VIRGIN BOOKINGS

Hi Guys hope you can help. A while back on a Virgin thread somebody posted a site where you can see the kayout of a virgin plane.I think it was something like v-flyers. Does anyone know the exact web site. We are flying Virgin. My friend has been talking to Virgin direct to arrange our seating as we both have children with special needs. They apparently have sorted the seats, special food for one child etc both ways. It all seems to be going smoothly i will keep you posted when the cock- up occurs!!![catinhat][catinhat]

Try
http://www.v-flyer.com/seats.asp
or
[website link edited]

andrew

<blockquote id="quote" class="ffs">quote:Originally posted by bluebirds
Hi Guys hope you can help. A while back on a Virgin thread somebody posted a site where you can see the kayout of a virgin plane.I think it was something like v-flyers. Does anyone know the exact web site. We are flying Virgin. My friend has been talking to Virgin direct to arrange our seating as we both have children with special needs. They apparently have sorted the seats, special food for one child etc both ways. It all seems to be going smoothly i will keep you posted when the cock- up occurs!!![catinhat][catinhat]
[/quote]

We have pre booked seats 5 times and got them each time. Also try the pre booking service on the net. It saves you getting to the airport 3 hours early.

<blockquote id="quote" class="ffs">quote:Originally posted by daisy
have just pre-booked mt seats with virgin, they have said not guanted ,has anyone had experience of them do they generally keep the seats you`ve asked for or are we likely to have different ones on arrival ? many thanks
[/quote]

Hi Karen

We pre-booked seats with Virgin from Manchester. We asked for bulkhead seats due to our son's diability but were told that it is not possible to reserve these seats in advance. They allocated five seats together, but made a note that we had requested bulkhead seats if any were available (I think they are offered to families with small babies as a rule). We arrived at the airport just before the check in desk opened (as advised by Virgin), and were very pleasantly surprised when they told us we had been given bulkhead seats before I even had the chance to ask the question.

Despite many reservations about Virgin after reading of the experience of some other members of the forum, I have to say that we were very well looked after and would definitely fly with Virgin again.

We too have always been fortunate with Virgin, Fletch, and so still tend to book with them if possible. With two boys who get "bored" easily, you just can't beat their in-flight systems for films and games. It keeps them happy which in turn keeps us happy as we can relax and unwind whilst they are entertained.[msnsmile2]

thankyou to everyone who has replied to me. i have requested my seats and can cheack on the web site to see if they have changed.so be be keeping an eye out .just didnt want to be in the row of 4 toghether get a bit twitched and it will be better if just 2 of us togher for me and other people !

We have had 2 flights recently where the entertainment system failed. My husband has yet to sample the 'delights' of their 'state of the art' equipment as it has never been available. Neither were games available - and these were the newest 'planes' from Heathrow.

Last time, on our return from Miami on New Year's eve we didn't even have any lights, and spent the whole flight in darkness, made it difficult to eat their awful food, too. The cabin crew were not at all helpful and although they eventually brought us individual CD players, it took them another hour to bring us a cd from a list of very old films, and then they conked out immediately because the batteries were flat. And then of course it was another long wait for them to be changed, and as for getting another film to watch, by the time they got round to getting one it was too late as we were on final approch.

Following the very poor meal the pot of tea was brought round at such speed that by the time you had heard 'Tea?' both it and its operator were halfway down the 'plane!

My daughter and friend returned from Miami 2 weeks ago. During the night they needed some water, as they were both becoming dehydrated. They pressed the call button and waited. After a long wait a very irate crew member came along and said 'Do you KNOW your call light is on?', (presumbly they did, and it was becuase they needed something!)then proceeded to turn it off and marched away without even asking what they needed!


Virgin do seem to be quite expensive and in many cases just don't care about the service they offer to their cattle class passengers. There are cheaper options and airlines which DO provide considerably better service.

