I know what you're saying. I must admit MA didn't do too badly with my big disruption at BUD, although one disruption at AMS was not handled too well by their contractor - the contractors could not care less.

MA's own staff at BUD on the other hand worked hard to get me to my destination as quickly as they could, and booked me on about 3 different flights in case one went (what a difference from another airline which shall remain nameless as I do not want to let myself whinge any more - it's not BA) as the snow-induced major disruption left them uncertain as to which flights would go and which would not.

To save me queueing time and time again (I had already spent 2 hours in the queue at the time), they put me on multiple flights and told me to see which one went. I very much appreciated that.

While I think their standard in-flight services were pretty rubbish, and the fact that they threw everyone out of airside after flight cancellation wasn't great, I take my hat off to them for booking me on multiple flights.

So, yes, I agree, how an airline deals with things when they go wrong is really important to me. I see it as being more important in many ways than other aspects. In fact I have refused to fly on a few airlines due to very poor handling of things that went wrong, and the reverse also applies.

That, I do not mind. They usually have the officially-endorsed priority, they often have flight time limitations issues to deal with, and also, it may well be that someone's flight is delayed if they are delayed in the security queue. For pre-flight duties, I really do not mind if they get priority.