TERMINAL 5 at London Heathrow Airport is one of the largest individual airport terminals in the world, and has the capacity to handle 30 million passengers a year. It was created to make air travel easy through one of the world’s busiest airport hubs, said Seth Keida, British Airways’ marketing manager, Middle East.
There have been some challenges along the way, he admits, and the moving of flights from Terminals 1, 3 and 4 to Terminal 5 took an “unprecedented feat of planning, testing and logistics. However, we have listened avidly to customer feedback in order to ensure that we continuously improve every possible element of our service”, he said.
“Consequently Terminal 5 is working extremely well and we have reduced queuing, implemented faster, state-of-the-art baggage systems and greatly improved punctuality. Terminal 5 provides the best customer experience at Heathrow and we are extremely proud of the results we are seeing with our operations and customer satisfaction with Terminal 5.”
Although exact figures for 2009 are unavailable being commercially sensitive, he said that the economic downturn had affected passenger traffic - long haul premium traffic had dropped across the industry while non-premium traffic was showing some resilience.
“For the first three quarters of the year we have announced a loss of £70 million and we are projecting an overall loss for the year of £150 million,” he added.
He felt that the experience at Terminal 5 effectively put the customer in control of their flight.
“From the technology employed both before and during the airport experience, to the flexible design of the building - which lends itself to a continuous forward flow of traffic – the entire customer experience is vastly improved,” said Keida.
Technology includes an online check-in facility and 96 check-in kiosks which ensure customers move more swiftly through the departures area. ‘Airside’ are 140 food outlets and shops, including the best of British labels such as Harrods and Gordon Ramsey’s Plane Food. Terminal 5 - the largest free standing building in the UK and the equivalent to 50 football pitches - was designed by architects Rogers, Stirk and Harbour and is spacious as well as modern.
Asked about how Duty Free was faring, he said that although again no figures could be revealed, he could say that duty free “plays an important role to our business from a financial point of view. More importantly, as a full service airline, we endeavour to offer our customers a comprehensive range of duty free products.”
Other benefits for passengers flying Club World or First from Terminal 5 include British Airways’ £60 million lounge complex known as the ‘Galleries’ and a range of complimentary treatments from its Elemis Travel Spas.