VS018 - 30/11/08 - Broken IFE

Heya

Well the worst thing happened! other than a cancelled flight obvoiusly! The IFE was broken on our return flight from New York to London Heathrow! On the flight out VS001, we had African Queen aircraft, which is a A340-300, but sadly that was fitted out with the old IFE system, fair enough, still have some channels to watch, but would of loved to use the Vport.

Then getting onto our return fight i was delighted to see that the aircraft, which was a newer A340-600, fitted with Vport! However, shortly after take-off we were told it was broken, something to do with the hard drive apprantly. So we had no IFE what so ever in the flight, i was really disappointed, however i do appreciate these things do happen, but why on all the flights that i actually go on!

Just wondering that if this has happened to anyone on here? That any ideas of compensation etc? The crew did say they were putting in a flight report, and telling us customer services would get in contact.

[Darren Wheeler]

Normally you get a card handed out which gives either:

£25 off a VH booking.
£25 off pre-ordered duty free.
5000 miles.

[Neil]

A letter to CS should result in one of the options mentioned by Darren, most likely miles since it is now after the flight.

Neil

On our way out to MIA last month V:Port wasn't working in suites 2-6A, and Mrs V and jr. were in two of them. They got DVD players for the flight and 10K each compensation (jr.'s was credited to my account).

It also went doohicky throughout the plane for the first 3 hours of our flight back, which was a real pain. No compensation offered for that though...

African Queen's IFE was working in 18C on Saturday night, although it rebooted itself 3 times at the start.

When I had a defective IFE in a full economy, all they offered was a DVD, no Duty Free vouchers or miles.

Must be a UC only thing.

Mark

On our way back from Hong Kong recently the IFE in the middle section of PE wasn't working. The crew tried everything they could think of but I overheard them saying that they'd never come across it being faulty in a block like this! I also overheard them saying that the pilot was getting in touch with technical support back in the UK to see if they could suggest anything.

They finally offered the passengers in this section £40 duty free vouchers (didn't hear any offers of miles instead but was trying to watch something at the time [:w]) and as Y was only about a quarter full they could move back there and enjoy the entertainment from there. Not sure that £40 was worth being downgraded for 8 hours of a long flight so was glad that we were OK.

The IFE on my flight back from Boston last weekend was not working properly (aircraft: Soul Sister). For my seat (21K) and the 2 seats behind (22H & K), the system would play normally for about 10 seconds, and then would freeze for 5 seconds, cutting out that portion of the film. This cycle would then be repeated constantly, making watching anything on the system useless. It was not possible to move to another seat as the PE cabin was full. To their credit, the CC tried to reset the system twice, and when this didn't work, gave out DVD players. No offer of miles or vouchers though.

From my experience if it's limited to a few seats the CC can offer DVD players but if it's more widespread then there is little that can be done and the players are kept for UC. I agree with Darren about the compensation cards though - this used to be standard policy - maybe it has all changed now, think some compo is due though.

FM

[Nottingham Nick]

From what I have read on here, and what I have been told from other sources, VS seem to be having MAJOR problems with the IFE across the fleet. The main problems (as usual) seem to be on the LGW / MAN planes, but the LHR planes do not appear to be exempt.

IF there has been a withdrawal of the automatic offer FC points for defective IFE, it may be because it is so widespread.

It could be that we are just hearing about it more, but I hope that there isn't an underlying cause. [:w]

Nick

Now that I think of it, the flight back from SFO had problems in 28A and 28C on a few movies, a lot of stuttering, which normally means a hard drive is on the way out.

I did n't think anymore about it, although I did mention it to the FSM for the log.

That makes the last 3 flights I've taken in the last few weeks to have a defect of the IFE of some sort.

Mark

IFE problems really aren't as widespread as you think, but with over 12400 seats in the fleet, there is bound to be isolated problems such as screen freezes that occur on a daily basis, and occasionally there might be a problem with a specific flight, but in the grand scheme of things, it is unlikely that it will happen and it is far from being a major problem, or far from being a problem that can't be fixed with a simple screen reset.

Most issues occur when the system is first switched on, all of a sudden you have up to 340 people all trying to access an interactive system at the same time, so the system lags and isolated screen freezes might occur, this might give people the perception that there is a widespread problem. But on the vast majority of flights, after about 5-10 mins, the system catches up and the rest of the flight is fine with only minor IFE cliches which only take a few minutes for the crew to remedy.

Typical Virgin, at least the IFE is consistent across the fleet

Consistently Poor[:?]

We must be the most unlucky family of 5. I cant remember the last time one of us didnt have to have a dvd on our lap, miss the best parts of a movie due to 10 minute freezes or having to share a screen!

'"On our way back from Hong Kong recently the IFE in the middle section of PE wasn't working. The crew tried everything they could think of but I overheard them saying that they'd never come across it being faulty in a block like this!'. This isn't common but can be either caused by the area distribution box covering that area

..... and from experience people just cant keep their sticky fingers off the system whilst it reboots!

Nearly every flight I have been with on VS has had the odd problem with IFE (always ex LGW shock horror!). I have come to the conclusion that this is why god inviented PSP, IPOD, DS etc! Bring your own, and then you can sit their smug in the knowledge that while everybody else moans, you are sitting pretty! LOL.

Lets face it, the crew have enough to worry about without endlessly trying to reboot the IFE system!

quote:Originally posted by musicmanbrain
..... and from experience people just cant keep their sticky fingers off the system whilst it reboots!

Nearly every flight I have been with on VS has had the odd problem with IFE (always ex LGW shock horror!). I have come to the conclusion that this is why god inviented PSP, IPOD, DS etc! Bring your own, and then you can sit their smug in the knowledge that while everybody else moans, you are sitting pretty! LOL.

Lets face it, the crew have enough to worry about without endlessly trying to reboot the IFE system!


Wise words I am packing a psp/itouch,ipod,iphone and applemac all loaded with films n games, especially as I will be sitting in 6a to MIA

I think it's unusual for whole blocks of seats not to work with VPort (not so much the Gatwick fleet..) but there's normally quite a few resets per flight - unless that's changed since i departed over a year ago.

When they talk of touch screen IFE...i get nervous! Like someones already said, VS IFE is consistantly poor...adding touch screen tvs would be meltdown!!

I always still never rely on any ife on any airline - you can't go wrong with a deck of cards or connect four! But maybe i'm just showing my age!

The system has something called an EADB (enhanced area distribution box), if one of these or one of it's output ports fails it will cause a block of seats to fail. I've worked on this system with touchscreens & to be honest they cause no bother.

EX2 is the next generation system & has all the seat hardware combined into the screen (that's right no more IFE boxes blocking your feet space), also allows you to download your chosen movies etc to your screens own hard drive giving some protection against total IFE failure.

I returned on VS 078 from Barbados to Manchester on November 30th and our IFE with V-Port wouldn't work either. That, together with seats that didn't recline on an overnight flight and a surly crew, ruined our flight home.