flyslow

Completely OT, but could you kindly PM me lottery numbers for August 2109 and maybe from few preceding months/years. Pretty please

Hawk777

I don't see this as being discrimination the same happened to me and a friend coming back from Madrid last week (with the exception of downgrade as flying eco) we where group 2 boarding but refused when went to board with group 2 and asked to wait till the end of boarding after boarding was complete we where given new boarding passes for same seats and told was a system error reseating us in other seats (we originally had exit row seats)

wheresmybagba

This is meaningless airline parlance. It doesn't mean anything and is not an adequate explanation for anything.

GetSetJetSet

Why was a row downgraded from CE to Economy? They slide the divider on those narrowbodies no?

BRITINJAPAN4

One possible scenario is that without checking the assumed you were Chinese and therefore delayed boarding you ... they were checking if they needed to alerts anyone of get permission. Not sure if this is racisim or profiling for risk, or if it matters !
Would not explain the docwngrade. By the way BA EuroFraud business on board means same seat but better food on the small chance you choice of meal is left !

orbitmic

To be honest, I think that this whole thread is way too speculative. Of course, this may not have been a case of discrimination but I think it is not very helpful to say that, basically, this "must" be something else because BA is not racist. I very much suspect that it is indeed something else, but I don't think any of us have got the elements to assert so and I think that the OP would be best off contact BA's (unfortunately useless) customer relations to share his worries and see what they say. In terms of specific:

1) I understand the OP's concern that this happened before scanning any boarding pass or confirming the OP's identity. However, the OP also mentions that they were told that their row would be downgraded, so presumably, somehow, there was communication about seat numbers. If ground personnel know your seat number, they know who you are, and may have known exactly what problem was involved for them to resolve. Ground staff "prepare" boarding, they don't just discover all issues as they scan BPs. They think of us in terms of sequence number but also tend to associate it with seat number to pick things up easily. So they may know before boarding start: "Seq 13 and 47 in 7A and 7B have been upgraded" or "The bag of seq 121 in seat 04D is not onboard" etc. They will still scan your BP but in a way they already know the next steps and when they saw your BP you might have been one of those "problem cases" that they were expecting and they would not need to scan your BP to know it. I cannot say that this is what happened, but it is certainly a realistic possibility.

2) Sure, the more contact you have with ground staff, the greater the chance to have some issues picked up early, but nevertheless, both good and bad things do happen after check in closes. After all, it is only by that time that things are actually known for sure. For instance, the ground staff may have known from the start that the flight is overbooked and that there will thus be a need for downgrades to get everyone in, but it is only after check in closes that they will know how many people have actually showed up, how many bags are actually onboard etc, so even when you have had multiple contacts with ground staff before boarding, there may still be changes/reconciliation to take place in the last 30 minutes before the flight.

3) I have absolutely no doubt that many people are behaving with prejudice towards those who "look Chinese" (I am voluntarily using the offensive thought process I attribute to the racists rather than the more descriptive label used by the OP) at the moment. I suspect that the OP may have experienced it directly in recent weeks and it is hurtful, offensive, and inexcusable. There is also absolutely no reason why the staff of BA or their partner companies would be more immune to such prejudice compared to the rest of the population (covid19 prejudice or otherwise), but to be honest, if we take that hypothesis seriously, do you think that asking people to stay behind and - therefore - with you would be a logical expression? I mean, if the staff member had stepped backwards from you when you gave your BP, I can see the point, if they had directed you to a self-board scan at LHR whilst you were queuing in a manned queue, I can see the point, but surely, psychologically, if the staff member were prejudiced in the way you fear (ie to put it bluntly, believe that you might be affected by Covid19 because you looked East Asian), then surely, psychologically, asking you to stay around, in their direct vicinity longer than is strictly necessary is the very last thing that they would have done. Instead they would have ensure that you "disappeared" in the plane as swiftly as possible to be away from them.

So I understand your worries and don't think any of us have got the answers that could alleviate your worries, and I also suspect that you will have experienced covid-related prejudice in recent weeks and are thus logically wary about it, and you have all my sympathy for this, but I don't think that the sequence of events that you describe necessarily make racist prejudice the most likely explanation here, and in fact, some of the very elements that you point out at suggesting such motivation strike me as making it unlikely because someone who would be prejudicially worried about your carrying the virus would logically want you out of their vicinity as urgently as possible rather than prolonging your proximity.

BAAZ

Not that it compensates for the distress caused, but Club Europe would have done nothing for your wife's lower back; the seats in Club Europe and in Euro Traveller (economy) are exactly the same. In Club Europe you'd just have had an empty seat between you and your wife.

orbitmic

Actually not entirely correct: on NEO planes - quite frequent on the GVA route, being in Y gets you the even worse non-reclining seats after row 12...

s0ssos

I saw an example of clear racism in Canada. I was sending someone off, and Air Canada was checking people's boarding passes again prior to the security queue (not sure why, as they didn't check non-AC passengers' boarding passes). The black lady was asking everybody whether they had been in China during the past 2 weeks. I observed quite a few, and noted that everybody just got asked it once. Except a Korean couple, who answered in the negative. The black lady then laughs and asks again, "Are you sure?" They answer "no" again.
First off, it isn't funny. Secondly, she specifically picked them out of everybody (I counted at least 10 other people) to repeat the question. Why? Because she presumed they were Chinese? Well, the AC flight is going to ICN, so probabilistically most people are Korean.
Anyway, there was another Asian person who didn't get asked twice (but she wasn't East Asian).

Clearly people are getting treated differently, based on whether the person thinks one is Chinese (or Asian).

Mike P

Why is the fact that the Air Canada employee 'black' relevant in the slightest to this story?

BRITINJAPAN4

You know this is NOT racism, its treating different people differently based on a probability of risk, its called profiling, adding on to a good dose of Noth American ignorance of course. Not sure why AC would check non AC passengers BPs ? Was the laughing an attempt to lighten the atmosphere or was it demeaning ?

Too many people too fast to jump on the "isms" bandwagon. In case no one noticed, this virus is a serious issue

BRITINJAPAN4

A clear case of racisim !!

BRITINJAPAN4

Good to see we keep expanding the English language with new words , even if we have enough already !

s0ssos

Glad you picked up on it. Why is the fact that the couple was Korean relevant to the story?

s0ssos

I thought you just defined it as "profiling"?