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British Airways to suspend Bahrain and Kuwait flights “by the end of Q1 2025”

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British Airways has announced it will suspend services to Bahrain and Kuwait early next year. Passengers on impacted services were informed this morning.

The news follows hot on the heels of BA pulling its own aircraft off Dallas and Miami services, to be replaced by flights from joint venture partner American Airlines.

In a letter to colleagues, the airline says it continues to “navigate a challenging operating environment”.

Rolls-Royce delivery delays strike again

The culprit, once again, appears to be down to engines. Delays on receiving engines and parts from Rolls-Royce, particularly for the Trent 1000 engines that power BA’s Boeing 787 fleet, “have significantly impacted” the flying schedule and was one of the reasons the launch of flights to Kuala Lumpur was pulled at the last minute, as well.

“The impact of this supply chain issue has meant we’ve been using standby aircraft from our 777 fleet to avoid cancellations. What’s more, equipment manufacturers and suppliers globally are struggling to meet demand, increasing the risk of further disruptions to our flying schedule.

Our teams have been working tirelessly to ensure our aircraft are available to meet the needs of the flying schedule. However, unfortunately, the measures we’ve introduced so far are no longer sustainable, and a more substantial course of action is now needed.”

That course of action involves suspending flights to Bahrain and Kuwait by the end of March. It seems these routes were underperforming, with BA suggesting that “these routes are currently not as viable as others.”

Bahrain and Kuwait are not exactly routes with high leisure demand, so it speaks to the post-covid environment that these previous business heavy routes have been cut over other, leisure oriented routes. I think few people on HfP will mourn the loss of these two destinations and will be happy that others, such as the recently restarted flights to Bangkok, continue.

It will, unfortunately, lead to a number of redundancies in Bahrain where BA has a cabin crew base.

BA has been flying to the region since 1932

Amazingly, the predecessor airlines of British Airways have been flying to the Gulf since 1932. Did you know that London to Bahrain was the first route flown by Concorde?

In 1992, to celebrate 60 years, British Airways produced this video (click to visit YouTube) which is a fascinating look at how flying used to be.

This couple don’t look like the sort who would appreciate ‘breakfast pancakes’ served at 1pm:

What are you entitled to if your flight has been cancelled?

If you have a flight to Bahrain or Kuwait beyond the first quarter next year then you should already have received an email from British Airways informing you of the cancellation. Don’t forget you are entitled to your EU261 rights, which means you have a choice of:

  • a full refund
  • re-routing to your final destination at the earliest opportunity
  • re-routing at a later date at your convenience under comparable transport conditions, subject to the availability of seats

Guidance on the British Airways A travel trade website suggests that anyone with a flight scheduled from 1st January 2025 until 31st December 2025 will be able to change their flights, although you won’t be able to claim a refund unless your flight was cancelled. It’s not clear why BA is letting people move from flights which in theory, between January and March, are still operating.

The current guidance suggests that you will be able to rebook onto any date with availability with British Airways. Alternatively, BA will let you rebook onto a Qatar Airways service +/- 14 days of your original travel dates.

Gulf Air and Kuwait Airways are the only other airlines to fly direct from London to these destinations, respectively, but BA has not announced any rebooking onto these airlines (yet). As we saw with the delayed launch of flights to Kuala Lumpur, it may be worth waiting a few days to see what other options pop up, rather than rushing to the phone immediately.

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Category

British Airways and Avios

Comments (79)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • John says:
    8 Nov8 November 09:32

    As a reminder given some of the misguided commentary on the LHR-KUL thread, BA can only approach other airlines for a rebooking agreement once they have announced the route closure. Therefore, if you want to be rebooked onto non-stop Gulf Air or Kuwait Air flights wait at least 1 week before phoning for this alternative.

    • meta says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:02

      That’s bs. Competition laws don’t prevent them to start negotiations. It’s more that they can’t make up their mind and wait until last moment to make a decision leaving no time for negotiations plus they are also greedy so they want to hold onto passenger’s money as long as possible.

      • Nick says:
        8 Nov8 November 14:01

        That’s your opinion. In the eyes of BA’s lawyers and external legal advisers, starting discussions with other airlines before announcing publicly is a huge no-no, and extremely likely (per their training) to land managers doing it in prison. At the very least they’ll be dismissed with no notice, this is company policy.

