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Covid-19 BA Rebooking/Cancellation/Refund HELP & ADVICE *No Speculation etc*

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Old Mar 14, 2020, 4:58 pm
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Last edit by: corporate-wage-slave
BA Covid-19 Rebooking / Cancellation / Refund Help & Advice

If your flight is cancelled by BA:
Commercial booking: Your options are: cash refund OR Future Travel Voucher (FTV) OR rebooking OR Avios credit
Redemption booking: Your options are: full refund of cash and Avios OR FTV OR rebooking.
BA Holidays booking: You should be given a refund pro-actively.

If your flight is cancelled by BA - any flight in the PNR - you can get a full refund so long as you booked directly with BA. You can only get a refund by telephoning BA. Refunds are taking between a few hours to a few weeks to be repaid, depending on the sort of booking made. If you don't wish to travel you can opt for an FTV or eVoucher valid for travel until 30 April 2022, though flights more than 355 days away are not currently bookable - flights are enabled at 355 days before departure. Vouchers such as 2-4-1 are also thereby extended. You can do this even if the flight is operating. The best advice we can give is to delay opting for an eVoucher options until the last moment, since if BA cancel your flight you have more options. BA have also adjusted the Standard Customer Guidelines so that if BA cancel the flight you can be rebooked to anytime in 12 months after you originally bought the ticket, so long as there is space in the cabin - there is no need to have a fare bucket available or Avios availability. If you choose the Avios credit you will get between 108 to 126 Avios per GBP of your fare. Note older posts in this thread may now be inaccuarate since the current policy has been amended several times.
===
If your flight is not cancelled but you don't wish to travel
Commercial booking: If you are eligible for Buy with Confidence, you can have an FTV valid until April 2022. Rebooking may lead to a fare recalculation but no change fee.
Redemption booking: Your can do the normal Avios refund, with the redeposit fee capped at GBP 35 per person. Alternatively for the same fee you can rebook to new dates subject to availability. Alternatively you can have an FTV.
BA Holidays booking: You may be get a refund proactively, otherwise you are looking at an FTV for at least the flight component of your trip, maybe for all components.

If all of the flights in your booking are still scheduled and you don't wish to travel then you best wait until a few days before departure in case there is a cancellation. As you can see above, a cancellation gives you better options. You are in scope with Buy with Confidence if you are flying between now and completing travel before 31 August 2021, also if you bought your ticket after 3 March and due to complete all flights before September 2021. The BA web page on this is:
ba.com/confidence
===
Below are some of the options / workarounds being suggested in order to obtain a refund as opposed to a Future Travel Voucher, but they probably no longer work:

Refund of Cancelled Flights:
  • Call BA (no longer a requirement to be travelling in the next 72 hours, you may need to make repeated calls to get through). Telephone numbers are in this thread, but you can also find them on BA.com at the bottom left of the website, under Help and Contacts.

Paid Seating Refund:
Bookings made using Lloyds Upgrade Voucher
You should expect to receive:
  • Full refund of Avios and money paid
  • A new voucher issued, which has validity for 6 months (from the date of issue, i.e. when you request the 'refund')

Lloyds Upgrade Voucher Notes
  • Flights can be used within 12 months, so it will be good for travel up until the end 6 months plus 12 months if you book just before the new expiry
  • It's been advised to take the voucher instead of rebooking as it gives me more flexibility.
  • The original expiry date of the voucher was irrelevant because the booking was cancelled.
  • You must book within 6 months of the voucher being issued and the ticket has 12 months validity so you can change flights after, provided the new flights are within the 12 month window.
  • You won't receive any email, only the refund and the miles.
How to find out the status of your voucher and the amount it contains Future Travel Vouchers versus eVouchers
  • See posts 3052 and 3151 to understand the difference. FTVs cannot be used online (and are not really vouchers), whereas eVouchers, issued for simple bookings, can be used online.
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Covid-19 BA Rebooking/Cancellation/Refund HELP & ADVICE *No Speculation etc*

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Old Apr 30, 2020, 7:56 am
  #1906  
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The rebook in any cabin space does need to be within ticket validity which is 12monyhs from date of purchase, the system will allow it to be changed longer but for that you are relying on an agent not noticing the ticket validity or being to bothered by it or having a nice supervisor agree for them to do it if the agent notices.

personally I've given authority to reissue on the above basis a few times depending on how long it's being extended by.
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 7:58 am
  #1907  
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Originally Posted by twincheeks
I am looking to add a return journey to my 241 outbound trip. At the moment there appears to be very little reward availability for the flights I want. ATM The cash price for return flights appears to be quite reasonable and will provide me with a little more flexibility.

