JessicaB

Just wanted thoughts on this one. We arrived yesterday in Miami having booked assistance for my mother who is unable to walk long distances. We were told by the CC to wait on the aircraft, then told that if she is able to walk she should go up the jetty where assistance would be provided. We walked up to some seats where two others were waiting for assistance. After about 10 mins a guy comes with a wheelchair, he doesn't speak any English, takes one of the passengers away and a second guy pushes the second passenger, leaving just my mother and me. The despatcher appears after about 15 mins more of waiting, and she says that they know we are there and the assistance people will come back. The pilots ask us what we are doing there as they pass by a few minutes later. And then nothing. And absolutely nobody anywhere to help us. Eventually after maybe an hour more I find a BA member of staff in another corridor. He says he will try to get someone to help us. Again nothing, so as I walk around more, I find some windows where I can see the departure lounge for the return flight. I bang on the window, the despatcher sees me. She points to her radio to show she has made a call. We wait another 10 minutes, by now I'm getting quite angry. Eventually I bang on the window again and she makes a call on her cellphone. And maybe 10 minutes later a guy appears with a wheelchair. He says he wasn't aware we were waiting, he had been told everyone had been taken care of.

If I hadn't been there, I wonder how many hours it would have taken for someone to find my mother. Literally nobody was walking down the corridor which led from the jetty to the terminal. Mum was left feeling really upset, she is a very active 80 something and hates having mobility issues. The flight landed at 2.40pm and I think it was about 4.15 when we finally were picked up.

Clearly it was a lack of communication. Should I put in a complaint? And if I did, how seriously would it be taken? I don't want to waste my time and just get a standard copy and paste response.

corporate-wage-slave

There is usually a communication between the aircraft and the handling agents on arrival where someone will say "three wheelchairs" which hopefully corresponds with the manifest. It's a highly manual process and it goes wrong from time to time. The assistance agents are rarely held accountable for mistakes and mis-counting. I'm afraid to say the best thing is to decline to leave the aircraft until the wheelchair - and the wheelchair agent - have made an appearance at the end of the airbridge by the aircraft door. Why? Because the outbound crew cannot leave until it has happened and they have access to the communication channels to get things moving. Moreover at a certain point it will prevent departure back to the UK (given that security clearance and cleaning has to happen first, then catering).

JessicaB

Understood and this is good advice for next time, if there is a next time. But should I do anything to complain about what happened, or just leave it?

corporate-wage-slave

Your mother will get some Avios, but as I say the process is very manual, relies on minimum wage labour and this sort of thing happens regularly. See for example the mishaps that happen to Maj. Frank Gardner of the BBC. So if you complain it's really to get the Avios. You could also complain to MIA airport management, which may get some attention there. E.g. telephone access.

wrp96

As this happened in the US I would consider filing a DOT complaint.

Confus

You should complain even if just to prove a point. Anything related to assistance failures will at least be tracked and trends monitored. You could also look into DOT (or similar) channels, the ADA is very strict and again trends are particularly useful to them.

I also second CWS’s stellar advice not to leave the aircraft threshold until assistance is present: nothing magics up a wheelchair quite like a call from an irate Captain wanting to get to his bed/date/golf course but can’t leave his aircraft.

AlanA

I have had similar issues at MCO in the past two weeks.
at the door, put in a wheelchair and pushed up the ramp to the corridor.
the skycap then says he has to go and check if any others are requiring assistance and my wife could push me to security from there. He would pick us up again once through Customs!
I, in fact, wasn’t the only one on the flight this happened to. 99% had to get family members to push them, only one who wasn’t was an old lady on her own.
pkenty if skycaps at the door.
When through security, there was an area after the lift where I was offered again, a wheelchair but again, for my wife to push.

not impressed with this change it seems, of policy

dwugson

It's not just BA. My husband on medical evacuation from South Africa escorted by a physician had to wait an hour in Newark for a wheelchair. Services for the disabled are a disaster globally and in spite of laws requiring adequate support nothing seems to get accomplished.

KeaneJohn

I’m sorry you experienced this. I’d be inclined to write to BA claiming discrimination and as CWS said refusing to leave the aircraft until assistance has arrived going forward.

wrp96

Sadly I had it happen at DFW myself.

beachmouse

Sorry to hear about so many problems.

In almost every US airport, the wheelchair pushers are outsourced to a third party company, who has a really hard time filling those jobs because people who would take them typically need a paycheck pretty quickly and don’t want to have to wait for a month for the background check to work airside to come back when a lot of non-airport jobs would let you start the next day. IIRC, the London airports often face similar staffing issues for that reason.

SonTech

The airlines don't usually have a choice who to use as Assistance is provided by the airport not the airline so writing to BA, or any airline to be fair, will not get you much further. Airlines are just as fed up with assistance not arriving on time as the passengers. We always put the assistance company down as the cause of any delays in this instance.

SxMan

Always check that the assistance is showing on your boarding pass – paper one, alas not on the electronic version.

Sometimes, the assistance at the arrival airport can be cancelled if it hasn’t been used at the departure airport in my experience. LIN staff at least had the courtesy to ask, on three occasions, whether I did want the booked assistance when we arrived at Heathrow.

binman

personally I don’t think it’s about Avios. It’s about treating people with dignity and providing a service that is commensurate with needs and which does not discriminate. I don’t know how it works in the USA but in the U.K. the responsibility sits with the airport operator and there have been countless high profile individuals who have highlighted the dire state of provision over the years.

the advice to sit tight on the aircraft is sound. You will generally be last to disembark but in general you avoid the queues at immigration so there is some sort of balance.

But please do complain, and loudly. People with mobility issues or any other form of disability that requires some assistance may be helped in the future and not have to endure such poor service

spursdebs

Well this is the reply you will get from BA after I complained. And I did indeed put my flight details in and it was LHR. The whole system is woeful.An apology from British Airways



We’re very sorry you received poor customer service on your recent trip with us, especially as you weren't provided with the level of assistance you require. This isn’t what you should expect when you travel with us, and we understand why you needed to let us know about it. We’d also like to thank you for your patience while we got back to you.



We know how challenging travelling can be for some of our customers, and always aim to help our customers feel as relaxed and comfortable as possible throughout their journey. However, it’s clear from your comments that you didn’t get as much support as you should have.



I’ve checked through the information we've received, and noticed there are no flight details listed. If the flight was from London Heathrow, we can pass this on to the appropriate team if you wish to take this further.





I can assure you that your feedback will make a difference. We hold regular meetings to look at how we can improve passengers’ experience at the airport, and we use comments like these to guide us in these discussions.



I would still complain, it’s the only recourse we have. And no I didn’t get any avois.