British Airways Make a Mess

On Friday night the British Airline Association (Balpa) announced the strike of British Airways Pilots to
take place on the 9 th , 10 th and 27 th of September. This follows members rejecting an 11.5% pay increase
over 3 years, after a long-running dispute.
Passengers on grounded flights have been offered the option to receive a full refund or rebook. This is
where the problems started.
Firstly many people received an email in error to say their flight had been canceled, resulting in them
seeking unnecessary alternative arrangements with potential cost implications. Only an hour later they
learned that the email had been sent in error and that their original travel plans were unaffected.
Secondly, passengers found it near impossible to contact the airline regarding the grounded flights
despite BA saying they had “drafted in almost 100 extra staff to deal with a flood of complaints from
customers trying to rebook flights and chase refunds in the run-up to next month’s pilot strikes".
The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has been in contact with BA over its handling of affected customers
and its noncompliance with rules around European air passengers rights.
A customer rights expert at Which? Said “BA must urgently get its act together and ensure that anyone
whose flight is canceled is rerouted, regardless of whether it is with a different airline or not. The airline
also needs to do right by passengers who spent hundreds of pounds on new flights when they were
wrongly told that their original flights had been canceled and make sure they are not left out of
pocket".
The CAA has said customers should be offered reimbursement for canceled flights, alternative travel
arrangements that includes flights on other airlines or a new flight at a convenient date. Airlines should
also proactively provide information to passengers when flights are canceled too. Passengers who were
contacted in error should not incur any out of pocket expenses.

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About Me

Hello, I'm Carl, I was born and still live in Leeds, West Yorkshire with my wife, our  3 year old daughter Ava, along with our first 'child' our 12 year old dog Molly. Since an early age I have always loved being on holiday. From a young age I spent…

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