Having read this thread , it is my understanding that I can cancel the outbound 241 booking and will be refunded the Avios and charges in full, less a cancellation charge of £35 per person.

I would appreciate it if someone with greater knowledge of the BA system can confirm that my assumption is correct..
yep if you want to cancel your Avios booking it's 35£ per pax at the moment you do need to call in to do this
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 8:00 am
  #1908  
 
Join Date: Jul 2013
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Originally Posted by Hawk777
yep if you want to cancel your Avios booking it's 35£ per pax at the moment you do need to call in to do this
Thanks for the speedy reply👍
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 8:01 am
  #1909  
 
Join Date: Apr 2015
Posts: 148
Originally Posted by Hawk777
The rebook in any cabin space does need to be within ticket validity which is 12monyhs from date of purchase, the system will allow it to be changed longer but for that you are relying on an agent not noticing the ticket validity or being to bothered by it or having a nice supervisor agree for them to do it if the agent notices.

personally I've given authority to reissue on the above basis a few times depending on how long it's being extended by.
Thanks!
This whole thing is doing nothing for my anxiety levels! But I have learned a lot from this forum.
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 9:10 am
  #1910  
 
Join Date: Apr 2020
Posts: 1
Back in January this year I booked with with BA to travel from LHR to Tokyo on 1st July and I want to understand what my options are.

I know that if BA cancel the flight then I'm automatically entitled to a full refund or I have the option to cancel now and get a voucher for the full value towards my next booking.

However, I see some reference here about self cancellations with a £35 fee per ticket, is that something new as I cant see where that is stipulated?

Also, BA.com is currently only showing flight cancellations up to 10th May, is it possible to see beyond that?
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 9:20 am
  #1911  
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Originally Posted by pandaman
Back in January this year I booked with with BA to travel from LHR to Tokyo on 1st July and I want to understand what my options are.

I know that if BA cancel the flight then I'm automatically entitled to a full refund or I have the option to cancel now and get a voucher for the full value towards my next booking.

However, I see some reference here about self cancellations with a £35 fee per ticket, is that something new as I cant see where that is stipulated?

Also, BA.com is currently only showing flight cancellations up to 10th May, is it possible to see beyond that?
Hi pandaman and welcome to FT!

The £35 option is just the standard cancellation terms for a reward booking, so you can always cancel a reward booking up to 24 hours before the flight and get a full refund of everything minus a cancellation fee of £35 per person.

In terms of cancellations some June ones have been done now, but for July you may have to wait a few weeks.

This post summarises your options https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/32337156-post1899.html

Tbh if I were you I would just wait to see whether the flights are cancelled. If they are you can look at getting a full refund if that's what you prefer.
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 9:27 am
  #1912  
 
Join Date: Sep 2016
Posts: 1,159
Originally Posted by FlyingEgghead
Haven't seen any reply here. Upon calling BA, they were able to see that I used CHASEBA10 on the original booking but they were not able to apply this code to a new booking while using the voucher as partial payment. That is, the worst case I mentioned seems to hold. The rep agreed this seemed unfair but said that nothing could be done, so I politely ended the call without rebooking. Any thoughts or advice other than HUCA?
Update -- HUCA worked, but barely, it seems.

I seem to be talking to myself here -- is my problem really that obscure? But I thought I'd report back in case it helps someone. I got a BA rep who told me the same thing again (that the promo code cannot be used when rebooking with a Covid-19 voucher), but offered to check with a manager on what could be done, and call me back later. The result was good news -- it was decided that because I had used the promo code on my original booking, the discount I originally received could be added back into the voucher value. Then, I only had to pay the difference between the undiscounted new flight and the undiscounted original flight.
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 9:31 am
  #1913  
 
Join Date: Mar 2019
Posts: 133
Originally Posted by KARFA
Yes for a cancelled flight you can rebook. As long as there is any space in the cabin you will be allowed to rebook to the new flights, you don't need the same selling class to be available. You can book anytime up to your ticket validity.

