My wife and I are currently on a Caribbean holiday taking in Trinidad Barbados and St Lucia.We booked club world tickets from Gatwick to Port of Spain via a 1 hour stopover in St Lucia with the return route the same.
Port of Spain was not a nice experience and felt quite unsafe outside of the Hotel complex so I asked British Airways to allow us to board our flight at St Lucia, they refused point blank due to the system not letting them. I was prepared to pay the admin fee involved but they stated I should purchase 2 new economy tickets at £1300 each even though our club seats will be empty.
Surely in this day and age there must be an override to their system for cases like this.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by sospangar
My wife and I are currently on a Caribbean holiday taking in Trinidad Barbados and St Lucia.We booked club world tickets from Gatwick to Port of Spain via a 1 hour stopover in St Lucia with the return route the same.
Port of Spain was not a nice experience and felt quite unsafe outside of the Hotel complex so I asked British Airways to allow us to board our flight at St Lucia, they refused point blank due to the system not letting them. I was prepared to pay the admin fee involved but they stated I should purchase 2 new economy tickets at £1300 each even though our club seats will be empty.
Surely in this day and age there must be an override to their system for cases like this.
Customer Service your having a laugh.
Welcome to FT, do you have any OW status by any chance? It probably won't help you unless GGL or Prem though.
As you've already flown the outbound it doesn't surprise me it couldn't be changed.....the fare rules in your ticket rather than red tape that's to blame here. Expecting them to change it just because you didn't like the place is unrealistic.
I'm sure they could accommodate your request if you're willing to pay for a new ticket though.
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Don't let the Walter Mitty's get you down....
My wife and I are currently on a Caribbean holiday taking in Trinidad Barbados and St Lucia.We booked club world tickets from Gatwick to Port of Spain via a 1 hour stopover in St Lucia with the return route the same.
Port of Spain was not a nice experience and felt quite unsafe outside of the Hotel complex so I asked British Airways to allow us to board our flight at St Lucia, they refused point blank due to the system not letting them. I was prepared to pay the admin fee involved but they stated I should purchase 2 new economy tickets at £1300 each even though our club seats will be empty.
Sorry to say this but is this not standard operating practice? When booking there are options for more flexible tickets and while they may not be as cheap they are there for situations like this. If it was the airline's fault and you boarded in St Lucia then that would be different but I don't think they should be held responsible because you don't like where you chose for a holiday.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sospangar
Surely in this day and age there must be an override to their system for cases like this.
In this day and age of cheap flights which in the past 20 years have not kept apace with inflation, this is their way of making money
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No disrespect intended to the OP (welcome to FT by the way ) but why is it so often considered bad customer service when a company won't do something we want them to without us paying the full price for what we are asking of them?
It's like going into Tesco and finding chickens on offer and saying: I don't like chicken, can I have buy one get one free on beef fillet joints instead?
It's like going into Tesco and finding chickens on offer and saying: I don't like chicken, can I have buy one get one free on beef fillet joints instead?
To be honest, it wouldn't surprise me if they do get that question once in a while, although if it was someone from FT, the question would probably me more likely "excuse me young man", says the FT member, thrusting the gold card hanging off his shopping basket into the face of the individual stacking the shelf on his knees "where might one find the caviar, lobster and non-concentrated orange juice ? they sell it in Waitrose, so why can't Tesco sell it ? Oh, and by the way, I am starting a campaign to change the ghastly Tescos bags.".
Last edited by Short Final; Dec 30, 12 at 7:57 am..
To be fair to the OP not everyone takes much notice of fare rules. I suppose it is easy to assume that if you have a ticket that starts in A stops in B to go on to C then there it might seem obvious to some that you can start in B instead of A.....bit like having a Glasgow to London train ticket and joining the train in Carlisle rather than boarding at Glasgow. We know it's not possible on a discounted ticket but not everyone does.
Although to start blaming BA red tape and customer service of having a laugh is a bit too much.
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Don't let the Walter Mitty's get you down....
why is it so often considered bad customer service when a company won't do something we want them to without us paying the full price for what we are asking of them?
Because saying No always is bad customer service. Good customer service is along the line of "Certainly, I can change that for you, but as you are travelling on a discounted CW fare there is a change fee. This would be <insert price of new ticket here>. Do you want me to make that change for you?"
Same thing in the end, but customer goes away without thinking BA are unable or unwilling to help...
Because saying No always is bad customer service. Good customer service is along the line of "Certainly, I can change that for you, but as you are travelling on a discounted CW fare there is a change fee. This would be <insert price of new ticket here>. Do you want me to make that change for you?"
If they did this there would be no point selling discounted fares as everyone would buy discounted and then only if needed would pay the difference. The key point is that it was the customers preference that changed due to something outside BA's control
Good customer service is along the line of "Certainly, I can change that for you, but as you are travelling on a discounted CW fare there is a change fee. This would be <insert price of new ticket here>. Do you want me to make that change for you?"
Am I the only one that can spot the obvious flaw with that idea ?
i.e. the fact that Mr/Mrs Angry would still come onto FT and moan about how they were charged a £2,000 change fee and how BA are a bunch of scamming rip-off merchants for charging such a ludicrous fee.
The only way to deal with it is how BA would deal with it as present if you called them. You would be told you're on a non-flex ticket and so either pay for a new ticket or put up and shut up (albeit probably with a different choice of wording !).
BA - Red tape not allowing change of flights
) but why is it so often considered bad customer service when a company won't do something we want them to without us paying the full price for what we are asking of them? 