        If you know different and have qualifications to back it please get in touch, I’m sure they’ll be pleased to take your advice for a reasonable fee.

    • JDB says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:08

      This is a myth perpetuated by a few ill informed posters. The KUL cancellations were announced somewhat prematurely so a plan wasn’t in place. For these BAH/KWI route suspensions, the rerouting guidelines were published almost simultaneously.

      • Rob says:
        8 Nov8 November 10:16

        Take it from me as fact, Malaysia Airlines did not know about the BA cancellation in advance.

        • JDB says:
          8 Nov8 November 10:21

          That was BA’s choice not to tell MH rather than any legal considerations. The Beijing route suspension was known to China Southern so that rebooking policy was published simultaneously.

          • Rob says:
            8 Nov8 November 10:32

            There’s a JV with China Southern though, in the same way there’s a JV with Qatar Airways which presumably covers Bahrain and Kuwait.

          • John says:
            8 Nov8 November 11:17

            Rob is spot on.

          • JDB says:
            8 Nov8 November 12:03

            The option of rerouting with LH group airlines was offered for the Shanghai and Hong Kong cancellations (but not Beijing) at the time of the announcement. They aren’t in any sort of JV/codeshare deal on these routes. I think the issue with KUL is that BA isn’t very friendly with MH. That said, BA isn’t at all friendly with Iberia but they are obliged to play together.

      • Martin says:
        9 Nov9 November 06:17

        JDB.
        Do you work as a lawyer for these airlines ?
        You seem to always be on the side of these changes, backing the companies involved ..
        You put your penny’s worth into many a comment on many subjects, most of which seem to come from the corporate spiel, which is very often not actuality legally correct..

        Do you Google people’s comments and then post the Google answer ?
        It seems more and more like you are the new samsung AI bot (or Apple version).

        If you are the God from above, why aren’t you selling your services as an advisor. So we can all travel better for less ??

    • tiberius says:
      8 Nov8 November 12:20

      Will BA provide any confirmation whether they are negotiating/ pursuing an agreement with Gulf Air for cancelled flights? I had flights cancelled for Eid and F1 in Bahrain, Qatar timings aren’t great (and Gulf operate at almost identical times to the now former BA flight)

    • Lady London says:
      8 Nov8 November 23:41

      They don’t actually need a rebooking agreement to follow the law snd reroute pasaengers whose flights they cancelled. If there’s another operator’s flight thst meets the as soom as reasonably possible condition, the cancelled BA passrnger has a tight to bw rerouted onto that flight or another flight that meets the passenger’s legal entitlementbto be rerouted onto it. At BA expense. BA has no right to insist that ” an agreement mist be present” before they do this.

      BA wanting sn agreement is only aboiu them reducing their costs to do what they legally have to do snyway. If a passenger urgently needs to secure his rerouting he should not be sitting around or having available seats on flights that fulfil his rerouting timing needs disappear or have valid reroutings refused while BA wastes his time saving themselves money for a decision they made that hsd caused his plans to be messed up.

  • David Quinn says:
    8 Nov8 November 09:48

    We had flights to Shanghai booked in premium economy next March 11, but BA have cancelled that flight too, specifying the engine issues as the reason. It was booked as part of a bigger package via a travel agent. We’re waiting to hear from the TA what the replacement will be. Do the same rights apply to a TA booking like ours?

    • NorthernLass says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:02

      Yes exactly the same rights, though TA will have to sort it out.

    • JDB says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:05

      Yes, you have identical statutory rights but having to deal with an intermediary may slow things down but at least requires them to deal with BA. The problem with your PE booking is that many of the possible rerouting airlines such as Qatar or China Southern don’t operate a PE cabin.

      • David Quinn says:
        9 Nov9 November 10:05

        Thanks, that was my concern. The original routing was economy via Beijing and we paid quite a bit more for the direct PE flight, so not keen to downgrade again. We’ll see what they come up with.

  • Raja says:
    8 Nov8 November 09:51

    LHR to Bahrain was one of the reasons I used BA (companion voucher etc). Any specific reason they stopped?

    • Rob says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:03

      Flights are empty, based on recent feedback. We’re talking under 50 people at times.

      • Raja says:
        8 Nov8 November 10:24

        Wow …didn’t realise it was that bad… Was wondering why I always had loads of availability… Got my next trip booked in 3 weeks in club world for the four of us.

