No ticket assigned, advice

[carolc]

Hello,
We recently travelled to Mexico on Amex241 world traveller plus ticket. At check in at Cancun we were told BA had not assigned us a ticket and we had to call them. After 90mins on the phone the flight closed.
They called us back within 2 hrs and offered us flights via USA (no ESTA so we declined), economy the next day, or business the day after. We accepted the economy ticket as we were unsure if BA would cover 2 nights in a hotel.
We filed the complaint and so far they have offered to cover our out of pocket expenses plus £200 each. No downgrade reimbursement. What should we expect?
Thanks

[Anna]

So BA ticketed you on the outbound but not the inbound? You should have had a single ticket number each unless you booked the 2 legs separately.

I don’t think you will get downgrade compensation easily as BA will say you voluntarily accepted the economy flights. I’m sure there have been people in the same situation if you look at the cancellation and downgrades posts in the relevant threads, there will be a lot of info about how successful people have been with claims.

[carolc]

So BA replied to our query “how do we have no ticket?”
“We can see when you made your booking, the agent removed your flight in World Traveller Plus and held in a space for Club World, but then no further action was taken. We’re unsure why this was done, but please be assured, this has been fed back to the agent’s manager.”
Which translates to, we were going to upgrade you but forgot to complete the transaction.

[JDB]

This is quite a tricky one as your situation doesn’t fall strictly under the terms of UK261, probably including denied boarding. While BA will fall back on the passenger needing to check their travel documentation, this was clearly a mistake by the airline and one they have admitted. The question then arises as to how much you should be compensated for their error. They have offered £200 so you need to work out in an objective way what the compensation should be (excluding your out of pocket expenses already agreed). A starting point might be calculating the downgrade reimbursement to which you would theoretically have been entitled (75% of the amount paid in Avios and surcharges (not actual paid out taxes/charges). Another theoretical is the denied boarding compensation you could have received; I’m not sure this situation is technically ‘denied boarding’ but the effect is the same and it’s BA’s fault, so CEDR/MCOL might be sympathetic. I think that having already offered £200 and what BA has admitted, I think that if you press them, they will pay more as long as you don’t pitch it too high. You need to be clear, as suggested above, that your downgrade was entirely involuntary and simply a pragmatic decision because you had to get home etc.

[SamG]

Had you asked about upgrading or the price differences etc? Weird that the agent would have done it without being requested. Not that it’s your fault that the booking wasn’t left ticketed correctly regardless!

Personally I’d say it’s reasonable to want full IDB compo + the difference in points / taxes for the WTP-WT downgrade as you did chose to do that rather than wait . MCOL would be sympathetic I think, the OP had a flight showing in their app, it’s beyond reasonable expectation for a passenger to be expected to know the difference between a reservation and a ticket and know how to check it’s been ticketed correctly etc

I’ve said it before – it’s insane that outstations don’t have a hotline to a ticket desk. Fair enough to not have someone ticketing trained at a 1-a-day station (although BA doesn’t even have them at Heathrow which is ridiculous) but not being able to get issues resolved to stop someone missing their flight is really crazy.

[SamG]

BTW the BA gold number when you’re outside the UK is 020 7949 3066. I’m not gold but I do have this saved and in an urgent scenario I’d give it a go , I can’t see an agent refusing to help you if you explained the time critical situation you’re in

[carolc]

Thanks for the advice.
We’ll definitely try the “denied boarding/more than 4 hour delay” route and expect the standard £520 each, plus the downgrade reimbursement. Not being too pushy! And we did not request an upgrade to Club World, we just spotted a month ahead that our seats had changed.

Incidentally after a 20 minutes call with BA ticketing they told us to call Executive club as we had miles flights. Then another hour on the Gold line (husband Gold for life) who still did not manage to issue us tickets, the flight was not full.

[JDB]

carolc wrote:

Thanks for the advice.
We’ll definitely try the “denied boarding/more than 4 hour delay” route and expect the standard £520 each, plus the downgrade reimbursement. Not being too pushy! And we did not request an upgrade to Club World, we just spotted a month ahead that our seats had changed.

Incidentally after a 20 minutes call with BA ticketing they told us to call Executive club as we had miles flights. Then another hour on the Gold line (husband Gold for life) who still did not manage to issue us tickets, the flight was not full.

I think you should be wary of asking for the £520 each, at least framed in that manner. You are really asking for damages for BA’s negligence/breach of contract and BA has recognised this in its offer of compensation outside the statutory framework. I don’t think you were technically denied boarding but the statutory compensation for that is a measure of the sort of sum to which you might be entitled, so you have a gap of £320/each to bridge! Try to calculate the 75% downgrade reimbursement as another gauge, but I doubt BA will pay you both and will say it was voluntary as they offered Club the next day.

[philco78]

You should still receive the difference in fare between the economy/ business.
I doubt the 4 hour delay compensation will come into play here because the flight did operate

I’m an agent and have had this plenty of times from clients. BA will eventually refund. It may take 6-12 months

[JDB]

philco78 wrote:

You should still receive the difference in fare between the economy/ business.
I doubt the 4 hour delay compensation will come into play here because the flight did operate

I’m an agent and have had this plenty of times from clients. BA will eventually refund. It may take 6-12 months

If you do go down the route suggested above, I believe that BA would only pay you the difference between the class you paid and the class travelled, i.e. because you used a companion voucher, for one person, but this still amounts to 60-65k Avios. Via the statutory reimbursement route, you should get back 75% of what you paid (for that sector) in Avios and surcharges, but x two passengers, even though you theoretically only paid for one. The statutory reimbursement rules don’t distinguish between a one class or two class downgrade, whereas the first method does, so you need to work out what to ask for!

[Lady London]

Not clear were you originally, by you, booked in Club or not?

I’d say they owe you IDB. Who cares about the reason – you were IDB and it wasn’t your fault. The rest as to how it happened is detail and doesn’t matter.

Did BA inform you of your rights while they were sorting out your reroute? If not, that’s a fault on their side as they are required to.

If you needed to travel no later than the following day and BA told you they could only reroute you to meet that date need you had, in Economy not Club, then they owe you downgrade reimbursement for each seat (even 241 seats) at the same £ value as the first seat. So 75% of what you paid whether cash or avios, with only the “true” taxes/airport charges/immigration official charges, taken off before your 75% is calculated.

This may take you a year, hopefully less, but I’d demand both (separate claims). £200 is really insulting – they’re hoping to get away with a lot here.

As a precautionary measure I’d do a Data Subject Access Request now, to request copies of all the telephone conversations concerned, this will keep things clear and assist you to fend off any different presentation by BA, of how things happened.

Please go after each of these, I strongly recommend separate claims for the 2 amounts due. I think it’s well worth 1 CEDR claim too for both together if not paid, or whichever is not paid within 8-20 weeks or so (you can after 8, but give them longer) and after 2 or 3 chases in that time.

Please let us know how it goes.

PS Don’t forget your (also a separate) claim for extra accommodation and meal expenses for the extra day as well as transport to and from where you stayed: also owed under duty of care. So could be 3 claims in total but this gives them the chance to pay what they agree with asap and not hold everything up.