T8191

Having been 'eaten' by bed-bugs in a hotel in the Washington suburbs, i know how awful it is for the victim. In my/our case, the hotel responded brilliantly and efficiently ... it was handled almost like a nuclear incident!

However ... cleaning is largely irrelevant. The 'little offenders' will travel on other people's clothing or luggage from wherever they were infested. And guess what ... some of those infestations will be carried onto an aircraft seat near you by the previous passenger. It can happen anywhere, any day, any route, any airline.

A decent response from BA would, however, be appropriate.

RolfD

I understand your point of view but bed bugs and BA seems to be in the news on few times. so it has to be a clean problem ( that includes fumigating the plane)

MPH1980

I don't believe any airline would routinely fumigate the entire plane - as in carefully making sure that each seat is individually done.

Bedbugs could get on the plane and bite people same day. You'll never stop it.

I found this on Delta:
Bitten by bugs on my Delta Air Lines flight to New York

This on United:
Bed Bugs (on my UA Flight?)

This on American:
https://loyaltylobby.com/2016/07/20/...nd-passengers/

This on Cathay:
https://www.airlinecomplaints.org/sh...ad.php?p=32798

It's not exactly hard to find reports on most airlines.

WickedStepMother

I don’t know why I read this thread. I will now itch for a week!

RolfD

Bed bugs is a big problem that need to be address by the airlines , if they are unable to do so , the customers should filled a formal complaint with the CDS or the European commission.

RolfD

Hotels are proactive when it comes to bed bugs ( otherwise they will be listed on tripadvisor with a bed bug infestation). Airlines should learn few things from hotels on how to deal with this issue

jessicariddell

I even had similar experiences, you won't believe many top hotels had this problems. When I made compliant they told this was the first time but bad experience is bad experience.

scillyisles

Some staggering response on this thread and yes I would agree that some of them are already contenders for most absurd response of the year.

Bed bugs are an issue in any high occupancy location where humans (the bed bugs source of food) remain stationary for long periods such as hotels and airplanes.
They love areas that are undisturbed and subject to light or no cleaning as this allows them to multiply - I guess in this case they must actively seek out BA planes given that BA ones will provide them with the best habitat. They do not have the ability to multiply from one or two to an infestation overnight so if the seat was infested, it means they were present for some time enjoying their surroundings and ready food supply.

As others have commented, getting rid of bedbugs that hitch a ride home can take months, lots of chemical ingredients/fumigation/disposal of furniture which can run into many thousands of Ł plus all the stress of dealing with it. The jury is also still out on whether bedbugs can spread disease - some recent studies have shown they can spread certain types of blood borne disease.

It would be good if the op could give the airfame details of this plane and the seat number as my guess is that BA will do nothing about it.

dulciusexasperis

Some posters seem to be unaware of the rise in bed bugs worldwide. Do some reading. https://www.google.ca/search?q=incre...hrome&ie=UTF-8

This article gives a good explanation of the issue. https://www.vox.com/2015/4/27/850249...-kill-increase

The irony of complaining about them on an airplane (any airline's airplane is as likely as any other) is that air travel is a primary factor in their spread in recent times.

To expect any airline, hotel or your own first born to not bring them home to you, is an expectation out of touch with the reality of how impossible it is to guarantee that won't happen.

All you can and should do is report it when you encounter it and hope it will be dealt with in that instance. But do not think it will never happen again, somewhere, somehow. If you step out of your home or someone steps in to it, chances are sooner or later you will encounter the little devils these days. The holiday from them is over. LOL

mwalsh

No. Me too!

T8191

Whilst I accept your basic premise, there’s quite a commercial difference between taking one (of a hundred?) hotel rooms out of service for a few days, and grounding an aircraft for the same timescale. The loss to an airline would run into tens/hundreds of thousands, not a few hundreds.

RolfD

[QUOTE=T8191;29249853]Whilst I accept your basic premise, there’s quite a commercial difference between taking one (of a hundred?) hotel rooms out of service for a few days, and grounding an aircraft for the same timescale. The loss to an airline would run into tens/hundreds of thousands, not a few hundreds.[/QUOTE

until a lawyer in the Old USA decides to have a class action suit again the airlines/bed bugs

T8191

Good money spinner for the Lawyers. The People v. Bed Bugs. That would run to the US Supreme Court, the European Court of Justice etc.

Who is going to defend the bugs’ right to exist?

710 77345

But it would be possible for BA to take the affected seats out of service at a reasonable cost - I don't think it's reasonable for people to be paid to fly back on the return flight on the seat that the airline knows to be infected.

T8191

I claim no engineering expertise, but I suspect changing a First/Club World seat and all the associated electronics is not a quick task (many hours, if not at least a day)... during which, of course, the aircraft is out of service, with all the concomitant effects on revenue, schedules and hundreds of passengers delayed/disrupted across the world. Would EC261 also apply?

A brave man who decides to press that button, I suggest!