Hi

I am BA Gold and will be until 31.12.2023 and have been for a couple of year now. After that I will at least be Silver for 2024 given what flights I have already booked with OneWorld airlines.

Today was one of the worst melt down experiences I have had in the last couple of years.

In the last 4 months, I have had flights not catered in Club Europe..then sat in 1D and they then forgot my order for a cup of tea...A CUP OF TEA was my only request and it was forgotten.

Flights so late leaving Heathrow that I have had to get Ubers as there was no other way to get to the city centre as public transport had finished.

But TODAY took the biscuit

Let me explain..due to some route cancellations in 2022, I had a flight rebooked a Club Europe flight from Newcastle to Heathrow and back to Manchester today.

The UK had a weather issue on Thursday and Friday but was mostly cleared by today Saturday. However, I was apprehensive and checked the BA app the night before and the flights were still operating.

In the morning I looked again on the app and there was a DELAY.

I looked at the previous days flight and realised that the last flight of the day was 2 hours late and therefore this may effect legal minimum rest time of the crew. Which it turned out it did (BA did not shuttle up to Newcastle Crew to operate the flight) and so we needed to wait for the crew to meet legal minimum rest requirements.

So we were all stuck with a 1.5 hour delay.....to Heathrow.

The lounge at Newcastle was very busy as other airlines were having some operational issues and I was required to move from the table which I had to a booth. So they could get more people in. A bit annoying to say the least. Plus Aspire made it that I was an inconvenience for them even though I was in Club Europe.
As a side par someone came in looking for their Airpods and luckily I was able to point them to the member of the Aspire staff who had cleaned the booth and had their Airpods.

So the flight from Newcastle to London left 90 minutes late which was advised. Both the Captain and cabin crew were extremely sorry for the delay to the service. The flight was quick and touched down at Heathrow at 14.22. Please remember this time!!

We then taxied to the end of Terminal 5C and stopped. The captain came on an advised that there was a plane at the gate we had been assigned and were awaiting to have it doors closed and pushed back.

Over the next 60 minutes we got 3 apologies for the captain to advise that there issues with staffing at Heathrow (I had experienced this over the last 6 months) and that until the plane at our gate had pushed back we could not park up.

We arrived at the gate 95 MINUTES after the plane arrived. Yes 95 minutes.....I feel so sorry for all of the connecting passengers on that flight with short connections (everything under 3 hours!!!)

We there any weather issues in those 95 minutes...NOPE.

Once arrived at Heathrow I realised that my 4 hour connection has turned into under a 1 hour visit to the lounge.

Was this was one off.........well my flight to Manchester proved it was not.

So I had a connecting flight to Manchester and it proved for me that BA is understaffed with the ground personnel.

I checked and researched that plane to Manchester had arrived on time from Sofia. So this was not an issue. I had been advised that that is a going to go from a bus gate and WOW was that an experience even for Heathrow.

The plane to Manchester was leaving from Gate A4 (a). The scheduling gods decided to put another flight from A4 b at the same time. It was so crowed it was uncomfortable so I kept myself in seating away from the scrum.

The MANCHESTER flight stopped boarding as there was not a person to dispatch the plane. So the departure was pushed back by 30 minutes.

We were eventually bused to Terminal 5C gates which were not attached to the terminal. The plane pushed back 85 minutes late from Heathrow and arrived into Manchester 72 minutes late.

To prove how little confidence I had in BA and the flights arriving on time, I booked both a train from Manchester Victoria which left 70 minutes after my flight was supposed to flight arrive. PLUS a MegaBus which left Manchester Airport 2 hours after my flight arrived into Manchester Airport. I am currently on the Megabus as just made it!!!

Main Points
Were there air traffic issues with Air Traffic Control in France today..YES.
HOWEVER this does not excuse a replacement flight crew being dispatched to Newcastle to take on the flight.
PLUS a 95 minute wait for a GATE is cannot be excused. I have arrived just before a torrential storm with Thunder and than delay was just 25 minutes getting a gate.
The lack of updates on both flights today from the Captain and Cabin Crew on both flights was poor fell short of my expectations of British Airways
The lack of ground personal personnel at Heathrow Terminal 5 operations keeps on being brought up with every flight I am catching with BA. As a side note, I flew out with Singapore Airlines from Terminal 2 in January. Check-In was slow..However the rest of the operation was a breeze.

I am scared that in April I have a 2 hour 25 minutes connection from Terminal 5 to Terminal 3 and I will not make it.