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Apologies for clogging up the forum with another compensation claim question.
Back from a trip to the USA with my son. This was an Avios booking using two upgrade vouchers on BA flights. We flew business going over to BWI and premium economy coming back from JFK. The return flight was cancelled the morning of the flight (technical issue with the inbound plane apparently), and we were rebooked onto an AA flight the following day, but in economy. So as well as a flight cancellation, we were downgraded for our return leg. I’m trying to figure out what claim I can put in for this. So far I’ve got:
1. Expenses – basically an additional night in the hotel we were staying at, which I paid for out of pocket and have the receipt.
2. €600 x2 as per EU regs.
3. Compensation (in Avios?) for the downgrade from Premium Economy to Economy. Unsure about this as upgrade vouchers were used?Questions:
1. Have I covered everything above?
2. Are these separate claims or can I cover all three elements in a single claim? If so, where do I do that?
3. How do I cover the downgrade claim, if I have a case?
4. This was booked under two separate booking references over the phone – do I need to raise separate claims for each?Many thanks
NBP
Was your son on the same booking as you for JFK-LHR?
We had two separate booking references for our respective bookings as it was booked over the phone using two companion vouchers.
Which type of vouchers are involved? How old is your son?
Personally I’d claim the cancellation and duty of care elements together (as you can say you are claiming for more than one person) and a separate claim the downgrade reimbursement (don’t call it compensation as that’s not what the regulation says).
The former should get laid pretty quickly. The downgrade element longer as it’s more complex to deal with.
As above, but it’s much easier to claim separately for each PNR.
Which type of vouchers are involved? How old is your son?
Personally I’d claim the cancellation and duty of care elements together (as you can say you are claiming for more than one person) and a separate claim the downgrade reimbursement (don’t call it compensation as that’s not what the regulation says).
The former should get laid pretty quickly. The downgrade element longer as it’s more complex to deal with.
Barclays companion vouchers, my son is 21.
Can anyone point me to the pages where I can do all this?
@Nuno in Right to Care also claim meals and transport to and from hotel and any internet charge.
I suspect this will be a bit of a nightmare and BA will try and wriggle out of paying as much as possible. Usual tactic is to settle the cheapest bit and ignore the rest, so I suspect you’ll be back and forth for quite a while and end up at CEDR.
https://www.britishairways.com/travel/feedbackclaims/public/en_gb/select/dcd
Not sure if I’m being a dummy, but I couldn’t see anywhere to explicitly claim the EU regulation €600 per flight? I’ve claimed for the hotel – does the claim also assume the €600 will be paid too by default? I can’t see any reference to that during the process.
The link takes you directly to the delays/cancellations form. You fill in the details of what happened, what compensation you feel you should get, and bank details for BA to pay it to. It won’t be paid by default.
https://www.britishairways.com/travel/feedbackclaims/public/en_gb/select/dcd
Not sure if I’m being a dummy, but I couldn’t see anywhere to explicitly claim the EU regulation €600 per flight? I’ve claimed for the hotel – does the claim also assume the €600 will be paid too by default? I can’t see any reference to that during the process.
Once you go into the system, it offers two choices once you have selected ‘cancellation’.
Ok. What would you like to claim for?
Select all that apply:
Expenses incurred due to my cancelled flight
The compensation I am legally entitled to for the cancellation under EU law
I can’t remember if you can select both at the start, but if not it will ask you re the other at the end. You don’t need to specify the sum for the compensation (which is £520 rather than €600 these days) BA will know that from the route.
Select ‘ca
https://www.britishairways.com/travel/feedbackclaims/public/en_gb/select/dcd
Not sure if I’m being a dummy, but I couldn’t see anywhere to explicitly claim the EU regulation €600 per flight? I’ve claimed for the hotel – does the claim also assume the €600 will be paid too by default? I can’t see any reference to that during the process.
Select ‘A candelled flight’ and go from there.
Yep I’ve done all that and selected “Cancelled flight”, but going through the process, there’s no specific reference to claim EU compensation. So I assume it sits under “other”.
@JDB has posted the options you should see. You should be able to select the affected flight and there’s a text box for you to add your own details.
Yep I’ve done all that and selected “Cancelled flight”, but going through the process, there’s no specific reference to claim EU compensation. So I assume it sits under “other”.
BTW Reg UK261 applies in UK law. BA was the operating air carrier that cancelked your flight, which was from the USA, not the EU.
Data point. BA responded to both claims under separate booking numbers yesterday and today. Paid everything claimed with no pushback. They’ve passed my details over to the ‘loyalty team’ to look at reimbursement for the downgrades.
