BA Promotes Competitor Virgin Atlantic in Facebook Gaffe
Jackie Reddy October 24, 2016
The carrier’s social media team did eventually spot and correct the mistake, but not before a number of users and even Richard Branson had a laugh at BA’s expense.
A slip of the finger caused a bit of embarrassment for British Airways (BA) earlier this month when it accidentally promoted a Facebook post from competitor Virgin Atlantic. The blunder occurred on October 19th when a member of BA’s social media team appears to have shared a post from its rival, one that encouraged customers to fly to London with Virgin Atlantic rather than itself.
It didn’t take long for those following Britain’s flag carrier on Facebook to notice the gaffe and many were quick to point out the error.
User Paul Hayford posted, “Did somebody click the ‘share post’ button by mistake?” while Steven Dalgleish commented, “Wow someone at BA with a sense of humor…”
One user quipped, “I think someone’s getting fired,” but Richard Branson, Virgin Atlantic’s founder, weighed in online and acknowledged the mistake, saying, “Thanks British Airways! So kind of you to share!”
British Airways, which has approximately 2.5 million Facebook followers in comparison to Virgin Atlantic’s 510,000 followers, did eventually spot mistake.
While the caption of, “There’s never been a better time to visit London. Book today with Virgin Atlantic,” had already been promoted, approximately a day later, BA added, “Finally we agree on something except for how to get there,” adding the hash tag #FlyBAtoLondon on top of the original post.
A spokesperson for Virgin Atlantic told the Daily Mail that, “We were quite surprised to see that British Airways shared our post, however, on this occasion, we do agree with them that Virgin Atlantic is the only way to fly.”
They added gallantly that “As the individual [who shared the post] must have had a bad day, we’d be happy to offer them a free flight to make up for it!”
[Photo: Shutterstock/Prometheus72]
