Virgin priority boarding fail

[Human]

Just boarded VA863 MEL-SYD. Priority and General boarding at exactly the same time: one staff member doing PB, another doing GB.

 

[Milefest]

Virgin Clarifies Priority Boarding Policy

The theory behind this is that most “priority” passengers would probably be sitting in the front half of the plane. This would allow Virgin to start boarding the back half of the plane via the rear stairs earlier, making the whole process take less time.

This might make sense in an executive boardroom but the reality is that many people in rows 15 and beyond don't like navigating stairs or being exposed to the elements all while carrying hand-luggage/taking care of children.

 

[TheInsider]

This might make sense in an executive boardroom but the reality is that many people in rows 15 and beyond don't like navigating stairs or being exposed to the elements all while carrying hand-luggage/taking care of children.

What happens when you travel to ports without aerobridges?

 

[RooFlyer]

What happens when you travel to ports without aerobridges?

In Hobart, its very democratic. Everyone gets exposed to up to 300m walk across the tarmac in the wind and rain, if occurring. Those who do the front door get a zig-zag covered ramp; those at the back stairs. In fine weather I think the use is about 50/50.

 

[jakeseven7]

This might make sense in an executive boardroom

Agreed, VA1 had pretty tight control of PB process, it was by no means perfect but it was pretty rigid instructions to the gate dragons on how to execute. Not much room for interpretation.

Now with the new VA2 policy they’ve opened the door for personal judgement (whether they intended to or not…) and because every boarding situation and every gate dragon is different they’ve lost control of the process and the result is what we are seeing play out.

The one thing that struck me, with VA2 being a ‘different airline’ and repositioned down market post the collapse, and all the 1000’s of surveys they’ve done ranking all the benefits including PB - Perhaps they’ve decided their new target market doesn’t care as much about PB as their old more premium/business target market?

 

[eastwest101]

Agreed, VA1 had pretty tight control of PB process, it was by no means perfect but it was pretty rigid instructions to the gate dragons on how to execute. Not much room for interpretation.

Now with the new VA2 policy they’ve opened the door for personal judgement (whether they intended to or not…) and because every boarding situation and every gate dragon is different they’ve lost control of the process and the result is what we are seeing play out.

The one thing that struck me, with VA2 being a ‘different airline’ and repositioned down market post the collapse, and all the 1000’s of surveys they’ve done ranking all the benefits including PB - Perhaps they’ve decided their new target market doesn’t care as much about PB as their old more premium/business target market?

Yeah possibly - but I'd say its just more of a management focus on getting on-time departures and on-time performance up there as part of the window dressing for the eventual IPO/sale of VA2.

QF certainly doesn't seem to care about PB much either, so it's the classic duopoly result that you just have to be less bad than your competitor, mirror your competitor and control costs, and thats considered "good enough".

The other thing is that VA2 now has fares without checked luggage, and the various travails and problems of both QF and VA with baggage handling should have resulted in more people trying to do HLO on VA2 (and also on QF) so I expect that with the lack of increased capacity and more competition for less overhead luggage space, must be affecting VA2's on-time performance.

 

[MooTime]

I believe it's actually very clear, I fail to see the confusion....

"Specifically, Virgin changed the timing of its general boarding call to occur shortly after the announcement for priority boarding."

Can only mean 1 thing, PB called then GB called, even 2 seconds afterwards, no grey area there
Saves time yes, a little.

"However, we understand that Virgin hasn’t changed the priority in which its boards its guests. It is still official Virgin Australia policy that general boarding will only commence when the priority lane has cleared."

That statement not correct I believe as GB clearly does not commence once priority lane has concluded, the previous statement contradicts it.

I don't see any real advantage of getting all the PB pax onboard, even the slowies dawdling around or late from lounge for whatever reason.
Give PB slight head start, call the unwashed & hit the runway.

