Check In Chill Out

Sorry if this has been discussed before (if so I'm happy to be illuminated), but is the check in chill out a waste of time?

I've just returned from my first B+S VH trip (to Antigua) with the family and in an effort to save time took advantage of the check in chill out arrangements where you check your bags at the resort before 'going back to the beach'. The problem here is that there were NO queues at the airport for check in at all, and we still had to be at the airport in plenty of time to get through the emigration queues. Since the check in at the resort happened at noon and took about an hour we actually lost more time than we saved. And with two young kids the extra hand luggage we accumulated as a result was a bit of a pain. In all I would therefore not recomend the service [n].

Perhaps this works well on some of the other islands, but would have to say that this is not so in Antigua. From Virgin's perspective I can see that this is a great idea (especially if everyone takes advantage of the offer), but not sure I see much value and would say (especially to families) make your own way to the airport and check yourselves in (especially as you can perform OLC the night before).

On a positive note, flew out on ROM and back on GAL and neither crashed in flames as Alitalia planes are liable to I understand [:p].

Crew excellent there and back, planes (both sporting the new paint job)clean inside with Y seats that looked quite recently re-upholstered in greys and reds (lucky enough to have not been down the back for a while, so I may be wrong here) but this was a surprise. IFE worked though headphone sockets very hit and miss. Worst was wife's seat that seemed to recline on its own but this was made up for with 25GBP duty free which I drank (the wife was asleep) before we reached home [:I] The England Cricket 'team' (ahem... 10 wickets!!! really chaps [V]) enjoyed our flight out with us, but didn't see them down back for some reason.

Good trip then, but probably will not check in and chill out again

I used the check in chill out in Antigua a couple of years ago and found it very useful. It was nice not to have to hump heavy suitcases around and meant we didnt have to make arrangements with the hotel to look after the cases after we checked out but before we left for the airport.
I thought it was a nice touch and a free service too so a thumbs up from me.

We have used it too and found it great.

Yeah, most people will use the hotel check-in service, so there will never really be any queues at the airport, you could check-in at the airport if you like with no problems.

However most seats will be taken by the time you get to the airport, so that's one advantage of using the check-in chill out service, but if you don't have a particular seat preference I think it's best to enjoy your last day and check in just before the flight.

When I came out of Antigua in March 07 it was an absolute nightmare at the airport with really long queues and bad organisation even for PE.
I think that it's probably not the best option with kids though as you have so much on the beach with them.

I would suggest that the success of the Check in Chill Out has moved the problem away from the airport to the resorts. There were about 30 people all trying to check in in the resort in the mid day non air conditioned heat in our case, and no queues what so ever for check in at the airport. I can see that a smaller resort would work much better in this regard particularly so if you do not have hungry pre-school kids getting grumpy.

On a slightly different note is is clear that prior seating requests count for very little (I know this has been discussed to death here) as on both the out bound and inbound trips we where spilt from being a family of 4 into a 3 with one behind (outbound) and two twos (return) not unmanageable but a bit of a pain. I've never had problems with LHR flights in this respect in any part of the plane. I would think that this is probably down to the system trying its best to find us bulk-head space which I know is unavailable to the seat selection tool before check in, and to be fair at least some of the family were given Bulk-heads on each leg and this was useful. I would have prefered for us all to be together though given the choice.

Oh and Bacon Rolls for breakie was nice... thought they had turned into Muffins

In summary then, no doubt Check In Chill Out works much better for those travelling without kids as comments here seem to suggest. Thanks for the replies.

[HighFlyer]

Personally, the service is of no use to me either. If i am staying at the beach for the afternoon, chances are i'll need some of my things and more than i can fit in my hand luggage so I'd need to dump an extra bag on arrival at check-in anyway, kind of defeating the purpose.

I think its great to offer the opportunity but it obviously doesnt suit all.

Thanks,
Sarah

In all of our B&S trips to the various islands we have used this service which was fine if you can get yourself organised with just hand luggage. Next year we will fly to BGI without VH so the service will not be available to us so it will be interesting to see if their is any difference. I agree with the others, if it works for you then use it.

Iain

Does anyone know if at Downtown Disney where you can check in in the morning and check your bags there is a charge for Gold members family?

I know gold get this for free and others need to pay 10 bucks each bit does the gold offer carry to their famlies?

Thanks

Originally posted by iforres1
Next year we will fly to BGI without VH so the service will not be available to us so it will be interesting to see if their is any difference.

Check In and Chill Out is a VS not VH service. You can do it yourself - we did. Just ask the hotel reception for the form, fill it in and fax it back to VS at least 2 days before your return flight.

Originally posted by diggeryd
I would suggest that the success of the Check in Chill Out has moved the problem away from the airport to the resorts. There were about 30 people all trying to check in in the resort in the mid day non air conditioned heat in our case, and no queues what so ever for check in at the airport. I can see that a smaller resort would work much better in this regard particularly so if you do not have hungry pre-school kids getting grumpy.

I think you're correct. We used it in Antigua at the start of the year and it worked pretty well, but we had managed to assert our position in the waiting throng. If we hadn't, any time benefit from the later departure from the hotel would have been offset by the time spent waiting completing the check in/ chill out procedure.

Paul

Originally posted by McMaddog

Originally posted by iforres1
Next year we will fly to BGI without VH so the service will not be available to us so it will be interesting to see if their is any difference.

Check In and Chill Out is a VS not VH service. You can do it yourself - we did. Just ask the hotel reception for the form, fill it in and fax it back to VS at least 2 days before your return flight.

Cheers for that info. I did not know that[y]

Iain

Check in chill out is ok in my experiance, but only in St Lucia it was easy and meant that we did'nt have to get to the airport so early. However at St James club Antuiga it wasn't to good as it was share with the neighbouring hotel, The beach club and there were about 30 Virgin holidays customers using the service.
If your staying at the almondbeach village in Barbados it's abbosotly awful!!! (i don't recomend it). We have just returned from the Almond Casurina in Barbados and it was ennoying because all of your party have to be present at the time of the service which meant running and getting the kids out of the pool so the staff could cheack there passports (quite annoying) also check in chill out isn't avalable in Jamaica. so,

UVF - Almond Morgan bay, recomended
ANU - St James club, not recomended
BGI - Almond beach village, not recomended
MBJ - Gran Bahia Principe, not avalible
BGI - Almond Casurina, recomended

When i was at VS, we were always told if people didn't use check in chill out, the airports would grind to a halt due the vast amount of passengers versus facilites available!

When my husband and i used it in BGI last year, we made the classic mistake of not keeping enough clothes with us so landed into a cold wet Gatwick wearing flip flops and linen.