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BA lounges : COVID-19 closures and reopenings

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Old Jul 3, 2020, 10:51 am
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List of Lounges Currently OPEN to BA Passengers (open wiki for details)

This wiki includes details of open lounges accessible to premium (F/J or Gold/Silver) passengers travelling on BA operated services, either within the terminal BA depart from or accessible via airside transfer.

Other lounges may be accessible for passengers willing to transfer landside to other terminals or concourses, although this is generally not recommended due to time constraints as a result of needing to re-clear security. Additionally, some airports may offer pay-in lounges which are not otherwise accessible by BA premium passengers (either temporarily or permanently).

Most open lounges are operating with a limited food and beverage service, and other services may be unavailable or modified.

For opening hours, please check the oneworld lounge listing at https://www.oneworld.com/airport-lounges?location= which is now being regularly updated.

If your airport isn't listed below, this probably means there is no lounge available for BA premium passengers (either temporarily or permanently) - please check the oneworld listing for the most up-to-date information.

British Airways Lounges
Aberdeen British Airways Lounge
Boston British Airways Lounge (First Dining is unverified)
Cape Town British Airways Lounge
Chicago British Airways Lounge (First lounge is permanently closed)
Dubai British Airways Lounge (BA First passengers and oneworld Emerald members on BA flights only, The Bar is unverified)
Edinburgh British Airways Lounge
Geneva British Airways Lounge
Glasgow British Airways Lounge
Johannesburg British Airways Lounge (First Dining is unverified)
New York JFK British Airways/American Airlines Greenwich Lounge, Soho Lounge, Chelsea Lounge
New York Newark British Airways Lounge (First Dining is unverified)
Lagos British Airways Lounge
London Gatwick British Airways First Lounge, Club Lounge
London Heathrow Terminal 3 British Airways Galleries First, Galleries Club

London Heathrow Terminal 5 British Airways Concorde Room, Galleries First, Galleries Club South, Galleries Club North, Galleries Club T5B, Galleries Arrivals
Milan Linate British Airways Lounge
Philadelphia British Airways Lounge (First lounge and First Dining are unverified)
Rome British Airways Lounge
San Francisco British Airways Lounge (First Dining is "accessible". See post 4222: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/34492191-post4222.html)
Seattle British Airways Lounge (First lounge is unverified)
Singapore British Airways Lounge (The Bar is unverified)
Washington British Airways Lounge (First Dining is unverified)

Note that the BA-operated lounges at AMS, BHD, BRU, IAH, NCL, MAN and YVR have all closed permanently during the COVID-19 pandemic. Alternative oneworld or third party lounges are listed below. Note that the Elemis Travel Spas at LHR and JFK have been permanently closed.

Non-BA oneworld Lounges
Amman Royal Jordanian Crown Lounge
Atlanta
American Airlines Admirals Club North Terminal (AirTrain ride required)
Austin American Airlines Admirals Club
Bangkok Japan Airlines Sakura Lounge
Dallas American Airlines Admirals Club (multiple locations)
Denver American Airlines Admirals Club
Doha Qatar Airways Silver Lounge (BA Silver / OW Sapphire travelling in Y)
Doha Qatar Airways Al Mourjan Business Lounge (J class pax only - temporarily accepting BA Gold / OW Emerald in Y or W)
Doha Qatar Airways Al Safwa First Lounge (F class pax only)
Frankfurt Japan Airlines Sakura Lounge
Hong Kong Cathay Pacific The Wing, First (accepting F/J passengers and Gold/Silver cardholders)
Houston Terminal A American Airlines Admirals Club (airside transfer via AirTrain available to/from BA gates in Terminal D)
London Heathrow Terminal 3 Cathay Pacific Business and First Class lounges (open 05:30 to 17:30 Mon-Sat, 07:00 to 17:30 Sun)
London Heathrow Terminal 3 The Qantas International London Lounge (open daily 06:00 to 14:00)
Los Angeles Terminal 4 American Airlines Admirals Club & Flagship Lounge (airside walk to/from BA gates in TBIT)
Los Angeles Terminal 6 Alaska Lounge (airside walk to/from BA gates in TBIT)
Los Angeles Tom Bradley International Terminal OneWorld Lounge/Qantas Business & First Class Lounge
Madrid Iberia Premium Lounge Dalí / Iberia Premium Lounge Velázquez
Mexico City American Airlines Admirals Club
Miami American Airlines Admirals Club (multiple locations)
Miami American Airlines Flagship Lounge / Flagship First Dining Gate D30 ( Flagship First Dining only available to departing BA First Class passengers )
Nashville American Airlines Admirals Club
Paris Charles de Gaulle Terminal 2A American Airlines Admirals Club
Phoenix American Airlines Admirals Club (multiple locations)
Philadelphia Concourse B/C American Airlines Admirals Club (airside walk to/from BA gates in Concourse A)
San Francisco Terminal 1 American Airlines Admirals Club (airside walk to/from BA gates in International Terminal)
San Francisco Terminal 2 Alaska Lounge (airside walk to/from BA gates in International Terminal)
Sao Paulo Terminal 3 American Airlines Admirals Club
Singapore Qantas International Business Lounge