 

[QF WP]

I actually had a VA flight BNE/MEL 2 weeks ago and as I approached the PB line, a couple of pax (including a mother and her teenage daughter) moved from the long NPB line to the PB line. The daughter said "mum, this us the priority line" but the mother was having none of that as the others were heading to the scanner. Then the Gate Agent announced (as I think she'd looked up from scanning) "this is the Priority Boarding lane, business class, platinum, Gold members only". I chuckled internally as they had to now go to the back of the NPB line (which had moved forward and they'd lost their place). I smiled and felt sorry for the daughter, handed over my BP to the GA. It worked perfectly

 

[Ade]

VA660 SYD-CBR 12MAY23 - PB fail - boarding call announced in the lounge wayyyyy before the boarding commenced. Left the lounge at first boarding call, walked up to gate 47 only to find that boarding hasn't commenced. Staff at the gate were scrambling to do something before they can commence boarding ...

I could be wrong, but I thought the screens in the lounge showed "boarding", but outside the lounge I saw "go to gate" ... so not sure what went wrong & where ...

As the flight was operated by Link, at gate 47, we boarded a bus, but had to wait on the tarmac for over 10 mins for all pax to arrive & board ...

 

[nedl]

VA716 Brisbane to Sydney this morning, the lounge staff announced that the flight was boarding so there was the usual exodus of pax from the lounge to the gate. Surprise surprise, the flight hadn't started boarding and didn't until nearly 10 mins later. Massive queue as a result. What's going on? The lounge announcements used to be incredibly accurate.

 

[Ade]

The lounge announcements used to be incredibly accurate.

Only adds more evidence to what I have been facing ... there seems to some sort of *urgency* in getting pax to the gate even if boarding has not commenced ... why would they do that ... If the boarding gate was too far away from the lounge, I understand ... what else could be causing this inconsistency in the comms between boarding gate and lounge?

If I might add, I have noticed similar boarding issues at CBR as well, however, at those times, I was not travelling.

 

[QF WP]

VA716 Brisbane to Sydney this morning, the lounge staff announced that the flight was boarding so there was the usual exodus of pax from the lounge to the gate. Surprise surprise, the flight hadn't started boarding and didn't until nearly 10 mins later. Massive queue as a result. What's going on? The lounge announcements used to be incredibly accurate.

I generally tend to wait until the boards are showing Final Call, or I get that "final call" announcement in the Lounge. One doesn't want the announcement where they page you by name

 

[BAM1748]

I generally tend to wait until the boards are showing Final Call, or I get that "final call" announcement in the Lounge. One doesn't want the announcement where they page you by name

Don't want to waste time, at least your own, step through the airport doorway as they are calling it.

 

[AIRwin]

One doesn't want the announcement where they page you by name

They know who you are...

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

Paging the last passengers who failed to board V*4xx_ and offloading of bags have commenced...

 

[pauly7]

Another very ‘token’ PB effort out of Sydney today.

PB given about 1 minute of a head start then general boarding commenced and scanners then did one lane each.

From all my flying experience the last couple of months, Virgin has well and truly killed the value of this benefit for those who valued it, regardless of whatever media talking points they sent to AFF to repost on here .

 

[simmomelb]

Another very ‘token’ PB effort out of Sydney today.

PB given about 1 minute of a head start then general boarding commenced and scanners then did one lane each.

From all my flying experience the last couple of months, Virgin has well and truly killed the value of this benefit for those who valued it, regardless of whatever media talking points they sent to AFF to repost on here .

I've not experienced this yet, but it sounds like I will in the near future :/
Get that feedback in!

 

[Kereng]

Yesterday MEL-SYD they called PB at the same time as general but PB scanner wasn’t loaded. I was second in PB queue and had to ask if we could use the general lane scanner as they had already started boarding general. Was told “yes, but only until this scanner is fixed”. General boarding at the same time as PB happens every week now when I fly back from MEL, but have never had it on the SYD end.

 

[Luke B]

I've not experienced this yet, but it sounds like I will in the near future :/
Get that feedback in!

Agreed, I had a negative experience at MEL with lack of priority check-in and boarding. Got 5k Velocity points as compensation.

 

[Must...Fly!]

Boarding flight called at -38 min before departure in lounge. Ok, I know from FR24 this is the first flight for this bird for the day, might be true. Unfortunately not, fooled me...stood around for 21 minutes before boarding actually begin. Pretty ordinary.

As for PB, I was among the first through so didn't get a chance to monitor the whole simultaneous boarding business.