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No more criticising BA if you are an Executive Club member [amendment to BAEC T&Cs]

No more criticising BA if you are an Executive Club member [amendment to BAEC T&Cs]

Old Sep 29, 2020, 12:53 am
  #1  
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No more criticising BA if you are an Executive Club member [amendment to BAEC T&Cs]

An interesting change to the Executive Club Terms and Conditions slipped in by BA on 25th September 2020. .The definition of Misconduct has been broadened.
“any conduct, including but not limited to making misleading statements, which causes, is intended to cause or is likely to cause a detrimental effect or reflects unfavourably on the reputation of British Airways or any aspect of its business, brands, products or services”
A nice vague catch all which gives BA the power to get rid of anyone who posts anything anywhere reflecting unfavourably on them.
What price freedom of speech? - reply CENSORED
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 1:13 am
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May as well close the BAEC sub-forum then!🙄

Oh the irony of ‘misleading statements’.



Last edited by passy777; Sep 29, 2020 at 1:20 am
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 1:19 am
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So you buy some Avios in one of the many promotions, criticise the BA/Exec club on here, and they cancel your account with all the newly purchased Avios?

Lol.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 1:23 am
  #4  
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Originally Posted by macdrew
An interesting change to the Executive Club Terms and Conditions slipped in by BA on 25th September 2020. .The definition of Misconduct has been broadened.
“any conduct, including but not limited to making misleading statements, which causes, is intended to cause or is likely to cause a detrimental effect or reflects unfavourably on the reputation of British Airways or any aspect of its business, brands, products or services”
A nice vague catch all which gives BA the power to get rid of anyone who posts anything anywhere reflecting unfavourably on them.
What price freedom of speech? - reply CENSORED
The key wording here is surely “misleading statements”. The “not limited to” is legalese which - exactly because it’s so vague - wouldn’t stand up in court in the extremely unlikely event it ever got that far.

“The breakfast I got served in Business was an absolute disgrace, not a hint of taste in it”
“I felt the flight attendant was unduly brusque with me”
“Alex Cruz’s cost cutting mantra is dragging BA into the gutter”
“I didn’t feel safe on my BA flight because of ....”, even.

All opinion.

“BA is routinely cutting down on maintenance and its planes are unsafe as a result”, presented as a statement of fact.

Well, you’d better have some proof about that one, particularly if you’re spreading the word deliberately and/or maliciously.

The former BA doesn’t care about. The latter is libellous unless it can be reasonably proven to be true (or believed to be true) and if it became urban legend then it could create an issue for the airline.

Last edited by NWIFlyer; Sep 29, 2020 at 1:28 am
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 1:35 am
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Sorry to have to disagree, but the key wording of the phrase is any conduct which causes, is intended to cause or is likely to cause a detrimental effect. The bit in between the commas is a qualifier which does not affect the overall meaning.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 1:40 am
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I would humbly suggest you look at the various pieces of legislation which protect consumers against unfair contract terms, the latest of which is the Consumer Rights Act 2015, weigh them against my comment on court action - then decide how this would pan out.

In short, I think you’re interpreting this as it’s written in ‘normal’ English, whereas in fact it’s a legal document. The two are very different animals.

Last edited by NWIFlyer; Sep 29, 2020 at 1:47 am
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 1:48 am
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Sorry, but I don't understand why you brought in legal action and courts to side-track the thread..
The only relevant point is that BA have given themselves the power to kick you out of the club if you criticise them publicly.
If someone doesn't like the fact they have been kicked out are you really suggesting that they take legal action against BA?
In which case I would think that they have more money than sense or have never heard of Miles & More.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 1:59 am
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Originally Posted by macdrew
Sorry, but I don't understand why you brought in legal action and courts to side-track the thread..
The only relevant point is that BA have given themselves the power to kick you out of the club if you criticise them publicly.
If someone doesn't like the fact they have been kicked out are you really suggesting that they take legal action against BA?
In which case I would think that they have more money than sense or have never heard of Miles & More.
i would suggest that yes, if soemone was removed from BAEC under this clause and hadn’t in fact used a misleading statement, then they may well seek civil action, given the value of Avios many people hold and personally I would agree with @NWIFlyer here that this clause is designed to provide the possibility of action when people are making malicious statements and we are very unlikely to see it used at all let alone against someone commenting that they didn’t like the catering or complaining about the Service.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 2:05 am
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Originally Posted by macdrew
If someone doesn't like the fact they have been kicked out are you really suggesting that they take legal action against BA?
Yes. In the airline world that is not unprecedented. In the US a frequent flyer member took NW to court because they terminated his membership along with several 100,000 miles. Now his behaviour was outrageous and he was a serial complainer who seemingly did it purely to gain compensation, so he lost. A few comments and pictures of the current bento box? Not going to stand up in UK law. BA wouldn’t care anyway, but if they suddenly started behaving totally irrationally that’s what we have a justice system for - to prevent abuse of the consumer.

As to why you’d think a direct comment on the implications of the new wording are derailing the thread I’m frankly mystified. The application and practicalities of that application are absolutely central.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 2:18 am
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Any contract read in isolation can look harsh and draconian. Read in the context of the relevant law and legal precedent and they look much more reasonable. I don’t like BA introducing this, but I can understand, to a point, why they have.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 2:19 am
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I'm mostly surprised anyone reads the T&C's of anything, but I'm lazy.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 2:22 am
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Originally Posted by dougzz
I'm mostly surprised anyone reads the T&C's of anything, but I'm lazy.
Didn't South Park do a whole episode on that?
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 2:27 am
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The wording is extremely poor and very vague. It will definitely discourage many customers to complain in public. We have seen before,many companies will not offer any compensation but once this has become public via a newspaper or something similar they will make amendments. Misleading can be anything. BA can argue for example the statement “ The current atrocious food in CW is due to cost cutting” is misleading. It’s about the health and safety of the customers etc.
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 2:30 am
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Old Sep 29, 2020, 2:35 am
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Originally Posted by macdrew
The only relevant point is that BA have given themselves the power to kick you out of the club if you criticise them publicly.
If you look at the wording of the Ts and Cs, either before or after this change, you will discover that BA have and had the power to eject you from BAEC for wearing brown shoes. This tends not to happen.

Last edited by corporate-wage-slave; Sep 29, 2020 at 2:54 am
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