Virgin Delays

[Melfuzz]

Just wondering how on time are Virgin flights? When I have used them in the past they have always been delayed but I have always travelled from Heathrow and to west coast America. It has always been at least 30 minutes delay.

[AlecK]

There are sometimes minor delays in departure of 20/30 minutes average probably due to missed take off slots etc. but these are usually made up inflight. Severe delays are uncommon and in the unlikely event of a technical problem VA have a large fleet which can organise a spare plane quite quickly.

[Melfuzz]

Thats good the longest I have been delayed with Virgin is 3 hours and I was getting mad!

[Vikki]

We've never been delayed more than 20 minutes....

[AlecK]

We have had a major delays with VA but that was in the bad old days of Air Atlanta lease planes from MAN and though it was annoying at the time I was happy with the goodwill guesture that VA offered us. We use VA all the time now to Orlando to collect Flying Club Miles. :)

[ukwdwnut]

We have had a major delays with VA but that was in the bad old days of Air Atlanta lease planes from MAN and though it was annoying at the time I was happy with the goodwill guesture that VA offered us. We use VA all the time now to Orlando to collect Flying Club Miles. :)

dont think we have ever been delayed with VA, but ive only flown with them twice, but as you say alec we are gonna use VA all the time now for the miles, mine are building up nicely with the CC :D

[Catherine]

I have noticed that Virgin are also changing most of their September departures from Gatwick from 2 flights to just one. I would suggest if you are going with Virgin just double check to make sure your flight has not been changed. I think it must be a slack time of year to go and they have decided to scrap a flight.

[champagnegirl26]

We had no delay on the way out this year but a couple of hours on the way back which i was really happy abaout! We found out at DTD check in and this gave us more park time!Claire.

[Melfuzz]

I didnt realise it was all the September flights. (still bitter about it)

I suppose cause the schools have gone back its not as busy

[triciacarole]

We had no delay on the way out this year but a couple of hours on the way back which i was really happy abaout! We found out at DTD check in and this gave us more park time!Claire.

I'd love that type of delay, being told at DTD and having more fun time :D .

[Keith]

We had a five hour ish delay leaving Orlando airport with virgin in March and they were pretty useless :( not TCD useless, but normal airline useless if you know what I mean?

We turned up, everything was ok, flight at normal time blah blah... then they just didn't board anyone... an hour past normal flight time, they said "sorry for the delay, we're working on it". Another 30mins they said "there's a problem with the plane, we'll know more in 2 hours". Then at the end of the 2 hours, they said "we need another 2 hours. Thankyou" :(

Eventually, the family sitting next to us got up and went to the desk to complain. They came back saying that the plane was beyond help but that Virgin had another plane going to london so we'd be put on that one and then flown or bussed (EEK) back to manchester. Well that news spread like wildfire and before long, everyone was banging on the desk saying no chance!

So in the end, they announced that they were diverting the orl->london plane to Manchester first and we'd all be on that one.... cue all the London passengers getting very very upset!

Of course that wasn't the end of it... we then had to go BACK through all the Orlando security to the checkin desk at the start of the airport, wait in a MASSIVE queue to checkin all over again on the new flight... then all the way back through security etc. to the new gate :( They couldn't seem to just automatically check us into the new flight (stupid IMHO).

AlecK's right of course, that was caused by the hideously old air atlanta leaseback planes sooooo hopefully things will be different now but it just shows they can all be pretty bad when problems occur :(

[AlecK]

It has to be said that nothing winds people up more than lack of information. When we are delayed at Orlando information was poor but when we turned back to MAN last year for repairs we were on the upper deck and the pilot came out for a brew as repairs were being done and kept us very well informed. Knowing that everything possible was being done to get us back airborne as safely and quickly as possible helped a great deal.

[Keith]

It has to be said that nothing winds people up more than lack of information. When we are delayed at Orlando information was poor but when we turned back to MAN last year for repairs we were on the upper deck and the pilot came out for a brew as repairs were being done and kept us very well informed. Knowing that everything possible was being done to get us back airborne as safely and quickly as possible helped a great deal.

*completely* agree. Quite why customer service folks haven't learnt that lesson yet is beyond me. If they'd just err on the side of giving information instead of huddling behind the desk and looking all defensive :rolleyes: