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Really would appreciate some advice as what to do next please. Here is a summary of the issue:
I am writing regarding flights BA7069 and BA7234 on 01/10/2024] from London Heathrow to Bogota Via Madrid. 01/10/2024
The flights were booked in January using BA Avios and Companion Voucher all confirmed including seat selection and vegetarian meals.
26/09/2024- Noticed a problem on the Iberia App- it was not showing seats and meals that had been confirmed via email. Called BA who explained this was Iberia’s responsibility. Called Iberia who said there was an error in the ticketing and that there was no booking. Spent 5 hours on the phone between BA and Iberia, was eventually given a new Booking Reference and assured a ticket had been issued for us both.
30/09/2024 – unable to check in online. Multiple calls to Iberia and BA, no one accepting responsibility. Hours on the phone. Multiple conversations with supervisors. Advised all was in hand and told to complain to BA by advisers. Advised a new ticket had been issued and received a third booking reference.
I asked the supervisor to stay on hold so I could check in online but was told not to bother and get some sleep, it would all be sorted by the morning!1/10/2024 – Arrived at airport, unable to check in, advised no ticket by Iberia.
Iberia would not help as they said BA responsibility.
BA would not help as they said Executive Club responsibility.
No executive club representative at airport.
Only option was to call the same people that had failed us multiple times.Unable to get through as message said busy try again later.
Eventually got through but was now short of time. Needless to say this was all extremely stressful.With only 45 minutes to flight we were offered the following:
Alternative Flights
Same flights but economy to Madrid. ( We opted for this as otherwise all our bookings for the rest of the holiday would have been affected).We did not have the allocated seats we had previously booked or vegetarians meals. I also ended up paying for the seats on the return flights that had previously been allocated.
I raised a complaint with BA, we had clearly overpaid on taxes and air miles(appreciate not much) and were severely inconvenienced.
I received a complaint reference but no other correspondence. I have just checked the status of the complaint and it has been closed!!!
So my questions are:
What do I do next?
What can I expect in terms of compensation if any?Many thanks for the advice, I am at my wit’s end!
Technically each passenger is entitled to downgrade reimbursement for the LHR to MAD sector plus potentially a refund of difference in Economy vs Business APD.
How much did you pay in APD?
Downgrade reimbursement should be 30% of the fare paid but it might be more to just go for a refund in the difference between economy and Business class. Work out which is the higher figure and claim that.
Your problem is that you flew Iberia so it should be them you need to get the reimbursement but since you booked and paid BA I would submit a new claim to BA requesting downgrade reimbursement of x Avios and £y APD for flight BA7069 on 01Oct2024 on PNR xxx123 for each passenger downgraded. Do not ask for compensation as it isn’t.
Next time around check in MMB on the BA app or your e-ticket receipt if you have a ticket number beginning either 125 for BA metal or 075 for IB metal. If no ticket number it hasn’t been issued and you need to resolve before going to the airport. You can also go the Finnair or RJ websites and key in the PNR reference to see if the flights have been ticketed.
Dear AJA
Thank you for the detaied advice.
I have just checked the E ticket receipts for the original booking PNR and the one issued prior to the final one and yes there were ticket numbers issued starting 125.I suspect the information given to me by BA is just nonsense and I will never get to the real reason as to why there were problems.
Thanks again
I have just checked the E ticket receipts for the original booking PNR and the one issued prior to the final one and yes there were ticket numbers issued starting 125.
I had an e-ticket with the 125 number and a few weeks later, I noticed that there were little dashes against the booking in the BA app where the 125 number should be.
When I called up, the 125 number had dropped off due to a BA change in the flight times – so the e-ticket is of no help in some circumstances.
If the 125 number is not showing in the app (after the usual log off/log on again routine), then it’s time to call up BA.
Out of interest, were your flight times changed prior to departure?
@Scout123 Not hijacking your thread but I have what I hope isn’t an issue, but could be related and the post by @Skywalker pricked my ears up.
I have two reward flights next May MAD-LIM and LIM-MAD-LGW on IB but booked via BA. All was fine, all seemed ticketed.
A couple of months ago I got an email saying the MAD-LIM and LIM-MAD flight times had both changed. The changes were very minor so all fine. Now the MAD-LIM flight has disappeared out of MMB though the LIM-MAD and MAD-LHR flights are still there with 125 ticket numbers. Try as I might I cannot add the MAD-LIM back in on the BA app I just get an error message.
Should I be worried about my MAD-LIM leg not being ticketed?!
@Scout123 I suspect IB changed the flight time or the codeshare details on the LHR-MAD flight and it dropped off your booking and neither Ba nor IB took responsibility for reissuing the ticket in time for you to fly. You were clearly fobbed off over the phone when you requested they stay on while you checked the booking. You shouldn’t have hung up.
I would concentrate on getting a refund for the LHR-MAD flight then once that has been resolved you could raise another complaint explaining how stressful it all was. You might not get anything but BA might just throw some extra Avios your way – technically you’re not entitled to extra compensation for inconvenience or stress so if it goes nowhere not much more you can do.
@tootsci I would try the IB website and key in your IB hooking ref (different to the BA one) and see what comes up. Also try either finnair or RJ websites with your BA booking ref and see what comes up.I suspect your longhaul sector has dropped out of the booking due to the flight time changes or potentiallya change in codeshare details. I would definitely call BA to confirm what’s going on.
Technically each passenger is entitled to downgrade reimbursement for the LHR to MAD sector plus potentially a refund of difference in Economy vs Business APD.
How much did you pay in APD?
APD is paid based on the highest cabin of the trip not on a per sector basis. Thus there would be no refund as the OP was apparently sat in business class on the MAD-BOG leg
@Skywalker – no flight time changes
@tootsci I would try the IB website and key in your IB hooking ref (different to the BA one) and see what comes up. Also try either finnair or RJ websites with your BA booking ref and see what comes up.I suspect your longhaul sector has dropped out of the booking due to the flight time changes or potentiallya change in codeshare details. I would definitely call BA to confirm what’s going on.
Thanks – I get the same error on Finnair MMB but when I go on RJ MMB I can see the booking with a 125 ticket number, but I also get a box saying “A schedule change has occurred on this trip. Please acknowledge it and choose your trip options again (seats, meals,…) (15070)” But there is nothing to click on to acknowledge it! I might still give BA a ring when I can….
@Scout123 – sorry to hear of your tribulations with BA. Unfortunately, the presence of a 125 ticket number on an e-ticket receipt doesn’t suffice for an agent to check you in. The saga of recreating your booking on new PNRs is most unusual. To correct one error from above, as the booking has been booked and ticketed via BA, you will only see BA 125 ticket numbers for your return journey, even if the flight is on an Iberia aircraft. BA can’t issue tickets on IB paper.
@tootsci – you can’t acknowledge changes via third airline sites. This needs to be done via BA to put your booking back from a pending status to confirmed. You should then be able to manage your booking as normal.Technically each passenger is entitled to downgrade
Downgrade reimbursement should be 30% of the fare paid but it might be more to just go for a refund in the difference between economy and Business class. Work out which is the higher figure and claim that.
Your problem is that you flew Iberia so it should be them you need to get the reimbursement but since you booked and paid BA I would submit a new claim to BA requesting downgrade reimbursement of x Avios and £y APD for flight BA7069 on 01Oct2024 on PNR xxx123 for each passenger downgraded. Do not ask for compensation as it isn’t.
@AJA the Article 10 provisions for downgrade reimbursement are compensation and one should specify both words in any claim. The CJEU in the reasoning for the judgment in the leading case (Mennens) puts it thus – “Article 10(2) of Regulation No 261/2004 aims to compensate a specific inconvenience” and later “that conclusion is supported by the objective of Article 10(2) of Regulation No 261/2004, which is, as has been noted in paragraphs 26 to 28 above, to compensate, by way of a flat-rate sum, the inconvenience caused by the decrease in comfort associated with the downgrading by the air carrier over the entire distance and for the entire duration of the flight concerned.”The wording used in Article 10 is purely to differentiate this flat % rate compensation from the fixed sums of liquidated damages relating to delay, cancellation and denied boarding.
This matters because of the way BA handles claims – when customer relations get a refund/reimbursement claim they send it off to ticketing to calculate and they will just take the difference in classes because they don’t usually deal with compensation – ie something different to their normal work. They then either send the result back to CR or pay the refund. If the passenger pushes back, CR will commonly say it has been correctly calculated, end of story. In this instance, the passenger will be better off with the difference but usually, to get the right result without too much argument, one does need to be asking for downgrade reimbursement/compensation and ideally to do the calculation for them, specifying the Mennens formula has been used.
@tootsci – were you able to confirm the booking the BA site? Or did you call BA? I have the same issue, flying MAD to EZE and then EZE to LHR via MAD and the time of the booking moved by 10 minutes. I can’t access the e-tickets and get the same error on RJ website.
@tootsci – were you able to confirm the booking the BA site? Or did you call BA? I have the same issue, flying MAD to EZE and then EZE to LHR via MAD and the time of the booking moved by 10 minutes. I can’t access the e-tickets and get the same error on RJ website.
@HSV Not yet (am at work)It’s odd that only the outbound not inbound the issue seems to be with for me when both have had the minor time change.
Tried on a PC rather than my phone and if I don’t log in to my Executive Account and enter booking reference and surname, and I can now see the booking but just not add it to my account. It says “confirmed, note time change” or words to that effect, and my seat reservation is there. The inbound booking that has stayed in my account also says confirmed, but I think it would be wise for me to phone BA this evening to make sure all is ok with both!
Looks to me like BA has narrowly escaped an additional denied boarding claim. Which would be worth a lot more, and given I am sure the passenger has good records of each failure one by one of each British Airways failure to do the correct thing, I can’t see how BA would be able to avoid paying IDB compensation as well.
If this had taken long enough at the airport to resolve so that the passenger’s flight was missed it would have been an IDB claim. Instead BA has squeaked it by forcing the passenger onto the poorest grade of seats on the flight but still the flight.
I’m beginning to wonder if forced downgrade should have to be compensated the same as Denied Boarding. It would have a chance of making award passengers more costly to downgrade, rather than being BA’s easy cheap target for downgrade as at present. The problem is, you technically don’t have the right to refuse to board if they are downgrading you – you could then count as a no-show.
From some stories I’m wondering if an award seat isn’t really counted at all against what BA has sold, it kind of looks like when they’ve sold an award seat they keep on selling it anyway and as soon as they sell it for more,or decide they can, the person that saved up their avios and voucher for the trip is downgraded because BA had made no commitment to carry an award user in the class they sold him.
So you book a table in a restaurant, but you may only eat if there are leftovers. That’s BA award tickets in Club ?
I phoned up BA. They confirmed more or less what @JDB had said. The booking had gone into a pending status and it needed to be confirmed which the agent did. She mentioned status’s HK and TK but I got lost there. She also said joe public cannot do this – we have to phone. The booking is now showing as CONFIRMED on RJ site and I also see the full booking details on the Iberia site.
The downside is, if times are amended again, will have to go through the process again!
HK – Seat confirmed on a flight
TK – Timing changed by the airline on a confirmed sector.@HSV Looks like I do have the same problem as you – currently been on hold the last 10 mins while the CS rep is looking into it further….
@HSV Looks like I do have the same problem as you – currently been on hold the last 10 mins while the CS rep is looking into it further….
Took a while but my tickets have now been reissued, and my seat reservations have held. I still can’t see the booking that dropped out of “My upcoming bookings” though but hey ho. I have email confirmation of the tickets so I think all fine.
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