[Lady London]

Hum. Rotten typing. *It would take a lot to get stuff from them out of my mental and digital spam trays.

[Lady London]

My problem is I don’t know to what extent we are all being manipulated to take these views on what is happening in US politics.

America is full of decent hard working people who need a President to take a firm direction and they hope he will make progress on problems important to them. They voted him as the best of the available alternatives and maybe he was.

No one’s perfect and I wish America luck and thank them for the leadership role they took in the world in the past century and more and thank them for what they achieved. They need to do more for Americans now and I hope their leadership finds a path to that.

[Lady London]

I don’t think they are backpedalling. This was in their plan. They wanted to kill off most people, so they basically stopped the Executive Club or whatever it’s called now. They made a pretence of rewarding some people still, in the way they nerfed The Club but basicslly those people – corporate travellers – are already comforted enough by BA alresdy. Via the deals made with their employers, not really choosing which airline themselves in most cases, and often lucky enough to travel in classes other than Y or Y-, anyway.

BA did indeed mumble that they would run promotions after they’d nerfed the Exec Club. I thought this was extremely arrogant. As someone who’s behaved in a way that damages our former good terms doesn’t usually get my attention. But I forgot of course that so many loyslty programs of various types are now exiting Round #1 of loyalty, grabbing all the micro-data thry’ve collected, restrategising and basically withdrawing the Round #1 program.

So leveraging the micro-data, if they’ve learned to analyse it, is going to give us Round #2 loyslty programs snd individually let us know what they’ve learned by (perhaps iteratively) targeting us.

I can’t wait to see the Round #2 loyalty programs that are emerging and not just the airlines. But meanwhile I’m a bit busy restrategising myself and thinking thete’s a reasonable chance world events may bvggvr up anyone’s stattegy. So BA hasn’t got my focus. It eould tske a lot to get stuff from them out of my mental and digital spsm trsys.

[Lady London]

BA Flyer IHG Stayer wrote:

No it isn’t a change. it’s been there since basic economy fares were started

@LadyLondon American and Iberia also have the same policy on not interlining bags on separate tickets. Which is actually a One World policy which started in 2016

Indeed, @BAFIS.

BA, a dominant player in Oneworld, partner of AA in the Transatlantic Cartel..err sorry the Transatlantic Alliance, and sister airline of IB (both owned by IAG), was the first mover on this. Those two OneWorld airlines have since followed BA in disallowing this status privilege on HBO tickets.

Fortunately there are still a number of other airlines available who do not refuse these things.

[Lady London]

Take smaller luggage on board.

Qatar are ruthless in Y (recent experience no give on any of several flights) and very, very expensive if you transgress 0 tolerance. Never got hassle in J on them but you never know.

[Lady London]

Someone died is the thing here. So some of us would decide it’s in poor taste to claim compensation regardless of a right provided by law. Especially as it does seem passengers were looked after correctly in terms of them being accommodated and / or rerouted.

[Lady London]

Quite a few other airlines do still maintain any extra luggage privilege / additional piece for individials holding status that gives these privileges even on Hand Baggage Only tickets. But BA specifically does not honour this privolege on HBO tickets even if you do have status.

That, and refusing to check luggage through -“interline” luggage even when the passenger has a connecting journey that just happens to be made up of more than the ticket being checked in on, even if both tickets are issued by BA on BA flights, are a couple of the areas where British Airways has decided its service will be less than other airlines.

[Lady London]

Pretty sure that if you rejected very promptly to the seller (which on a credit card under s75 kinda includes the cardco but not if it’s a charge catd or debit card) an item that should not have been delivered to you or did not match what wss sold, there’s something in UK law that lets you issue the seller a notice to collect it within 10 days, otherwise you will exercise your right to dispose of the item as you see fit.

Note it’s up to them to arrange collection within that period of notice, you’re not obliged to send it. Obvs make sure you give them how to contact you to arrange collection.

So provided you were prompt in rejecting at least to the seller when it was delivered, I’d suggest you look into this. You can jointly address Amex (if credit card) or cc them (if charge or debit) on the official notice that you send.

Sorry IANAL so can’t quote where it”s written down – as you might want to check if time lapse after your initial prompt rejection matters – but I used it a number of years ago and sending the notice got action immediately.

[Lady London]

@Travel Strong I suspect the hotel was overbooked but they didn’t want to lose the other 3 mights of your stay. In fact I’d lay money on it.

[Lady London]

Yes please do update @Jennieb .

It’s completely unbelievable that we are seeing repeated reports of this with unticketed BA tickets.

Other companies I deal with used to.encounter this issue with card authorisations expiring if the actual billing did not take place within 7 days, including IME Amazon. But since at least a year now,none of the companies I’ve dealt with has had this problem.

Amazon snd 1 other seem to have been able to use authorisation codes much longer than 7 days after they obtained the code by me giving card details and approving the transaction initially with the bank. So clearly other companies are finding a solution to this problem so wby not BA ?

[Lady London]

Well done Cat.

