Flight cancellation options

[Jonathans]

My BA Club flight from LHR 8:20 tomorrow morning to AMS has been cancelled due to weather. We’ve been rebooked onto a 16:30 from City in Economy.

A few questions as I’m travelling with kids etc booked into an airport hotel at LHR with parking so the easiest option may not be the best option.

1) will our “within 24hrs” antigen test still be accepted in AMS?

2) Will BA cover the cost of getting us all to City airport?

3) Is any compo due for the involuntary cabin downgrade?

4) The KLM flight a little later is still going from LHR. Can I insist BA put us on it?

Thanks

[Jonathans]

5) can i request BA move our return flight to LCY instead of LHR fee free?

[Lady London]

I’d go to the airport at close to the original time I would have and go to the sales desk and ask them for what you want. On the day, airport has greater powers and flexibility and I’d defo be asking for the KL flight. This will only work if you didn’t accept the other one.

Get there early (or at least one of you, with the others ready to move quickly)allowing for big queues plus the extra transit time to T2 for KL. Could even be worth one of you getting up extra early to queue early and get it done.

If it doesn’t work come back and someone can answer the other questions. If it does work and you’re still downgraded make sure you keep it clear that the downgrade is involuntary and you’ll be sorting out downgrade reimbursement after the flight (don’t accept any refund at all meanwhile even if it’s offered)

[Londonsteve]

That certainly sounds like sage advice LL, but could another perspective be that rather than getting to LHR for the crack of dawn in time for a flight they categorically cannot take, is it not better to plan for a late afternoon departure from City and to deal with the downgrade separately? In my view a downgrade on this route is a blessing in disguise as LCY has no lounge and CE from LCY offers little difference from ET. If they were booked into CE from LCY BA could argue that they have received the same product which actually they haven’t compared to a LHR departure. I would imagine BA will have no problem to pay for a taxi for the group to travel together from City, they are unlikely to blink if the cost is below £100 which is should be.

[Lady London]

Good point Londonsteve.

BA has been reported a few times here to agree they will reimburse transport between airports when they changed people’s flights. Then when receipts were submitted they denied and the person had to fight. Or they later refused to pay cos it was a taxi and not the awful journey by public transport between LHR and most other airports.

Plus if car is at Heathrow, they are already in a hotel tonight at Heathrow and BA wants them to take this other flight for BA”s convenience from another airport over 8 hours later tomorrow. Which gets them to their destination so late they’ve wasted their whole day tomorrow.

So I thought a serious effort at getting the KL flight, from Heathrow where they already are tonight, at close to the time of their original BA flight, without wasting the day trailing from Outer West London to East London for BA’s convenience, was worth a try. Plus if they’re early enough have they not got the decent lounges in Terminal 2 if they retain their seats in Business?

[Londonsteve]

Ah, I missed the part about the airport hotel. My bad. If they are already there then I guess it does no harm to try, long as they are not averse to early wake-ups! I had visions of someone driving up from Somerset to arrive at the airport for 0630 with no obvious prospect of getting on a flight that morning.

[SamG]

How did you get on? BA usually be ameniable to moving you to KL since your flight was cancelled 24hrs before departure – the call centre can do it – BA these days has very little extra power at the airport – one of a few airlines that actually getting in front of a human won’t be much more helpful than calling!

Otherwise you’ll get a refund of the fare difference + they’ll pay for a taxi. They’ll try say their limit is £50 but since there is a group of you they’ll pay if you push back IME. But with the winds still being high until past lunchtime I’d try to avoid an LCY flight if you can as that could be disrupted too

[Lady London]

SamG this is shocking news.
Normally if your flights have been really messed up right before they take place it’s always seemed the airline airport desk’s job is to process you onto another flight asap and they have wide powers in doing so. Certainly a better chance of being processed onto someone else’s flight if you’ve bern dumped at the airport on the day due to your flight being cancelled, than if you were asking for another airline flying at the same time as a rerouting ahead of time.

And yet JonathanS has reported from MAN this morning, that there is no BA desk at MAN empowered to make the ticket amendments for irrops on the day.

Setting aside why did JonathanS send a message after 7pm yesterday evening saying his family and car were at an airport hotel in *LHR* and his flight to AMS at 08.20am from *LHR* had just been cancelled, and yet this morning he’s posted on a different thread that he’s at *MAN* this morning trying to get the desk to resolve today’s irrop, is this not a terrible pattern of lies and withdrawal of service from British Airways? Making it impossible to get decent help or exercise passenger’s rights to be helped to fly as near to their booked time as possible when BA cancels
a flight? To withdraw services from the airline’s home airport that are able to reticket irrops on the day of travel, seems extreme withdrawal of service by British Airways.