It may be that you can rebook online once the cancellation has been done, although I suspect it won't work and you will have to call.
Hi KARFA, thanks for the response. I have just got off the phone to BA and they are not offering rebooking, only a voucher or a cash refund (Why would someone take a voucher?!).

The agent stated they are no longer rebooking because they are not certain when routes will resume, so they want to avoid the back-and-forth of cancelling and rebooking. I'm not sure if this is because my route has no flights 14 days after my cancellation, or if this is a new policy.

Just wanted to share that note.
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 9:34 am
  #1914  
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Originally Posted by Sailbot3310
Hi KARFA, thanks for the response. I have just got off the phone to BA and they are not offering rebooking, only a voucher or a cash refund (Why would someone take a voucher?!).

The agent stated they are no longer rebooking because they are not certain when routes will resume, so they want to avoid the back-and-forth of cancelling and rebooking. I'm not sure if this is because my route has no flights 14 days after my cancellation, or if this is a new policy.

Just wanted to share that note.
Odd. I rebooked some trips yesterday for later this year and it wasn't an issue. Also got a cancellation today and MMB would let me rebook for later this year - will have to call tho as MMB wouldn't offer exactly what I wanted. I can't see anything on the BA travel trade site to suggest they are no longer doing rebookings.

I think that agent is perhaps operating their own policy!
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 9:43 am
  #1915  
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Join Date: Feb 2010
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold; Flying Blue Life Platinum; LH Sen.; Hilton Diamond; Kemal Kebabs Prized Customer
Posts: 63,850
Originally Posted by FlyingEgghead
I seem to be talking to myself here -- is my problem really that obscure? But I thought I'd report back in case it helps someone.
Well, yes thanks for reporting back,I'm sure it will help some silent lurkers, but I would guess it is pretty obscure: very few of the participants in this forum are with Chase, most are based in Europe anyway, and those that are on the Chase discount may well be just wanting a refund or won't have a material extra sum on the eVoucher. I think we are well below 1% territory, there would be considerably more people here using the Armed Forces discount, which has some similarities.
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 9:45 am
  #1916  
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Originally Posted by Sailbot3310
Hi KARFA, thanks for the response. I have just got off the phone to BA and they are not offering rebooking, only a voucher or a cash refund (Why would someone take a voucher?!).

The agent stated they are no longer rebooking because they are not certain when routes will resume, so they want to avoid the back-and-forth of cancelling and rebooking. I'm not sure if this is because my route has no flights 14 days after my cancellation, or if this is a new policy.

Just wanted to share that note.
don't know why you where told that it's absolute rubbish if you want to rebook call back and tell them to look at corona virus guidelines update 3 and they have to rebook you under that policy as long as your dates fit with it or if your flight is cancelled under the general conditions of carriage apply too
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 10:01 am
  #1917  
 
Join Date: Mar 2017
Location: Lincolnshire, UK
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Has something changed to the way you can get refunds?

A coupe of flights have just been cancelled and I was assuming we would have to call for a refund - and that only the voucher route was available online. However, MMB is implying that I can cancel online - dare I press the cancel button and/or will that just take me to contact us page?


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Old Apr 30, 2020, 10:03 am
  #1918  
 
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Pressing the "Cancel" button will take you to the "Request voucher" page.
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 10:04 am
  #1919  
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Originally Posted by vintagepilot
Has something changed to the way you can get refunds?

A coupe of flights have just been cancelled and I was assuming we would have to call for a refund - and that only the voucher route was available online. However, MMB is implying that I can cancel online - dare I press the cancel button and/or will that just take me to contact us page?


you'll be taken to voucher page
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Old Apr 30, 2020, 10:14 am
  #1920  
 
Join Date: Mar 2019
Posts: 133
Originally Posted by Hawk777
don't know why you where told that it's absolute rubbish if you want to rebook call back and tell them to look at corona virus guidelines update 3 and they have to rebook you under that policy as long as your dates fit with it or if your flight is cancelled under the general conditions of carriage apply too
What are the dates to fit within that? I'm seeing no flights for 6 weeks after my original booking... Is this why?

I'll phone back because the refund hasn't been issued as my card has expired, so it's going to another team to phone me. I was offered the value as a voucher or the value as cash... Not sure why someone would take the voucher with such an offer.

I was originally booked 28-31 May LHR - OSL and now want to move to 23-26 JUL (first availability I see).

Thanks for your help!
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