So a one week turnaround. Happy with that. My last claim (last year) ended up at CEDR and took months. Maybe BA have their admin sorted put this time round.
Be careful.
“They’ve passed my details over to the ‘loyalty team’ to look at reimbursement for the downgrades.”
This matter should quite probably have been handled within the same team as also handled the compensation side and expenses for extra night side of your claim. As what you’re due for downgrade is called reimbursement in the legislation. But in fact for long haul flights the legislation requires a reimbursement with a punitive aspect – ie you get 75% of what you paid for your flight, back.
This is what thw law entitles you to and it’s considerably more than any loyalty team they’ve passed it to might be thinking.
All that’s taken off what you paid for the flight segment on which you were downgraded, before the 75% due back to you is calculated, is any genuine government taxes and very small few dollars true airport type charges. Taxes are practically zero from the US. So you are due back very close to 75% of the cost of that sector. (There’ll be a breakdown of fare paid in your confirmation most probably.)
That 75% will be a lot more than the difference between Economy and Business in miles and/or cash, that the loyalty team may try to fob you off with. For long haul that works out to a lot more than the difference between the classes so beware. (Not so much, often, for short haul.)
Be careful.
“They’ve passed my details over to the ‘loyalty team’ to look at reimbursement for the downgrades.”
This matter should quite probably have been handled within the same team as also handled the compensation side and expenses for extra night side of your claim. As what you’re due for downgrade is called reimbursement in the legislation. But in fact for long haul flights the legislation requires a reimbursement with a punitive aspect – ie you get 75% of what you paid for your flight, back.
This is what the law entitles you to and it’s considerably more than any loyalty team they’ve passed it to might be thinking.
All that’s taken off what you paid for the flight segment on which you were downgraded, before the 75% due back to you is calculated, is any genuine government taxes and very small few dollars true airport type charges. Taxes are practically zero from the US. So you are due back very close to 75% of the cost of that sector. (There’ll be a breakdown of fare paid in your confirmation most probably.)
That 75% will be a lot more than the difference between Economy and Business in miles and/or cash, that the loyalty team may try to fob you off with. For long haul that works out to a lot more than the difference between the classes so beware. (Not so much, often, for short haul.)
Thanks for the heads up. When you say “75% of what you paid for your flight”, what does this actually mean when its an Avios booking (and a companion voucher was used as well)?
Total payment per booking (the call centre set it up as two separate bookings) was £330 and 67000 avios. GBP315.00 + Tax/Fee/Charge GBP15.00 (call centre fee) = GBP 330.00.
Outbound was Club, inbound was supposed to be Premium Economy, which is the segment that was downgraded.Taxes/fees/charges per booking are listed as:
Total government, authority and airport charges> GBP 0.00
Total British Airways fees and surcharges> GBP 0.00
Total taxes, fees and surcharges per person> GBP 0.00Be careful.
“They’ve passed my details over to the ‘loyalty team’ to look at reimbursement for the downgrades.”
This matter should quite probably have been handled within the same team as also handled the compensation side and expenses for extra night side of your claim. As what you’re due for downgrade is called reimbursement in the legislation. But in fact for long haul flights the legislation requires a reimbursement with a punitive aspect – ie you get 75% of what you paid for your flight, back.
Be careful of what?
For avios tickets the reinbursement and refunds have always been handled by the ‘loyalty team’ and not general BA customer services who do deal with the day to day compensation and duty of care claims.
Ditto refunds for cash tickets have always been dealt with by a separate refunds team.
@Nuno looks like maybe RFS? I would still expect true taxes (from US very very low), and the tiny airport type charges to be taken off any cash element before the 75% due back to you is calculated.
As mentioned, at this stage, and if BA behaves technically correctly, then other than the above you should get back 75% of whatever form(s) your payment took, whether avios, cash or a mix, as applied to the flight on which you were downgraded.
All of your claims are for the first seat, and if you’re using a companion voucher then once yours has been calculated then the companion seat gets the same based on your seat whether compensation or ‘reimbursement’ (never heard of BA giving a companion voucher back).
@BAFIS : surprised you should ask. You’ll remember here on HfP we’ve had a number of people report that BA tried to fob them off with the difference in avios between classes only, on a downgrade, on an avios booking, instead of the rather more compensatory reimbursement of 75% of what they paid for the downgraded flight, that the legislation entitles them to.
Now that you point it out, I am wondering if this is only proof of my point that putting what is essentially a legally required payment that has nothing to do with loyalty, but is legally required compensatory reimbursement after a downgrade, in the hands of a loyalty team is why we had those reports of incorrect offers.
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