Seattle Alaska Lounge (airside transfer via AirTrain available to/from BA gates in Concourse S)
Tampa American Airlines Admirals Club
Tokyo Haneda Japan Airlines First Class Lounge (accepting F/J passengers and Gold/Silver cardholders)

The AA forum has further details of open Admirals Club lounges: Link

Third Party Lounges with active BA contracts
Accra Adinkra Lounge
Amsterdam Aspire Lounge
Athens Skyserv Aristotle Onassis Lounge
Antigua Executive Lounge
Atlanta The Club at ATL
Barcelona AENA Joan Miro Lounge
Bahrain The Pearl Lounge
Basel EuroAirport Skyview Lounge
Belfast Aspire Lounge
Berlin Lounge Tempelhof
Bologna Marconi Business Lounge
Bordeaux Salon des Vignobles

Bridgetown Airlines Executive Lounge / IAM Jet Centre
Brussels Diamond Lounge Pier B
Copenhagen Eventyr Lounge

DalamanCIP Lounge
Dallas The Club at DFW
Delhi Plaza Premium Lounge
Doha Oryx Lounge
Dubai Terminal 1 Marhaba Lounge
(BA Club World passengers and oneworld Sapphire members on BA flights only)
Dublin Dublin Airport Executive Lounge (reduced hours - 04:00-18.30 only, see here for latest details)
Düsseldorf Open Sky Lounge (Terminal C)
Faro ANA Lounge (non-Schengen only)
Florence Aeroporti VIP Club
Gibraltar Calpe Lounge
Grenada IAM Jet Centre

Hamburg Hamburg Airport Lounge
Hong Kong Plaza Premium Lounge
Houston HAS Executive Club

Ibiza VIP Sala Lounge
Istanbul IGA Lounge
Inverness Aspire Lounge
(open part-time, see post 3357)
Jersey Executive Lounge
Johannesburg Shongololo Lounge
Keflavík Saga Lounge
Krakow Business Lounge
Kingston Club Kingston
Larnaca Aspire Aphrodite Lounge
Las Vegas The Lounge at LAS (T3)
Lisbon ANA Lounge
Ljubljana Business Lounge
Lyons Salon Mont Blanc

Malaga Sala VIP Lounge
Male Leeli Lounge
Malta La Valette Club
Manchester T3 The Escape Lounge
Marseille Salon Cezanne Non-Schegen Lounge opposite gate 10

Milan Malpensa Montale Non-Schengen Lounge
Montreal National Bank Lounge
Moscow DME Domodedovo Airport Business Lounge
Mumbai MALS Premium Lounge
MunichAirport Lounge World
Nairobi TAV Lounge

Nassau The Lignum Club Lounge
Newcastle Aspire Lounge

Nice Infinity Lounge
Nuremberg Dürer Lounge
Oslo OSL Lounge
Palma Sala VIP Lounge
Phoenix Escape Lounge

Port Louis ATOL Lounge
Prague MasterCard Lounge
Rio de Janiero Plaza Premium
Riyadh Premier Lounge
Rotterdam Prima Vista Lounge
San Diego Aspire Lounge
(Sun, Mon, Wed, Fri departures only)
Sao Paulo LATAM VIP Lounge
Sofia Preslav Lounge

Southampton Spitfire Lounge
Split Business Lounge

St. Lucia (UVF) Iyanola Lounge
Stockholm (ARN) Norrsken Lounge

Tenerife Sala VIP Lounge
Tel Aviv Dan Lounge
Thessaloniki Manolis Andronikos Skyserv Lounge
Toronto Plaza Premium Lounge

Toulouse La Croix du Sud Lounge
Valencia Sala VIP Joan Olivert
Vancouver Plaza Premium Lounge
Warsaw Bolero Lounge

Zagreb Primeclass
Zurich Aspire Lounge
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BA lounges : COVID-19 closures and reopenings

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Old Nov 11, 2020, 7:42 am
  #1591  
 
Join Date: May 2014
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Originally Posted by FlyingScientist
What's the record time for visiting all gates at LHR T5?
If I still had access to a particular database I could tell you the time to go from *every* gate in T5 ABC to Ready to Fly in T5A transfers, T5B transfers and T5C transfers. They were set up for Conformance and, yes, they differ from gate to gate and place to place! I know the person who entered those values and, yes, the story is that they walked.
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Old Nov 11, 2020, 8:20 am
  #1592  
 