      • e14 says:
        8 Nov8 November 10:28

        So that’s the reason EF shut down the seatmaps, so we couldn’t monitor BAH, KWI and DOH?

        As for the ‘new’ service to BKK, a three class rust bucket 777 out of Gatshit, nope that does not leave me with a warm glow. Let’s get LIM back on the list 🤣

        • TGLoyalty says:
          8 Nov8 November 10:41

          What makes the Gatwick 777 rust buckets? They are younger than the G-VIIx 777 and similar age to G-YMMx at Heathrow and had full refurbs in 2018/19.

          • Skywalker says:
            8 Nov8 November 12:08

            @TGLoyalty I like that you picked up on @e14’s 777 “rust bucket” comment, but left “Gatshit” unchallenged 😀

      • meta says:
        8 Nov8 November 13:38

        A month ago I saw 8 seats available in F across number of days.

  • Stephen says:
    8 Nov8 November 09:56

    As someone who lived in Kuwait for a number of years, losing the BA flight will be a real pain, with only the somewhat shabby (and dry) Kuwait Airways as a direct alternative.
    The BA morning flight leaving Kuwait was always quite fun as the passengers, who often had no or very limited access to alcohol in Kuwait, got stuck into the booze for 6 hours, before being poured out at Heathrow around lunchtime.

  • ADS says:
    8 Nov8 November 10:11

    CWS makes the point that BAH may be a victim of Saudi Arabia becoming more open to visitors

    The rest of the thread has some interesting points too

    https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/36655580-post24.html

    • Thaliasilje says:
      8 Nov8 November 12:56

      c-w-s seems to have a lot of info regarding BA, is he affiliated with them in any way?

  • Domo1915 says:
    8 Nov8 November 10:26

    I really enjoyed the Bahrain flight. Went last year after Christmas. Terminal 3 Heathrow lounges and Pearl Lounge in Bahrain was really nice too. Business availability was easy though so flights weren’t busy so can see.

    Hopefully it’s not replaced with yet another dull US destination.

    • Richie says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:31

      PITtsburg is still for sale.

    • Jake says:
      8 Nov8 November 11:01

      Happy to be corrected but I don’t think this will lead to new routes or new flights? I suspect the equipment issues on ‘flagship’ high yield routes were costing more than the profit made on Bahrain / Kuwait.

      As such it is probably preferable for BA to have these planes waiting as a replacement so they don’t have to cancel high-yield routes rather than running the other flights.

  • Nico says:
    8 Nov8 November 10:35

    Looking at results today, does not inspire confidence to have more flights going east and I am booked to KL in April in PE.

    • Lady London says:
      8 Nov8 November 23:50

      I can’t see next summer happening for much of what’s being cancelled now for the winter.

  • tiberius says:
    8 Nov8 November 10:38

    I solely used my companion voucher for trips to family in Bahrain. Am I correct in saying that the only way to get to Bahrain with a 241 is to fly BA to Jed/Riy/Doh/Auh/dxb with a 2 for 1 and get an unprotected connecting flight from those destinations to Bahrain? Would I be able to book Lon to Doha with a 241 and qatar to bahrain with avios (obviously with no 241/paying the full avios price) on the same ticket to make it a protected connection?

    • JDB says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:46

      No, BA won’t book reward and revenue flights on the same PNR nor check your bags for the onward flight. Airline systems fare construction systems aren’t designed for mix and match, it’s not just BA being awkward.

      • meta says:
        8 Nov8 November 13:43

        The systems are not designed for mix& match, but they are designed for interlining luggage even when on separate tickets. The majority of airlines will do that for you, but a few odd ones stand out like BA, Iberia, etc.

        In Hong Kong you can just go to the transfer desk and they’ll do it for you even when on separate tickets with BA. Not sure if there are other airports set-up like that.

        • John says:
          8 Nov8 November 19:58

          In Hong Kong, they will not do it for you any longer (they used to before covid). It is only possible if you book online 48 hours in advance and pay HK$260, and the flights must be 150 minutes apart.

    • Tony says:
      8 Nov8 November 10:47

      Your only option will be an unprotected connection on a different ticket. I had a similar issue in a different part of the world and despite BA selling tickets for the short leg via a code share the person on the phone told me they couldn’t add it to my 241 ticket even if I offered to buy it separately using cash.

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