New York flights - BA, Virgin or American Airlines comparison

Definitely not American Airlines, service and cabin crew were not up to much.

Have flown BA Business Class, Virgin Upper Class and Premium Economy, all good.

We recently flew back from NYC, booked through BA but it was an Aer Lingus flight via Dublin to Newcastle.
Getting through Dublin was a much less unpleasant experience (and quicker)than going through Heathrow, so if your final destination is a provincial airport that might be something to consider.

I've just flown back from Costa Rica with BA, not flown Virgin. We flew "cattle class" but friends booked and paid for seats in Business Class and were down graded upon arrival at St Jose airport to fly back to UK. They were extremely upset as it's an 11 hour flight, through the night, so not the comfy seats they expected. To add to their discomfort, the cabin lights in their part of the plane were unable to be turned down, so they had to try to sleep with bright lights above. Not happy bunnies.
The service, meals etc were acceptable.

I must comment to that our arrival experience at Gatwick was fantastic once we'd disembarked. We zipped through Passport Control no problem, with plenty of scanners.

Both Good, we normally go Premier Economy class.

Aer lingus were by far the cheapest when we went and no issues at all....its only 8 hours ( and 6.45 coming home) ....we paid more for Singapore airlines when we fly east because its longer flights.

We always say AA is where cabin crew go to die!!
Absolutely dreadful service/no service at all really.

Flown with them twice - first time choice/price and we said never again! Unfortunately, when British Airways cancelled our flights home from New York, we were transferred to an AA flight, which just reinforced our opinion of them.

At the time we were really hackedoff with BA too, who then took almost 6 months to compensate us for the flight and the extra £2000 we paid in meals and Hotel, owing to the cancellation.

I’ve done Virgin, which was good - still have their pyjamas and eye mask, but it was a one off when I went to New York with a friend.

It’s always BA for us, from Newcastle, via Heathrow.

We like Virgin. When our plane home was cancelled they put us up in a hotel, flew us home business class and gave us airmiles as well. I use a Virgin credit card and pay for everything with it. In return I build up my airmiles.

I have flown all three, I rank them as follows, Virgin, BA and American Airlines fell short, far behind the other two. That was a few years ago though.

Virgin - but must be Premium Economy.
Otherwise they’re all the same. A squeeze and a squash.

We flew KLM business class back from Ecuador and it was great.
Flew BA economy out there (couldn’t get an upgrade, seats not available) and that was okay, in fact quite comfortable with lovely crew.

We’ve booked via BA on recent trips to the US, but they’ve been AA flights. Imo, AA are a better airline, better planes, cleaner and with nicer food. If they flew into T5, we’d use them all the time.

I prefer virgin as the service is better . BA sometimes have a code share with various American Airlines and it shows . We booked BA to Charlotte and it was an American airline . Ok but not great .

Just flown back from NY in Dec with BA. Economy was quite good food very acceptable. Flew Virgin to Canada many years ago so no recent experience. Never flown AA

BA and Virgin a tie for first place, and American Airlines well behind in my experience.

Our SIL is a frequent flyer, he travels to New York regularly, his preference is always Virgin, he uses dial a flight as a booking agent.

Our DIL (Irish) recommends flying Aer Lingus from Dublin.

janeainsworth

We recently flew back from NYC, booked through BA but it was an Aer Lingus flight via Dublin to Newcastle.
Getting through Dublin was a much less unpleasant experience (and quicker)than going through Heathrow, so if your final destination is a provincial airport that might be something to consider.

We flew from Glasgow via Dublin with Aer Lingus. Much less stressful than Heathrow, because US border control had already been dealt with in Dublin

Thank you everyone for the helpful information. Sorry to take so long to reply but our internet has been down for TWO DAYS (Virgin!)

I realize that you want to go to the USA but all things considered at the moment, what about Canada?

Reported.

Virgin business class every time!

Do you know whst?

Not everyone can afford Business Class at five times the price of Economy!

You might want to have a look at Play. They fly to the US via Iceland from the UK (with a free stopover is you want one). Their economy prices are amazing and the flight time from Iceland is about 6.5 hours, so perhaps a bit easier to deal with. They are no frills. Their website is flyplay.