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Originally Posted by JessicaB
Ridiculous thinking that the risk of contracting Covid by eating inside the lounge is going to be higher than taking the same food and eating it a few steps away from the lounge. Whoever makes up these stupid rules.
It does at least show that BA isn’t alone in having an ‘interesting’ approach to COVID rules.
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Old Nov 11, 2020, 8:40 am
  #1593  
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Originally Posted by FlyingScientist
What's the record time for visiting all gates at LHR T5?
Dunno about gates, but I could tell you the time for a visiting all the lounges in T5 (airside) and having a large glass of red. Well, actually I couldn't - it has all very hazy by the time we boarded (I blame the pop-up cocktail bar in the F lounge at the time).
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Old Nov 11, 2020, 9:04 am
  #1594  
 
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Originally Posted by krispy84
It does at least show that BA isn’t alone in having an ‘interesting’ approach to COVID rules.
There are many examples. For example you can buy food at Pret, but you cant eat it at Pret seating. You can eat it at in the communal seating areas 5m away, however. Clearly airports are an area where "take-away" can't really be facilitated. In fairness this is going to be a niche situation.
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Old Nov 11, 2020, 10:23 am
  #1595  
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Originally Posted by BrianDromey
There are many examples. For example you can buy food at Pret, but you cant eat it at Pret seating. You can eat it at in the communal seating areas 5m away, however. Clearly airports are an area where "take-away" can't really be facilitated. In fairness this is going to be a niche situation.
Yes, and this is effectively the airport exemption.

The law says that premises must close where food or drink are provided for consumption on the premises, and that "consumption on premises" includes an area adjacent to the premises where seating is made available for its customers (whether or not by the business or the provider of the service) or which its customers typically use for consumption of food or drink served by the business or service. This adjacent area is to be treated as part of the premises of that business or service. An example of this might be a food court in a shopping centre where the seating area for eating is next to but not part of the place you collect your food.

The airport exemption allows for the second part, so within the airside area of an airport an area adjacent to the premises is not considered as part of the premises, effectively Pret in T5 can sell you food, you can't eat in Pret, but the general seating around the gates nearby where you might go to sit to eat is not considered part of Pret.

After reading Section 15 multiple times now I understand the airport exemption does not mean the lounges themselves could open if they were to serve food and drink for consumption in the lounge. They could serve takeaways though and (like Pret) it would be ok if consumption took place in nearby general seating areas in T5.

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/.../regulation/15
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Last edited by KARFA; Nov 11, 2020 at 10:38 am
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 1:52 am
  #1596  
 
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Originally Posted by JessicaB
Ridiculous thinking that the risk of contracting Covid by eating inside the lounge is going to be higher than taking the same food and eating it a few steps away from the lounge. Whoever makes up these stupid rules.
I don't think anyone did make that decision; rather, the lounge has found a loophole in the rules and is exploiting it.

Personally, I don't think airport lounges should be permitted to open at all in the middle of a pandemic and when all travel is supposed to be for essential purposes only.
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 2:14 am
  #1597  
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Originally Posted by Misco60
I don't think anyone did make that decision; rather, the lounge has found a loophole in the rules and is exploiting it.

Personally, I don't think airport lounges should be permitted to open at all in the middle of a pandemic and when all travel is supposed to be for essential purposes only.
Agreed. And the subtext of course is to discourage communal gatherings. That some arrangements don’t suit this doesn’t make the overall direction wrong.
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 2:44 am
  #1598  
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Originally Posted by secretplantofightinflation
Some hideous attitudes displayed in recent posts.
....but entirely, definitely 100% spot-on in the experiences and descriptions though
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 3:44 am
  #1599  
 
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Originally Posted by secretplantofightinflation
Some hideous attitudes displayed in recent posts.
I bet, unlike some of the snooty types on here, the aforementioned types pay out their own pocket rather than their boss'.
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 3:51 am
  #1600  
 
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Originally Posted by Misco60
Personally, I don't think airport lounges should be permitted to open at all in the middle of a pandemic and when all travel is supposed to be for essential purposes only.
Given that it's largely only work + educational travel allowed (other exceptions probably not many people), I can see a strong case for people needing to work. Airline schedules have been heavily cut, so you're unlikely to have a flight at the time you'd normally want, and layovers are often much longer. Public transport is cut, especially to airports, and you want to try to avoid peak times. Add all that up, and you have a lot of people who likely need to work spending longer than normal at the airport. Total numbers way down, sure, but I'd guess that the % of travellers needing to spend time working in the airport is up on normal times
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 4:00 am
  #1601  
 
