will have the existing older style seats.

Hi,

If VA are expecting to complete the refits by end of Feb 2005, do you think flights on 3rd to MCO and returning on the 13th are cutting it a bit fine?? We have been told by FC that the flights are confirmed UCS but I am a little concerned...

Cheers

Jason

quote:Originally posted by Matt
Not only am I flying out to MCO on Xmas Day, but today had it confirmed by FC that I'm on a UCS flight. Soooo exciting.

Leaving the riff-raff (rest of the family travelling) down the back[:p][:p]

Matt

I'll miss you by one day Matt! Travelling out on Xmas Eve, also UCS!

Hi Jason

I'm sure it'll be UCS. 3 out of 5 are being done this year, the 4th should be done in Jan 05, and the last one will be in the hangar in Feb so you won't be on that one!

Cheers
Alan

Hi Alan,

Is there any chance that V-FAB will be used on the MCO route at all ??? Also on the other LGW routes it is being used on are they including an IFBT. Just wondered.

Jason

Hi Jason

AFAIK there's no IFBT on any LGW flts. There's a chance that VFAB may operate a MCO service but at the moment it's only planned on Caribbean flts.

Cheers
Alan

As has been said before, (And it is my own personal annoyance with Virgin)LGW flights are the poor relations to LHR flights, and MCO is the worst of all. Virtually the same ticket price, but no IFBT, No V-Port, no revivals, but hey, whilst you can fill the flight, why bother with the Florida passengers? You could stick them in old 747-200's and they will still pay £300 odd in vast numbers.

I am surprised Ryanair has not started a STN-MCO route, it could not be much worse in terms of passenger service! (Flame suit well and truly zipped up)

Hi

Virgin are improving the LGW services, the planes are getting UCS, they will have better screens in UCS as well. Lets face it we cant expect VA to put all the same facility's into LGW airport and A/C as they do not make as much money from these flights.

This is what I have been told previously when I contacted FC.

"The demand for Upper Class seating is lower than our 'core' Heathrow
business routes of New York, Washington, Hong Kong etc.
Because of the smaller cabin we were unable to install a bar or the In-flight
Beauty therapist station on these aircraft.

We strive to achieve consistency of product throughout the entire fleet and
route network however commercial considerations, as well as in this case
customer demand, must be taken into account when planning the
configurations on certain aircraft and routes. "

So basically LGW flights will always get a slightly different product mainly because the AC have different layouts. I did have one thought how VA could even out the differences. Allow UC passengers to have 2 treatments in the V Touch Salon.

Also FC told me the following.

"At this stage the priority has been to refit the aircrafts with the Upper Class Suite.
Once this has been completed on all of our fleet, we will then be looking into
re-fitting the new V-PORT entertainment system."

So they will look at putting V-PORT into the LGW AC once the Suites are complete.

Quite why they do not do both V-PORT upgrades and Suites at the same time I'm not sure. I guess this is because they would have to put all new seats in Economy and PE as the current seats will not accept the bigger V-PORT screens. The only other things I can think of is that due to the massive cost they can't actually afford to do everything at once, also because they have said that LGW Suites will be completed by end of Feb putting V-PORT would effect the timescale too much. Lastly as we know VA do have some big changes for economy in the pipeline, they may well be waiting to install V-PORT when these other changes are going to be put in place.

Best Regards

Jason

[Bazz]

Hi Jason,

I think the biggest consideration it to get consistency in the UC product with the UC Suite fitted across all aircaft as quickly as possible, VS are currently picking up a lot of flak because of this lack of consistency.

There are significant cost implications to refit the suite and v:port, so the suite has priority and v:port can be added later when some more revenues are in, prudent cash flow methinks!

quote:So basically LGW flights will always get a slightly different product mainly because the AC have different layouts. I did have one thought how VA could even out the differences. Allow UC passengers to have 2 treatments in the V Touch Salon

Yes, but the reason they have different layouts is because they fit in a different market niche to LHR and MAN.

The three airports have (mostly) different customers, with different requirements and are prepared to pay different amounts. Hence VAA have developed nine different products (three classes from three airports), each of these will have their own pricing regime (fare classes) and will be priced on supply/demand.

