sts603

Yesterday flew BRU-LHR-JFK (ticketing on one AA-issued ticket) in Y. My girlfriend, who is living in London, bought a BRU-LHR ticket. High winds had everything backed up at LHR yesterday. My original connection (2h10m with the T5-T3 transfer) was in jeopardy and it was the last AA LHR-JFK flight of the night. We both had only hand luggage.

An earlier, also delayed flight, was 50% empty. I went to the gate to explain the situation and asked to be moved to the earlier flight. The GAs were pleasant and competent. They reviewed the situation, agreed with me that I had a substantial risk of a misconnect. So they call some manager and talk (in Flemish) for a while and come back and explain that they agreed to move me but would not move my girlfriend as she was not connecting. I didn't get into an argument as I needed them to process my change and after politely pressing the issue to no avail, merely dropped it. My girlfriend was left to wait out the later delayed flight was highly pissed and couldn't believe that the airline was so rigid.

I have heard about BA's absurd rigidity and anti-customer service attitude during IRROPS before but never would have believed it would be this bad. There is much wrong with American carriers but one thing that we are used to is common sense prevailing during IRROPS (where ticket change rules and restrictions on standby, etc. go out to the window to get people to their destination as timely as possible). Any passenger moving their flight forward due to a delay on their original flight is a simple change that is accommodated free of charge within two minutes (not the 20 it took to change my ticket and have the change refused for my girlfriend).

Given how much BA celebrates their customer service, it failed miserably here. Its a red flag for BA when a passenger longs to be on AA, US, DL or UA rather than their celebrated European airline. This was a simple, common customer service request. BA had nothing to lose by accommodating it and instead made a loyal OW Emerald question future bookings on BA and a non-statused London resident swear off the airline if at all possible. The lesson for most passengers is not going to be buy a refundable ticket in case of IRROPS because BA is rigid to a fault and wouldn't help passengers - it will be to avoid BA. For us Americans, the lesson means trying to stick with U.S.-carrier metal rather than flying via LHR and connecting to BA.

stewaran

whilst i agree with a lot of what you say.

the flip side is that had your flight been cancelled BA (or i guess any european airline) would have put you in a hotel, paid your food etc. where as an american airline would not!

sts603

But that is a legal requirement - it has nothing to do with BA's customer service.

And frankly, while I support that requirement during crew/maintenance, etc. delays, imposing it during weather, volcanic ash, etc. delays increases airline ticket costs for everyone.

G-BOAC

I am very loyal to BA, and generally very pro-BA. But I absolutely agree their irrops handling is almost always piss-poor Especially in situations that could help them out with a little common sense - what if your girlfriend's later flight was delayed enough to trigger EU claims; or cancelled totally? Letting an earlier flight go out quite empty and potentially stranding people makes no sense for BA either if more things had gone wrong.

At a recent GGL event I (and others) suggested to someone senior at BA that this remained a hugely weak link and they might like to check out how brilliant AA are at this (generally, in the lounges but even check-in staff can help you reroute with a few taps). They acknowledged they'd been very well treated in irrops by the Admirals Club AAngels themselves before so maybe it'll sink in. Eventually.

Hoch

You are ticked off because they wouldn't move your girlfriend to the same flight as they did for you?

A propos, the staff probably spoke Flemish and not Dutch

H

angatol

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NYTA

I have had a similar problem on BA - unlike the US carriers, they prefer to let a flight go out half empty rather than move you up onto the earlier one. I guess in their mind it's better to keep people from gaming the system by booking off-peak flights and then transferring to "peak" priced flights (even if empty) than to keep customers happy by putting them on an earlier flight when available at no incremental cost to them. Stupid in my view.

sts603

It ultimately arrived a little over an hour late. I may or may not have made my original connection (but certainly would have lost my J seat to JFK).

sts603

I understand this argument. American carriers also no longer let non-elites just standby for an earlier flight. But IRROPS is a different story. American carriers adjust and use logic. BA doesn't.

Swanhunter

Wot G-BOAC said.

angatol

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sts603

Did I ever say that? No. Not at all. Is it a strike against BA? Yes. Is it something that I will consider in my booking decisions in the future? Absolutely. And is it terrible customer service? Definitely. And would a U.S.-carrier have made the change for both of us, no questions asked, with a smile and in two minutes? Definitely.

And no - MCT between T5 and T3 is more than 1h. Have you ever tried to connect from the C gates in T5 to the AA gets (30 and higher) in T3? It isn't exactly short.

Furthermore, as we all know with weather delays, they tend to get worse. BA staff at BRU even admitted that that was a real possibility given the wind situation at LHR.

angatol

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Swanhunter

Oh, there is plenty of bad stuff done by the US majors. However irrops handling is - often - one of the good bits.

frb98mf

I'd like to see BA introduce standby as a perk for Gold/OW Emerald. There is now so little to distinguish between Gold and Silver other than Flounge access and a bit of extra Y redemption, this would be something really beneficial that might make frequent Y fliers in Europe, who are often content with Silver, make the extra push, to the benefit of BA's revenue.