LeisureFirst

Whereas the slave legacy on the other side of the Atlantic has made you all just much better people.

Land-of-Miles

^ Absolutely right! The issue is not who's fault the strike is the issue is how the impacts upon customers can be minimised. By planning a response earlier (and following the example of the more BA specific cabin crew strike) customer inconvenience could have been minimised and customers given certainty. Whilst the strike is not BA's fault it is certainly not the customers fault either.

Mrs LoM and I are heading out to SYD a little later today with no clear idea of whether we will be coming back as planned due to lack of information about the potential schedule impact of a strike, lack of any commercial policy information (affecting Mrs LoM more than I, since she does not have a flexible and endorsable ticket) and the looming additional action by QF.

Information on the schedule impact of the cabin crew strike was communicated well in advance and gave certainty to PAX. Whilst I think that BAA are digging their own grave if they allow this strike to go ahead this will do little to immediately assist those of us who are affected.

Whilst the strike may not be BA's fault, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out the PR consequences of multiple news footage streams showing stranded passengers, tents at LHR, insufficient BA staff to assist stranded PAX etc. etc. Just how many of these images are the travelling public prepared to tolerate and still continue to place their trust in BA? There is a real opportunity here and now to avoid another PR debacle but once again BA seem to be sleepwalking towards the inevitable disaster.

Land-of-Miles

I do not see how that is relevant or called for. The OP made a fair and valid point about UK customer service.

MIKESILV

The wonderful BA board intelligencia stikes again

Proud you are because you lot freed your slaves a full 24 years ( despite being the world premier slave traders for some three centuries) before the USA.

mike

carrliadiere

No more mention of slavery, let's keep this sophisticated!

Talks ongoing today between Unite and BA is the latest news from the BBC. With recent developments I am feeling a lot more positive that the airports will at least be open on the strike days, and I am thinking I may possibly get to go on holiday as planned.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7165196.stm

BAHumbug

I still think the best outcome to hope for would be to eventually get rid of BAA and give the airports to the airlines to run. I accept that BAA are successful in terms of returning huge profits to the shareholders but I can't help feeling it's about time somebody stood up and said that not everything in life has to make a profit in order to be considered an unparalleled success.

BA would run T5, BMI run the *A terminal and so on. It's hard to see how they could make a worse fist of things than BAA, and, as it's in the airlines interest to have efficient terminals which process people quickly and don't subject them to the 'Shopping Maul' experience in lieu of getting them to the gate on time, it's very likely things would be much nicer for everyone.

BAH

LiviLion

A progres update on the proposed strike action on the BBC Website:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7165196.stm

Should hopefully have an idea today then.

d'Yquem

Once I've worked out how to upload them, I've got some lovely pictures from T4 'fast track' yesterday. For some reason, only one of the x-ray machines was being operated... and 'fast track' was even slower and chaotic than normal.

There were three security men just sitting on their arses doing nothing. They were being supervised by a bloke with a clip-board (let's call him 'Clippy').

I asked Clippy why they had only opened one of the two x-ray machines. He told me they were short-staffed. He also told me to take my shoes off well in advance of the machine, which was amusing as I was already carrying them in my hands...

As normal, there was a scrum on both sides of the x-ray machine. All you need to do is lengthen the conveyer belt on each side by another ten foot and you could speed things up considerably!

Given how shambolic things are, I'm not sure any of them deserve a pension at all, index-linked or otherwise!

carrliadiere

I must say, I am very keen on all the positivity in that report. Words like 'optimism' and 'hopeful' are nice words to hear in this situation.

Disco Volante

Indeed

ian001

Whilst I doubt this strike is going to go ahead, I agree the lack of communication and action from BA could seriously blow up in its face if it does happen.

Arguably, the impact of this strike could be much more significant in screwing up operations for days than a cabin crew strike.

I assume that no aircraft will be able to land at LHR on the day of strike, so BA will have to cancel long-haul flights from outstations the day before (unless it can divert some to non-BAA airports such as CWL and arrange for local transport -as happened with NRT flights during the GG walkout!) leaving the decision as to whether to leave aircraft out of position at outstations meaning that disruption will carry on after the strike has finished or cancel the outbound flights the day before the strike. I guess there will be a mixture of long-haul cancellations the day before and after the strike to try and minimise the impact.

All in all a logistical nightmare.

IAMORGAN

I'd expect them to put a policy in place frankly yes. Whether or not this strike goes ahead, it's going to cost BA money and cause hassle. If it goes ahead, they will be completely swamped, because they will have to speak to pretty much every passenger with a confirmed reservation on those dates, along with the inevitable calls from people worried about flights either side of the strike, as well as managing the people who will inevitably turn up at the airports, they will need to plan logistics -what's going to happen with their aircraft, will they cancel services the day before and after for positioning, what about people already away wanting to return?

It would be nice if they even warned of potential strike action like bmi have on their website.

I understand why they are reluctant to put a policy in place, but it is this short-sightedness that has cost them their regional operations, staff strikes in the past, etc. Luckily they have a fairly good working relationship with flymaybe so they will undoubtedly book people ex BHX and MAN for regional services. bmi have bmibaby which is an option.

If only they could find a way to get staff from other airports to work there on the strike days so that the strike has no effect on operations; I'd love to see the expressions on the faces of the unions!!

Ultimately though, I think it's fair to be offered a change at least even if not a refund at this stage -people need to know what they are doing, not with three days notice!!!!!!!!

carrliadiere

Strike averted, totally excellent result!

I work at Sky so can't quote a source yet (just saw it go out from the newsroom), but this pleases me a great deal!

uk1

..... strike is off!

ian001

BBC News is saying that the first strike has been called off, following progress in talks. No signed and sealed agreement yet. A union meeting is to take place on 3 January to ratify whatever has been agreed.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7165196.stm

Encouraging news nonetheless.