jaslocombe

Best of luck!

Agent Zigzag

Saturday 16th Jan, BA227 to Atlanta.

After delayed boarding due to increased security we were eventually bussed to our 777 due for Atlanta. Upon boarding the Captain advised that a fuel leak was in the process of being repaired.

After 8 hours, one change of crew and 2 attempted push backs the flight was cancelled as US immigration would have been closed by the time we arrived in Atlanta.

Put up in the Sofitel o/n. I was rerouted to ORD as ATL was not my final destination. Most others put on the Sunday flight.

This is an extremely brief summary of what happened as I'm too fed-up to go into the farcical events that went on, on Saturday. However 8 hours on a remote stand is no fun at all! What level of compensation should I expect from BA?

Can I help you

Were you on the aircraft for the entire 8 hours or were you taken back to the terminal?
CIHY

Agent Zigzag

Full 8 hours on the aircraft. I was lucky enough to be in 12J and near the open door which was connected to stairs. This allowed me to get some fresh air. It must have been hell for those at the back!

Swanhunter

Threads merged for your reading pleasure.

Swanhunter
Moderator BAEC

Mrp Alert

This does not sound like a fun experience. Frustrating as it must have been, I am glad that the pax were fed and given drinks. While not ideal, it lessens the pain of being stuck.

And a huge welcome to getmehomeplease. Please don't let this be your last post - we love getting new folks on FT.

Agent Zigzag

Back to my original question - what compensation should I expect from BA.

Dan Dare

Hi Agent ZigZag my fellow sufferer of this experience. I asked this of BA on the day was handed a printed sheet quoting EC Regulation No 261/2004.

To cut to the chase - cash wise we are all entitled to €600 but as a loyal BA regular I am expecting some miles or the like to make up for the hassle.

It didn't get much better the next day with another delay (2 hours approx) then a farce with bagggage belts breaking. I got to my Hotel 27 hours after my scheduled arrival.

McG

Dan Dare, have BA advised you yet when and how you will be getting your €600 in compensation?

If I were in your shoes, I would have an email complaint into customer services straight away. I would also try to get a hold of the email address for Willie Walsh's office to let the head of the company know of your displeasure at what occurred, and to cc all your complaint emails to him.

I would then also think of a number of BA miles that I would be happy to accept as well as the €600 compensation, and then double it. May as well push for as many as you can. in 2008 I managed to get 25000 miles out of them after being offered 5000 to begin with. I told them that I felt that they were fobbing me off, and that if they took my complaint seriously then they would give me the 25000 miles I was looking for - which co-incidentally was the same as required for a 1 way u/g from WT+ to CW to/from the US. This tactic worked.

krischiv

Hi Guys!
Me and my wife were in this ordeal. We went through this along with another 100 or more folks with young children who travelled about 10 hours or more from India and elsewhere. Ultimately we reacghed Atlanta 24 hours behind schedule, totally upsetting our plans to prepare for the work week ahead after an absence of three weeks.

The passengers were very tolerant as many of them just started the flight and others like me were too exhausted to talk due to the travel exhaustion and time zone variation.

What surprised me was total disregard for the passengers incuding small children who have been sitting for almost 13 to 14 hours before this drama for another 8hrs with a furthe intention of flying for 9 more hours. When I asked a flight attendent from the first crew why we could not left in the terminalinstead of sitting cramped for 3 hours in the aircraft, the answer given by her was " I would like to be in my bed now if I had the choice". So much for the attitude. Instead of being sympathetic, she starts a verbal tirade with one of the other passengers saying that "you are putting words into my mouth".
This the worst example of treating fare paying passengers

The captain of the first crew was indecisive repeatedly,he should have known when his crews hours are up., before wavering between taxiing back and forth. He did not even bother to know if they had adequate food left for a nine hour flight with 300 folks on board.

After much protest, we got into a hotel lugging 4 suitcases up and down 6times. I was lucky that I had a US passport and did not have to go throught another 2-3 hours wait for the BA to get the copies of ticket so that the UK immigration could process the transit Visa ! The hotel accomadation provide was ridiculously bare bones (probably the size of a kitchenette ) the solace being the clean bed linen and the bathroom.

What gives the British Airways operations to hold 300 passengers against their wishes in a confined space for 8hours+ ?

When passengers were held on tarmac for 3hours+ the US govtstepped in quickly and enacted a law. Does UK or EU have any similar statutes? If not it is time that some one took notice of this and contain such callous and high handed attitude.

Thanks for posting the info reg the Euro 600 compensation.

Can any one further inform who to address this with.

bwaflyer

As far as I'm aware, under CAP 371, you cannot leave an airport with a crew base knowing that you will go into discretion.

Dan Dare

Done and awaiting BA response

Welcome to Flyertalk krischiv hope you find this forum as helpful as I do.

Go to here and fill out the on line form.

I heard the comment I would rather be in bed too I believe I was in the row in front of you that fateful day.

It was a miracle that the passengers remained as calm as they did.

B747-437B

You can, provided the flight is not originally programmed to go into discretion and the factor that drives it into discretion becomes apparent only after crew reporting. You may not however use the 3rd hour of discretion prior to the last sector of a multi-sector day, except in the case of an emergency that could jeopardise the safety of the aircraft/crew. You may not also use maximum discretion in certain cases where reduced mininum rest has been used for the preceding period or where certain limitations on early or late duties are in place.

CAP 371 Sections 18.1 and 18.2 would be the relevant references. Sadly, after the last month of flight disruptions, I have become quite familiar with these sections!

BA may have a more restrictive FDTL scheme due to union requirements, but there is definitely no such restriction under CAP 371.

Jimmie76

This has happend to my Dad on a couple of occasions once on BA and once on another carrier in the US. In the BA incident he was flying to India in F and there was something that went tech with the plane, confident they could fix it the plane stayed on stand and they served dinner (might just have been to the F pax). When they then announced that the flight was going to have to be cancelled hours later (due to crew hours) he was asked if he would like a hotel room and booking on a flight later that day to which he replied that he was going home to bed. Asked if he would still like the flight he said that he was only going for 4 days and whatever he was doing there, (speaking at a conference possibly) was not going to wait, so no but could he have his bags back please.

On the US flight (again in F, although domestic) I understand that there was very little (i.e. none) communication from the flight deck and they only eventually got round to mentioning that they were cancelling the flight (again due to hours) after they had towed the aircraft back to the stand/jetway.

8420PR

My first thought when reading this thread was what was the Captain playing at allowing all this to happen (especially to push back and then change his mind....). In your position I would have been glad to get off the plane that fly with a undecisive crew.

Hindsight is a wonderfull thing of course - my judgement is based on what I read here - it was probably much more complex and I am sure nothing was done on purpose. However I applaud the second crew for having the common sense to cancel the flight as opposed to subject their passengers to more pain.