I can understand some LGW and MAN flyers frustrations, but VAA ain't a charity. If enough people switch away from VAA then the pricing rules will be updated. I don't think we'll ever see the day with all routes flying the same configs with the same services.

Why should they be the same? I don't expect BA to provide the same product LGW-LCY as they do LHR-SYD.

VSlf

Whilst I see the economic wisdom in keeping a enhanced version of Nova there must be a cost associated with the flying downtime of the upgrades.

I can see Bazz's point, but at the same time think it would be better to do everything at once that way your a/c haven't got to be out of service twice for UC upgrades.

Its a shame that VS aren't adding an IFBT seat at the same time though.. as IFBT will be available on all flights except those to/from MAN/LGW..

Hi AlanA

Whilst I see your point and I agree that LGW/MAN routes are the poor relation, I do actually think that the service is better than Ryanair could manage! If your idea of a better service is a free-seating stampede, no seat pockets, recline or window blinds, paying for all your food and drink and the only 'IFE' being the menu card stuck above your head then good luck to you! Maybe try comparing VS LGW-MCO service to other airlines flying to Florida rather than comparing it to VS' business routes.

Hi Bazz/Jason/Jonathan

VS may have picked up flak for not having all the a/c fitted with UCS at the same time but it's simply not possible to ground the entire fleet for a month (assuming you can find 30 hangars) in order to re-fit them. I don't think any other airline would've done it any differently.

Re installing v:port at a later stage, I can't see it happening in the near future as it would be silly to take all the LGW fleet out of service again. I don't really know about these things but maybe the seats have a 'design life' so will need to be replaced in say 3yrs and v:port will be fitted then [?] The LGW 744s have only been around since 2001 so it would be rather expensive to chuck all the seating out just for the sake of some better IFE.

Cheers
Alan

IMO the decision not to fit VPORT to the LGW fleet is due to two main factors.

Firstly VPORT costs approx £4m an aircraft....im no mathmatician but 5 LGW aircraft at a cost of £4m each = £20m. It is certainly not going to cost £20m to bring nova upto a standard somewhere near the "acceptable" odessey. Therefore at this moment in time it is seen to be more feasible to opt for an upgrade of the current system.

Secondly VPORT takes time to install. It is a complex and time consuming task to fit a new IFE. Therefore the current refits happening at gatwick would take approx double the time to complete. Can VA currently afford be operating with an aircraft down until approx may/jun 05???

I see your point but the total time down is likely to be greater over two refits than one as I imagine some tasks will be common (IN the UC area at least) so will have to be repeated twice..

Alan,
whilst the Ryanair jab was a tounge in cheek comment, the problem for the majority of passengers on the UK-MCO routes is that the old days where Virgin were miles better than any other carrier have long gone.
American whilst not direct, give much better leg room in econ, airlines such as Travelcity, MyTravel, First Choice and even the soon to be launched FlyBlu are all breathing down Virgin economy's (and PE with their premium cabins)neck. Its all right (says he, who would only fly UC or PE at a push)giving the minority of fare paying Pax the superb service in UCs, but what fills the planes is the econ passengers, and they are, if you look at other forums starting to grumble big time. (though the changes to the MAN-MCO route will shut quite a few up next year)
Whilst I love Virgin, there is NO WAY I could fly economy with my family, both of us being 6ft plus tall and if pushed to fly that way, Virgin sadly, would be my last choice. (also, if someone flew from the Midlands direct, that would make me stop and think also. Just think if all you "Larrndoners" had to travel up to Nottingham to get on a Virgin flight )
Seriously, the changes to UC on the LGW routes will help, even if they are the poor relations in terms of services/amenities, but unless something is done about the econ seating, all the goodies in UC will not help the airline.
I am sure I read somewhere that the econ passengers on any airline are the ones who cover the running costs of a flight in terms of volume vs costs and the UC pax are the profits?
I know this is unscientific, but
take the new seating,and a full flight
379 econ pax paying an average of £360 = £136,440
58 PE paying £800 = £46,400
14 UCs paying £1500= £21,000

FlyBlu is advertising a go live for the website of 14th Dec!! but so many deadlines have slipped with them who knows!!

I agree the Y/W market is hotting up to B&S destinations - a few VS Staffers on here have indicated improvments in Y are next!!

I guess like all things we'll have to wait and see!:D