simons1

The first time I have read this thread through and tbh it summarises well everything wrong with BA these days.

Treat a high value client like garbage, make feeble excuses (why have CIVs and not use them) and then give the passenger the run around when a justified complaint is made.

To me whether it was a cash or mileage ticket is irrelevant, you don't reach status like that without spending serious money with BA.

Really pathetic effort by the airline I'm afraid.

scubaccr

Surely it must be misreprsentation to sell more F seats than available knowing you then need to downgrade a person who in good faith purchaed a BA F seat when they had choice of othe carrier eg CX/MH etc F seats

A broken seat in sold out non-overbooked cabin could be argued as different situation as BA only sold available inventory. Trouble is airlines arew known to lie to avoid EC261 and thus will also lie about overbooking and instead say a seat is broken.

I know on UK trains where First Class is flexible, business people / company execs book return legs at 3, 4, 5pm and only pay the used journey. As such train companies overbook first class to avoid losing revenue.

I don't know if with BA it is possible to book a truly "Fully Flex" F class with zero change/cancel fees? If so I can see issue as being caused by corp bigwigs (maybe Premier Card holders) booking return leg to UK for each of Wed/Thu/Fri than only using the needed flight once there busiiness away from home is completed.


This is not like a retail store selling more eg TV's than inventory , and eg obtaining extra 60" TV from another sister store to meet order and delivering on time.

KARFA

No.

Why would a broken seat reduce any EC261 liability for a downgrade when compare to straight overbooking?

Globaliser

To expand on KARFA's answer, the reason that the answer is "no" is because:-

1. [*]

brunos

I don't know where you get your info and I cannot vouch for AA, but it never happens on CX longhaul. There is a strict policy of not overbooking F.

JAXBA

Yes, yes it is. BA has fully flex fares available in all cabins on all routes.

Calchas

On UK trains you can just buy an Anytime First class ticket.

On airlines, many customers will change their ticket at the last minute or simply not show up and then change it later. Plus you have missed connections, walk up sales, people who get to the airport early and want to change to an earlier flight, and so on. Predicting how many people will actually be on the plane is quite hard.

Yes, you can always buy a flexible ticket, in every cabin.

It's not even premier cardholders who have uncertain schedules, this isn't unusual or a big deal. All you need is a mismanaged project or a meeting that might overrun and the value of a flex ticket is obvious. Moreover major customers will negotiate to ensure all their tickets are flexible, even at low prices. But, most airlines (including BA) do not allow multiple speculative reservations in the fashion you describe.

scubaccr

Badly phrased originally by me, I had meant having ticket they reserve their first class seat for mutiple time of day returns like all of 3/4/5pm

710 77345

Who overbooks trains and how? I would have throught every company gives you the seat number and carriage when you buy the ticket, and display your journey on the seat.
Flexible tickets can normally only have one reservation associated with them at a time.

Overbooking would mean knowing which specific seat is going to be double booked.

simons1

Seats on trains are not double booked. However the train companies sell more tickets than seats, that's why you get trains operating 'in excess of capacity' as they put it.

Open tickets mean you are not committed to a particular train.

paul4040

Absolute nonsense.

The majority of flexible tickets sold are done so without reservation, so the train company doesn't know which train the passenger is going to take. This is usually because the ticket is sold at the station for a train about to leave.

It's physically impossible to "overbook" First Class on a train because at the time of sale *every reservation is tied to a specific seat*.

Situations where the carriage has more customers than seats arise because of the situation described above.

Dave Noble

Since many have no reservations, it is quite possible to oversell 1st class

Rami Tamimi

There is nothing stoping you from having reservations for more than one train,eventhough it is probably not allowed by the conditions of carriage.

There are always unreserved seats and sometimes even whole carriages that are specifically designated for Non-Advance ticket holders without reservations. IIRC Virgin West Coast has two unreserved carriages,one in 1ST and one in STD.

sxc

Probably a good idea to get back on topic and not talk about trains any more.

paul4040

It isn't, as most of the flexible tickets aren't tied to a specific train. The ticket entitles you to a journey and not a seat (you can debate the merits of that one for ever...!). The journey can be undertaken without a seat.