sombrachinesca

I am flying LHR-MIA on BA 209 in mid-October. I am then connecting onto an AA domestic flight. It is the last of the night to my final destination.
I have noticed that 209 is late arriving almost daily. Sometimes as little as 15 minutes, other days by an hour or more.
I have a 90 minute connection at MIA -- I do have Global Entry and will only have a single carry-on bag.
I will be in F on this flight.

(1) If 209 is showing a late departure / arrival on my date of travel, can I expect any flexibility from BA as to rerouting me?
(2) Or should I expect them to insist I travel to MIA and then deal with the AA misconnect there?
(3) Alternatively, should I take the change fee penalty and try to switch flights now?
[There is an earlier AA flight with much better on-time performance, but it is sold out in F].

Thanks for any suggestions.
Bill

cameramaker

You have a through ticket, so why would you spend your own money in an attempt to connect?

First off the plane and with Global Entry, you should be through MIA quite quickly. If you do misconnect and its BAs fault, pocket the €600 and take the first flight in the morning?

Often1

All depends on how important it is for you to be at your final ticketed destination on time. You haven't even told us where you are headed, let alone whether it matters when you arrive.

Generally, you will not be rerouted until a misconnect occurs because aircraft often make up time enroute, your connection may be delayed, or the delay may not be sufficient to cause a misconnect.

If you do misconnect, it will be for BA to either provide or reimburse a hotel and meals and to rebook you the next morning. Unless the delay is for an "extraordinary circumstance" you will also be due delay compensation of EUR 600.

If indeed you arrival into your destination is time-sensitive, I would do what it takes to make it. But, otherwise, let the chips fall where they may.

Nicoolio

BA flights at MIA arrive at the E 30 gates so you will have to take a short train ride. While there is immigrations at the E Gates - normally this is closed for the BA flights (It seems to open for QR) so you will then have to to the D terminal - it is a good walk and then a bit of a walk in D to get to immigration. The problem with Global Entry is there is at least one place during the walk where they stop traffic completely while other passengers at some other stage of the process cross through. I'm sure it's not more than 8 or 10 minutes but it can seem longer as a plane load of passengers essentially cross the path from the BA flight to immigration.

It will then depend on your connecting gate. If you are on a regional jet going out of the D60 gates once you are through security you will take a different train - then you will walk to the end of the concourse - still a bit of a walk from where the last stop on the train is and then downstairs where there is a holding area for about what seems like 20 regional gates. I've had a couple instances where they pre-board to your boarding gate - some are another 5-7 minute walk - so as the passengers from the inbound flight are still walking to the terminal you are positioned to board - not pleasant standing there in the heat.

90 minutes is doable and in fact can be plenty of time unless you get blocked or if there is only one train running from the E Gates, it can also cause a jam if there are a lot of other passengers waiting. BA 209 is scheduled at 6:05 pm -- QR arrives at 5pm so if it's late - IB is earlier and later so not an issue. Air Italy is also 5pm. There are some others too.

mikeyfly

CIHY mentioned a while back that BA are very aware of their poor departure performance at T3 and that something was being done about this.... not sure if we've seen any more info on this though? The BA275 is also a common late one too

RollAnotherFatOne

It is hurricane season so this can have diverse impacts on planning. Last time I was in the region they were planning a week ahead of an evacuation where a hurricane never arrived. We were told to be careful eventhough our flight departed over five and a half days before it was due to arrive. They were desperately trying to book us on something earlier. Thankfully my heart coped with the dramas.

A P Yu

If a significant delay is known several hours before departure they may be open to re-routing you from LHR. But if its a small or moving delay they'll tend to get you to Miami and hope that by the time you get there they will have a solution. They tend to be good at Miami for having solutions ready at the gates as your arrive, i.e. new boarding passes for any new flights).

South London Bon Viveur

Is it all BA flights from T3 or just MIA? I fly VIE regularly and ( and have also done LIS from there recently) and those flights are mostly on time.

Steve_ZA

The LAS flights are frequently late too.

According to FR24 the 275 has been on time or early just 15 times in the past 120 days.

108912

I like how the BA crew call the BA268/9 (LAX) the 'two six late'.

djbenedict

Is flying at normal altitude westward from the UK not just fundamentally more unpredictable, in terms of ground speed, than flying east, though?

In terms of the OP's question, last time I connected in MIA, I was in the AA lounge about 50 minutes after landing on BA (207 I think). (That's with GE, HBO, almost first off the plane, but only my 2nd or 3rd time in this terminal FWIW). So, a 90 minute connection probably gives you a maximum delay to landing of circa 45 minutes or thereabouts. Absolutely the only way to gauge is to look at the current average delays IMO. If there's a later flight, and if the current average delay is < 45min, then don't worry - it will be fine. Would be my thinking, if travelling alone.