Of course, every airline can have an 'off' day, and I am sure there are loads of people who can quote chapter and verse about their poor flights, but this has been so frequent - 10 poor flights in the past year - that we really feel that they are resting on their laurels and think that it is enough just to tell everyone they are the best. Their claims for the excellence of their food are certainly wide of the mark - with a supermarket pot of sweet and sickly chocolate dessert as part of the main meal being the best they can offer, it falls far short of the best.

Luckily for Richard Branson people seem to be prepared to accept anything as long as it has the Virgin name.

Sorry to hear of all your problems with Virgin Ellie, sounds like you should boycott them in future.[msnoo][msnsmile]

Interesting reading. I thought I should share my own experience of Virgin. This is going back some time (about 1993), but we were travelling to Orlando from either Heathrow or Gatwick with our son, who was about 2 years old at that stage. My wife had got him added to her passport, but when she got the passport back, it had recorded the fact that there was one child, but they hadn't put his name in where it should have been. She wrote in his name and thought no more about it.

We reached the top of the queue for check in, the Virgin rep took the passports, handed my wife hers back and said "Your passport is defaced, you can't travel with us. Next please". Naturally we were a bit put out and not a little upset, wanted some explanation, would have liked a sympathetic ear, or some advice as to how to sort it out. We got nothing. Ignored, dirty looks, impatient tuts. Thoroughly unpleasant all round. Bearing in mind this was a Sunday, there wasn't much we could do.

We eventually found a nice lady from immigration, explained to her and she wrote us a letter for the US authorities, stamped the passport and offered to come with us to the Virgin desk to help. With much reluctance from Virgin, we eventually got on the flight, with a parting shot as we walked through the gate from the Virgin check in lady: "that'll teach you not to deface your passport again." We found it offensive in the extreme. All my wife had done was write our son's name in the appropriate place.

We had lost our seats, had to sit separately and found the staff on the aircraft hugely unpleasant.

We voted with our feet and have not flown Virgin since. As I travel to the States a couple of times a year on business, plus usually once a year as a family for a holiday (there are 6 of us and we normally take one or other sets of our parents along, making 8), I reckon their unhelpful and unpleasant attitude has cost them many, many thousands of pounds in lost fares.
the point is, I'm not protesting at the fact that they have a job to do and can't accept a passport with an irregularity (it was our own stupid fault, after all), but a friendly human face, with an offer of help or advice would have made all the difference. They could have offered to call US immigration and explain, or just been a little supportive and we would have turned into fans and booked all our flights with them.

Tonish

We had a bad flight with Virgin too where the entertainment system failed. The cabin staff did not seem too bothered but we persevered and kept asking them for something to be done. They eventually gave out the portable video systems they had but quite a few people didn't get anything, including some of our party. They eventually took our names and addresses in order to compensate us (a ploy just to keep us quiet for the rest of the journey so it turned out). We didn't hear anything from Virgin and out of principle I wrote to them. They wrote back expressing their concerns only to give us vouchers for us to buy something on one of their flights, so in other words we had to book more flights with them and they had to be within 12 months because the vouchers ran out!!

We didn't book any more flights through Virgin and we now only book flights through the american airlines and can honestly say the american cabin staff have a very different approach to the British ones. Much friendlier and more professional. We prefer their planes which seem to give more legroom (good when 3 of our party have long legs), seem to supply better meals and make the long trip more enjoyable all round. Yes, we are extremely biased towards the american planes/staff/service given. We also don't seem to encounter as many problems when booking veggie meals. Our flight this year to Las Vegas (sorry not Florida) was with Delta and they got it right both ways. This should not be a surprise as we checked about 5 times before we flew, something we have learnt to do as they always say they don't have our names down for veggie meals and cannot guarantee a meal throughout the whole flight!!!!! As I said, it shouldn't be a surprise but with the British flights we have had problems when they say our names are not down. The Americans say "Leave it with me, I'll sort it out for you" but the British staff say things like "Well, you should have checked" and when we say we did they say "You must make sure you order it when you book the flight". We always do!!! It's just not worth arguing with them though!

We are giving Virgin a wide berth as we do not think their staff care as much as the Americans do. Hope you don't encounter any problems though. Good Luck and have a great time.[msnsmile]