[Lady London]

We’ve not had such reports before, would be very rare. It’s a very personal operation as far as I know, I hope everyone is ok there.

[Lady London]

And in any language on the internet, Block Caps = Shouting. Any word in any language. So yeah maybe you only knew enough English to know the scam word (unlikely … given your excellent English).. but even then, putting it in Block Caps, = shouting.

Fully justified in a title needing emergency attentiom of course.

[Lady London]

It’s very helpful now to know these things. If this denied boarding was after 31st March, then based on the account given it sounds like the checkin agent failed to ask the passenger for the share code and just refused boarding.

[Lady London]

Ihar wrote:

I can see “soft landing” disappearing, especially at Gold where Silver gets you the same thing…. Most people haven’t travelled “Gold” on their own dime. Maybe a 15K renewal.. Obviously BA need to pay their consultants a lot more money to figure this one out…..

The BA reward system isn’t so complex

Don’t forget to clean your phone before your trip to the US, if you just sent that link by phone 🙂

[Lady London]

Yes, BA has frequently shown less luggage than I had, not allowed seat selection when it should etc. Having taken time to read the rules carefully as to what I’m enttled to I have never had a problem at the airport

[Lady London]

Scam as an accusation is already pretty far out for most cases. Putting it in Block Capitals in a topic heading just makea you look hysterical. It’s actually quite offputting.

[Lady London]

Tx Peter K Yeah I should give up maths. Realised my calculator is on a foreign setting so , and . doing odd things.

So loois like Qatar is offering 1.2 pencw per avios received by boost. Nothing desperately in mind to use any right now. My normal avios valuation is 0.67p – 0.75p depending on if I have any Nectar to.convert. So well less than 1p.

Would others pay 1.2p per avios to boost ?

[Lady London]

Am I nuts or is Qatar Airwaya offering me to boost my avios by giving them 12p yes that’s twelve pence – £0.12p Per extra Single Avios received.

They say they’ll give me about 25,000 avios if I pay them about £300. Have I miscalculated or does Qatar think I would do this? Should I give up maths?

[Lady London]

blue_wolf wrote:

it’s my corporate budget

Still not your personal money, @blue_wolf. Not even if you’re an owner of your firm. It’s simply not the ssme thing at all. There are all sorts of reasons why OPM net cost is less to the individual and to the firm.

Not the case for leisure travellers. Leisure travellers don’t get corporate perks nor pricing. And again, it’s their own money. So one way or another, lesure traveller is paying in full with personal money. Corporate traveller is not.

[Lady London]

blue_wolf wrote:

I individually am better rewarded for giving my high (economy!) corporate spend to BA

@blue_wolf Let me insert the abbreviation that you missed out.

“I individually am better rewarded for giving my high (economy!) OPM corporate spend to BA.”

OPM is a finance world abbreviation. It means “Other People’s Money”.

Of course you’re happy that you’re rewarded for using Other People’s Money (in this case your employer’s) to pay for flights at a super-high cost

If it was your own personal money and the same pricing, which is the case for 99%+ of leisure travellers, of course you wouldn’t be saying the same as:-

“I’m a turkey and I’m proud that I got cooked for Christmas.”

Annoyingly corporates already have better deals from BA in particular, and due to corporate pricing, rebates, discounta and other incentives, very frequently the traveller travelling on somebody else’s dime did not really get to choose his airline – the choice he had was already narrowed for him or even no choice at all.

[Lady London]

Does sound as though crew were implementing a policy of max 2 glasses of champagne per flight though. I’d be unlikely to drink that much on the ground in the length of time of most shorthaul flights anyway. Not even if it was a good champagne really.

[Lady London]

Sorry for your loss which must have been a shock for you.

Reports say BA can be very understanding in such circumstances. So I’d just call them in British office hours next week. They may be able to suggest things given 2 of you are still travelling. So I’d just ask them how best to do things now that this has happened but 2 of you would still like to travel.

Also depending on any insurance you may have there could be coverage from that side too.

[Lady London]

Make sure you avoid Easter. Search also NZ and possibly find another way across the Tasman

Y may be reachable but very unsure how far those AA miles will take you in higher classes.

See if Virgin Australia’s flights via Doha which are operated by Qatar aircraft and crew, are offering anything reasonable for cash.

On cash searches and particularly in Y, nearer the flight date some ok fares might come up, I do remember SkyTeam snd Air NZ had them. Perhaps check for soon dates now just to see if there’s a pattern.

You could also see if there are cheapish one way fares in either direction – Air NZ was offering some to Lon/Europe. You could then look at using miles for the other leg. As an Oz citizen she will be allowed to board the plane on a one way ticket if it comes to it snd sort out a return later. Seasonality for that is in your favour at this time of year compared to earlier.

QF does Rome which is easy enough to reach from the UK – they may have reasonably priced capacity if they are not too full if they’re running now.

[Lady London]

PPS Geography is not my strong suit but if the above 3 ideas do mot eork wondering if there’s a One World starting point in Europe for which MEL would be closer than Perth. Thinking vaguely about the effect of trying to make Perth the furthest point.