This, after months now when people have reported British Airways’s phone system has stopped being able to get them through to BA and often won’t even let them queue. Preceded by British Airways having removed passenger’s access to perfectly functioning longstanding buttons on their website that would allow the customer to request a refund. This other removal of passenger-assisting functionality sn’t accidental. Because after a workround to access the refund screen was posted here and other places, BA then blocked the workround too.

Why did BA’s chief actually stand up and say they’re improving the service a few weeks ago when all we’re seeing is BA refusing to allow themselves to be contacted even by distressed passengers on the day at BA’s departure airports? Easyjet is treating customers better

[Lady London]

Oops apologies that was Qwertyknows best stuck at MAN this morning with the same problem – BA simply not providing staff to deal with passengers dumped by BA irrops.

[QwertyKnowsBest]

Lady London wrote:

Oops apologies that was Qwertyknows best stuck at MAN this morning with the same problem – BA simply not providing staff to deal with passengers dumped by BA irrops.

Yeap that’s me. Sat in the dingy BA room in the escape lounge, hoping that I can sort something workable out with a BA staff member that can change flights. Certainly no-one here can help.

The MAN – LHR change was also an involuntary downgrade. Yet I can see business class seats available on the flight moved to.

BA claim my original flight was cancelled due to weather, yet all other BA MAN – LHR flights both, before and after mine are operating.

[SamG]

Lady London wrote:

SamG this is shocking news.
Normally if your flights have been really messed up right before they take place it’s always seemed the airline airport desk’s job is to process you onto another flight asap and they have wide powers in doing so. Certainly a better chance of being processed onto someone else’s flight if you’ve bern dumped at the airport on the day due to your flight being cancelled, than if you were asking for another airline flying at the same time as a rerouting ahead of time.

Having the call centre empowered with the same “all other airlines” options is a good thing – saves standing in a huge queue at the airport. This is a BA written down option 10 – https://www.britishairways.com/en-gb/traveltrade/bookings-policies/policies/standard-customer-guidelines#cancellations – if anyone ever needs to quote it! Though I imagine that getting through to BA call centre over the weekend was equally as difficult.

What is not good is BA removing a lot of on the ground ticketing abilities – particularly at outstations, meaning that those staff can’t help you even if they want to, they’re also stuck calling “London” (though hopefully not sitting in the same queues as us…)

This is also where using a (good) TA can come in handy since they can handle this for you – e.g. Amex travel. They’ll be able to call trade support and get you rebooked

Easyjet is a bit of a nightmare in this scenario to be fair – I missed a flight at Gatwick recently and they literally have no sales desk or anything. The guy managing the entry to check in told me I was better booking a new flight for myself online (he was correct) otherwise he’d “try” to find someone to do the rescue fee processs. If they cancel a flight you’d have no way of getting booked on another airline as is your UK/EU right except pay yourself and battle it out with them after. Their portal is good though for a easyjet rebooking and getting a hotel arranged

• This reply was modified 54 years, 4 months ago by .

[Jonathans]

So a brief update, whilst I categorically did not accept the revised LCY flight. But because I clicked to see what other possible flights I could move to, BA claim implied acceptance of the revised LCY flight and that there is nothing they can (or will) do.

Strangely, using the same link it still let me move the return flight to LCY (for free) so we’ve rebooked the parking at City and will look to claim this plus food from BA on our return.

All a little annoying and I’m sure BA could have acted better but will just take it on the chin. If there wasn’t young kids involved I might have the appetite for a fight but at this point anything for an easy life which lets BA massively off the hook.

[Lady London]

Implied acceptance…rubbish.

I’ll not comment on the rest.

[Londonsteve]

My thoughts exactly. Surely there is no scope for ‘implied acceptance’ in this commercial scenario. Merely clicking forward to see the flight re-routing options does not infer that you have accepted being re-routed in principle, or that you’ve accepted a particular flight. It’s akin to opening the menu in a restaurant, finding the prices or selection do not meet with your approval, then a bullying maitre d accosts you as you get up to leave and informs you that opening the menu is implied acceptance that they can thereafter serve you any dish they choose, as you’ve made yourself aware of the menu contents. These are, simply, mafia tactics.