Originally Posted by
Sydneyjb
I was to fly BA to Geneva on March 3 for the Geneva Auto show. The show was cancelled due to the Corona virus. I had a slight challenge getting American Airlines not to charge me the Award redeposit fee. But getting BA to refund my $390 for my bussines class seats has fallen on deaf ear. They Don't care!!! I tried talking to a supervisor twice, it's worse than talking to a brick wall. How GREEDY,
Any suggestions ? Right now $390 to me and most people on this planet is a lot of money. Plesse help !
Am I missing something ? I had an award reservation similar to the OP's, a RT on BA from Paris to Larnaca (Cyprus) via LHR. All I did was call AA, THEY cancelled the reservation for me, (no redeposit fee, I am OW Emerald) and refunded the taxes, very easily.. What are these $ 390 ? It seems an awful lot for selecting seats in the Business cabin (how many passengers ?).
I am not sure about the OP's chances of getting such supplementary purchases refunded, BUT it is painfully obvious to me that BA has had an atrocious behaviour in this crisis, far worse than AY, AF/KL, DL or AA (I never thought I would ever write this about AA). They have been procrastinating on every aspect of the process and displayed the utmost ill will up to a point of obscenity. It was a complete pain to make them volunteer exchange vouchers after everyone else had shown flexibility, and even now when they HAVE TO refund passengers for their own flight cancellations, their website still takes you to a voucher page, thus forcing to contact them by phone with long waits.
If and when we survive this crisis, something one should not take for granted, my own attitude towards BA in the future will be to stay away from them as much as possible. Judging by the forums, I shall not be the only one. The US airlines, by comparison, have been surprisingly flexible and generous.