VA or BA premium economy
 

sorry if this has been asked before, the only posts I could find were older. In my trip to Europe this summer, I have found reasonable prices IAD - LHR on both BA and VA premium economy. Which do you prefer, and is there really a difference? I can NOT stand economy, and am getting to a point where I can afford the premium - I wish we could do Biz, but for the whole family, the price is prohibitive, and they don't have enough miles to get an award ticket or an upgrade (I do, but I would feel bad ditching them ;) )

I meant to ask - a difference between cattle class and PE

I am really not thinking clearly - also meant VS, not VA

For a flight of that length, I would think that Premium Economy would be a good compromise. The seat and service on both will be largely comparable to what you would expect if you were flying domestic First class.

While I haven't had a chance to fly them, the VS PE gets slightly better marks, due to better in-flight entertainment, a glass of champagne, and dedicated check-in.

Last year we went PE (EWR-LHR) on Virgin - It was very good, not excellent. But it was much better than EC, and well worth it.

I looked at BA, and decided against it because the width of their PE seats were listed at 18.5", while the Virgin was 21" on the 340. The actual opening was smaller since there was a central armrest, but it was still very good.

http://www.seatguru.com/charts/premium_economy.php ((*))

You need to check the numbers on this at Seatguru or somewhere. But walking through the cabins (I never go PE: it's always the cheapo on my money or biz on a client's), the seats look a lot posher on Virgin than on BA.

Virgin's funky entertainment system is on all planes. There's a BA version roughly equivalent in numbers of films etc (though less edgy) - but I think it's still being rolled out, and it kept on crashing the last couple of flights I was on. If you can stand Virgin's self-congratulatory modishness (personally I can't), their PE product looked a lot better to me.

I feel the same!! so we did BA from Seattle to London and back last August in what they call Coach Plus...I think they are the old business class seats, very roomy, and do recline more than coach. There are not very many of them so you need to book as soon as possible. It gave us the rest we needed to get to London without feeling frazzled...and they are whole lot less than business. Go for it.

BA's premium economy is called World Traveller Plus.

I've only flown VS PE and to me, there's enough of a difference between economy and PE to make buying PE worthwhile. From what I understand, there's slightly more product differentiation between VS economy and PE vs between BA WT and WT+.

Also I haven't been following BA seat assignment policy, but if I buy a discounted WT+ fare, can I get advance seat assignments if I don't have BA/Oneworld status?

<i>Also I haven't been following BA seat assignment policy, but if I buy a discounted WT+ fare, can I get advance seat assignments if I don't have BA/Oneworld status?</i>

Unfortunately, no.

i have flown both and IMHO Virgin's service and product is much better than British airways. I am no a fan of BA as i feel they trade on a (now tarnished thanks to T5) reputation.I also think the seat to be inferior on BA. A lot of the Virgin flights have also had updgraded PE seats. I would fly V over BA everytime

I was until recently a committed BA flyer because I flew business class often enough that I had Gold status. Since I'm going to lose that status in 2008, I'm reconsidering airlines. I've flown BA's World Traveller Plus a lot, and have flown Virgin's Premium Economy (but not for several years). My view is that, if you don't have elite status with BA, Virgin is a better choice for a couple of reasons. The most important are a) being able to choose seats (you can't with BA until shortly before check-in); and b) the T5 fiasco (who knows when it will get better)? Another reason is that my recollection of Virgin is that Virgin treats its Premium Economy passengers as &quot;Business in a smaller seat&quot;, whereas BA treats its WTP passengers as &quot;Economy in a bigger seat&quot;. In other words, you get treated better on Virgin than BA.

Another option, if Virgin and BA still seem expensive, would be to consider flying Zoom Airlines (from Toronto, Montreal or New York) to London. Zoom offers a premium economy product that doesn't offer as much legroom as Virgin or BA (e.g. maybe 36&quot; of legroom instead of 38-39&quot;), but is generally much less expensive than Virgin or BA. You might find premium economy seats on Zoom for about the same price as economy on another airline.

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