CPH-Flyer

Put yourself in their shoes, they here an endless number of stories and reasons why people would like to access the lounge even if the systems shows them as not eligible. Of course they get quite hardened and curt with these requests.

intuition

It is like saying "I have 100k in the bank" based on a payslip that hasn't been stamped by bank.

That is not a trust issue, it is proper handling to deny. IF flight had posted you could easily have gotten a certificate from CS and lounge would have let you in.

OH-LGG

Are we talking about BA Gold/Silver here ?

zxcv1

Do we really live in a Wild West where people frequently come with detailed but false evidence for something such as premium lounge access, and as a result the staff must harden themselves and act coldly just by staring at what the monitor says about tier, ignoring well-known system slowness.

Given that the CS could have issued a temporary certificate, the very least the lounge gate keeper should have done is confirm the case by making a quick phone call to verify the evidence. Just ask the manager to come up and solve the issue if there are other customers to serve.

The risk of a false negative where the stakes are as small as a lounge access, and where there are all the reasons to believe in the evidence (unless it is a Wild West where everyone needs to carry a gun and has licence to kill trespassers), is just too much of an easily losing gamble to take. Flatly denying access might be formally correct procedure, but from any reasonable customer service point of view it is the wrong course of action considering the stakes and circumstances.

ffay005

Unless your qualifying flight was just before you entered the lounge, a call to CS might have helped. They can add the points to your account immediately, which then updates your status, as well.

intuition

I do get the disappointment. After "doing your part", taken the flights required, one expects the loyalty to be rewarded. When they act less than flawless, it seems they have no intention of being as loyal to you as you are to them. I get it, because I've been there myself.


But let's be realistic here. Your are still silver tier, because the crediting system is not instantaneous. Your expectation was that it should be, and based on that you also expect the company reps all around to fix that problem by doing some non-standard handling of you.

But these systems are not instantaneous and they never will be. There are a number of reasons for that, including a huge number of airlines needing to exchange data and reconcile all transactions before making them final and committed to loyalty programs. Like it or not, we all need to deal with that.

If your flights had posted, CS would have happily given you a certificate to cover the time between getting status "in the system" and receiving the actual physical card "proving" your status IRL. But before flights posting, they would not.

Again, you are still silver tier. You "know" you are gold because you've taken the flights, but IRL you are silver. Just like you can't withdraw your salary from the bank until your payslip has been processed in full. You naturally trust the employer to do everything right and "know" you have money in the bank, but the bank teller can't really be expected to do so too.


Asking the lounge attendant to call and find out your pending status? Where should they call? Your status is silver, until the flights have posted.

lkrt

flyerCO

I'm confused? Does AY Hold get into the wing? What about other OW Sapphire equivalents? Confused now with posts above about passenger becoming BA Gold.

ffay005

Oh? I took for granted it was AY Gold (as AY Golds (but not OWS) temporarily have access to the Plat Wing until the renovation is completed @flyerCO).

Well, in this case, you can't really expect AY lounge attendants to know anything about the BA programme status requirements etc.

reflektia

Yes, unfortunately we do. I have personally seen following interactions:

- Person using expired card and claiming that he has not yet received new card. Card had expired 3 months ago and computer said silver.
- Person travelling AF marketed/AY operated codeshare and insisting that CI staff has approved lounge access with AY platinum card (ok, this is tricky thing, but that's how it is).
- Person missing connection resulting in long wait, previous flight FA has told that he can use lounge due to delay (of course no proof)
- Person claiming that CI staff has given lounge access (didn't hear why)
- Person claiming that his brother is in lounge and has invited him also. Cannot call/summon his brother.
- Person using gold card with different name (both first name and surname). Claimed that he had changed name, but computer says no.

Probably lounge staff has lot of these experiences.

intuition

Silly me assumed we were talking about someone loyal to AY, but taking a second look OPs profile says BAEC so I guess you are right. Someone posting on AY forum about silver and gold status like they are a universal concept. Talk about ignorance. I especially like the fact that Finnair is to blame for slow posting in BAEC.


There is a temporary arrangement during lounge renovations for AY golds, no other programs.

Guillou

Assumed the same first but there is actually the same post (as a new thread) on the BA forum. The consensus seems to be also there that the status pending is a BA (and not AY) issue and that you cannot expect AY lounge staff to know how the BA loyalty program works.

JSM8

Yes I posted on the BA forum.....well its all OneWorld haha. Interesting dialogue on both the BA and AY forum.....as I said just now on that forum, on my next flight the status will be there on the system (Phew!)

esledo

keitherson

You have no idea the amount of time and effort people go to, to defraud airlines.

Forget sneaking in to lounges. Try sneaking in to business class on planes, trying to always get fees waived, making up fake documentation, and so forth.

This is the "HUCA approach" to everything.

Heck, even some one of the biggest bloggers in this hobby have done very questionable things.

And the problem is unless they are denied, they are incentivized to continue their behavior.