Virgin now non-direct from Manchester?

[sophiepop]

Firstly let me apologise as I seem to be asking lots of questions re this issue.

We have booked with Virgin Holidays on a Virgin Atlantic flight. The inbound journey has now changed to non-direct. If they are in the process of changing planes from the 747 to the A330 I can understand some changes to the schedule, but does this new plane that they are putting on long haul flights not have the capability to fly non-stop?

Our 'my booking' info is still saying it's the 747 and both flights are unaffected on there. It's only when I go to do a dummy booking that it goes horribly wrong.

If by any miracle we get to go on this holiday we really don't want to fly in-direct and will hope to cancel.

[Egon]

I rebooked my holiday EX MAN yesterday. They advised on the phone that both outbound and inbound are still direct flights.

Their 330's are perfectly capable of doing transatlantic flights

[thatdavieguy]

A330 replaces the 747 in quieter months to Orlando, reduced capacity mind you.

[sophiepop]

I just wish I knew what their plan was . Like everyone else!

I wonder why they've put it as in-direct? Weird. And it has all cabins sold out apart from PE for some weird reason.

[SiandAm]

I also noticed this earlier, and was quite disappointed as it’s the first time in ages we’ve actually got a direct flight, and paid a premium to do so to be honest. Then my very logical 15 year old made a very valid point, that as the new planes have reduced capacity there are no further direct seats available to sell as they will have been allocated to those of us due to fly on the 747. This kind of makes sense as out outbound on a dummy booking says no direct flight but there is still availablity for direct on the return date.
Having said all of that I’m still doubtful we’ll actually at all in August.

[MrPrice]

Originally Posted by sophiepop

I just wish I knew what their plan was . Like everyone else!

I wonder why they've put it as in-direct? Weird. And it has all cabins sold out apart from PE for some weird reason.

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It's the same on our November flights, all Economy seats are showing as fully booked the only availability were for PE and Upper Class.

[TeeKayDawn]

Does it tell you the route of the indirect flight? And when should you be travelling?

Edit:
Just dummy booked our dates and our outbound is only available as in indirect via Atlanta, and an hour later, or, 4 hours later.

Now I know the 10am flight wasn’t fully booked with PE seats (unless selections weren’t made by everyone yet), but I also know we were offered the 11am flight when we were looking and at that point it was direct!

[Dr.JumbaJookiba]

Originally Posted by sophiepop

I just wish I knew what their plan was . Like everyone else!

I wonder why they've put it as in-direct? Weird. And it has all cabins sold out apart from PE for some weird reason.

See more...

They have either removed the direct flight or showed some cabins sold out until they can put the new aircraft details into the booking system and transferred over existing passengers. No point selling any more seats if the 'new' flight might already be full if it's a smaller plane.

[sophiepop]

Originally Posted by SiandAm

I also noticed this earlier, and was quite disappointed as it’s the first time in ages we’ve actually got a direct flight, and paid a premium to do so to be honest. Then my very logical 15 year old made a very valid point, that as the new planes have reduced capacity there are no further direct seats available to sell as they will have been allocated to those of us due to fly on the 747. This kind of makes sense as out outbound on a dummy booking says no direct flight but there is still availablity for direct on the return date.
Having said all of that I’m still doubtful we’ll actually at all in August.

See more...

Your 15 year old has a very apt point there! It makes perfect sense

[salmon70]

Just checked our flight as we are due to fly in November and it states ‘there are not enough seats available on this flight please try flexible dates to see alternative options’. We were originally booked onto the 10am direct flight but looking at an email I recently received, they’ve moved us onto the 11.10am. I also paid for exit row seats in the bubble so will be interesting to see what happens as regards those seats.