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Originally Posted by KARFA
The law says that premises must close where food or drink are provided for consumption on the premises, and that "consumption on premises" includes an area adjacent to the premises where seating is made available for its customers (whether or not by the business or the provider of the service) or which its customers typically use for consumption of food or drink served by the business or service. This adjacent area is to be treated as part of the premises of that business or service. An example of this might be a food court in a shopping centre where the seating area for eating is next to but not part of the place you collect your food.
Interesting. Does this include outdoor areas where people tend to sit and eat from a nearby cafe?
Example - the pret in the corner of the square outside Reading station. It has seating areas which will clearly be closed. But there’s also a large wall/bench thing in the square outside where lots of people sit and eat/drink their purchases. Would the presence of somewhere like this - which is very obviously and regularly used for this purpose despite not officially being part of the shop’s facilities - cause it to have to close?
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 4:15 am
  #1602  
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Originally Posted by Confus
Interesting. Does this include outdoor areas where people tend to sit and eat from a nearby cafe?
Example - the pret in the corner of the square outside Reading station. It has seating areas which will clearly be closed. But there’s also a large wall/bench thing in the square outside where lots of people sit and eat/drink their purchases. Would the presence of somewhere like this - which is very obviously and regularly used for this purpose despite not officially being part of the shop’s facilities - cause it to have to close?
This the exact wording:

(4) For the purposes of paragraph (1), except where paragraph (5) applies, references to food or drink being for consumption on premises, include a reference to consumption on an area adjacent to the premises of the restricted business or restricted service where seating is made available for its customers (whether or not by the business or the provider of the service) or which its customers habitually use for consumption of food or drink served by the business or service is to be treated as part of the premises of that business or service.
It sounds like the underlined part could apply to the area you describe. If it did the result would be you have two choices, close off that area or close the business since providing food and drink for consumption in that area would be considered to be consumption on premises which is not allowed. It is a bit grey though, and tbh and clearly there has to be a limit.

EDIT: just to add I am clear now that the airside exemption (basically the "paragraph (5)" referred to above) does not mean lounges can remain open and continue serving food & drink as normal. I think that was the belief and some of the commentary when the regulations first came out. There was a certain amount of criticism of BA on the belief that the airside exemption meant the lounges could have remained open. It was also my understanding too, and I think I may have posted on that basis at the time as well.

After some reflecting and reading it again a few times, it is more clear to me now that airside lounges are not allowed to remain open if serving food and drink for consumption in the lounge - so when BA said they had to close the lounges this is not an unreasonable statement. It might be that theoretically BA could have left the lounges open for use but stopped any serving of food and drink - or at least provided it for takeaway only. But clearly reconfiguring for that within a few days may have been an unreasonable task and frankly the decision just to close outright sounds like the most sensible approach.

Last edited by KARFA; Nov 12, 2020 at 4:46 am
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Old Nov 12, 2020, 6:12 am
  #1603  
 
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Originally Posted by KARFA

After some reflecting and reading it again a few times, it is more clear to me now that airside lounges are not allowed to remain open if serving food and drink for consumption in the lounge - so when BA said they had to close the lounges this is not an unreasonable statement. It might be that theoretically BA could have left the lounges open for use but stopped any serving of food and drink - or at least provided it for takeaway only. But clearly reconfiguring for that within a few days may have been an unreasonable task and frankly the decision just to close outright sounds like the most sensible approach.
I think this statement pretty much sums the whole situation up; bang on point. Technically the lounges could be open, but without the provision of any service, food, or drink, so in essence just an additional waiting room. To put the effort in remaining open on that basis would no doubt be counter productive from a PR point of view, not to mention having to bear the brunt of unnecessary staffing costs. There is plentiful space to wait in other areas for the space of four weeks I suppose.
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Old Nov 13, 2020, 3:55 am
  #1604  
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Originally Posted by TyneTraveller
I think this statement pretty much sums the whole situation up; bang on point. Technically the lounges could be open, but without the provision of any service, food, or drink, so in essence just an additional waiting room. To put the effort in remaining open on that basis would no doubt be counter productive from a PR point of view, not to mention having to bear the brunt of unnecessary staffing costs. There is plentiful space to wait in other areas for the space of four weeks I suppose.
Seems like this is exactly what they are doing as of Monday!
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Old Nov 13, 2020, 4:54 am
  #1605  
 
Join Date: Oct 2020
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The thing is, the Lufthansa lounge in T2, airside, is open. I was in it yesterday. Staff serve drinks and food.

So the law must allow airside lounges to open and operate business as usual, relatively.

I suspect BA took the commercial decision to close the lounges and furlough the staff for the month, until December 2.
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