‘Luckily’ my Hannover flight was also showing a long delay so I hustled over to the T5 transfer gates and, oh dear, here we go, computer said no.
The flight connections desk had one free agent and I approached her with fear in my heart. That fear was quickly found to be justified, I’d been offloaded from my LHR-HAJ flight
By this time flighty was reporting a forty minute delay to my Hannover flight…. Sweet reprieve. Or at least I thought until both computer and offshore team said no, no such delay, it was only ten minutes late. You know how this tale ends, flighty was right and the flight left forty minutes late! No consolation for me at the time stood at the desk, no way could I get back on todays flight.
This left me with two options, rebooking, or flight in vain. The original offer from BA was to be rebooked onto the same flight 24 hours later. This would mean that I would likely get to a hotel by midnight tomorrow and have to be back at the airport lunch time Sunday. Flat nope, not doing that. At this point the agent I was dealing with needed to go on break and up stepped agent 2.
I had identified a LH flight that would get me to Hannover with at least a bit of time tomorrow so I requested this be booked. Back to the offshore team and after much discussion the flights I had asked for were booked. Agent 2 printed out the receipt for me and all was well… well, not exactly… wrong flights! They’d managed to book a later pair of flights that didn’t get me in until late night!! All of this took an age, mostly with UK waiting for offshore to answer or respond. By now it was time for agent 2 to go off for a break and up stepped agent 3! Back to the offshore team and after another long wait we eventually had the right flights booked. From the time I arrived at the desk to the time I left it was 83 minutes.
Whilst we had been faffing around I had booked the Moxy for tonight. The Sofitel was full, and BA were offering vouchers for the Ibis Budget!
I have to say that all three agents I dealt with were fantastic, the delay was all with the others they kept waiting for.