I am an Executive Platinum (Emerald) frequent flyer. I used to be the highest level of BA, with once over 2M miles.

I go out of my way to no longer fly BA because of the deteriorating service.

I also speak to many BA employees, and they all hate their job.

All in all, a fraction of what they used to be.

Anyway, I left my laptop on a flight from Munich to London. I realized it immediately. I was not allowed to retrieve it. So I went to lost and found. They were closed (at 7:30 PM). I could not speak to anyone who could help. I approached several BA employees at Terminal 5, and even asked for a manger. No one had any suggestions, other than "too bad". I went online and found that BA has outsourced Lost and Found.

Two days later, I was able to retrieve my laptop by actually traveling to the airport. I could not speak with anyone. Here is the best part. They charged me 20 POUNDS!!!!!  to get my own laptop back.

I tell everyone I know who travels to avoid BA. The lounges are run down (even the Concord which I was in recently), and Avios is a joke.

BA were once a pleasure to fly with, now I find it despicable, not only their contempt for customers, but also from what I read how they pay cabin staff.

My latest experience was a dreadful flight to New York on 4th December, whereby having paid lots of extra money for specific seats with more leg room, it transpired the flying cattle truck they loaded me onto had a different seating configuration to that shown on the BA.com flight reservation platform. The cabin crew told me this was a common occurance and they constantly have upset customers with the same issue. Haviing complained, BA "customer service" of course sent a standard response which had no relevance whatsoever.

On the flight back they did the same and even moved us on to two seperate rows.

At JFK there was chaos with BA flights cancelled becuase of snow at Heathrow. Now this might be excusable, but those customers delayed or cancelled, were just left in the check in queues, meaning people on later flights which were not cancelled could not check in and queues not going anywhere! There were no BA staff available, no anouncements - Nothing! Only some initiative by myself and 3 fellow passengers persuaded some airport staff to open another desk and pull passengers for our scheduled flight out of the stagnant queue and got us checked in. We just made the flight, but no thanks to BA.

How did an airline go from being great to shocking in such a short time. Perhaps the recently appointed CEO would benefit from attending the Harvard course on "Service Profit Chain" principles, to gain some insight on why poor customer service jepordises company profits and indeed the whole company in the longer term.

I am placing this issue in escalation and raising it with Visa. It is now a point of principle and must say I like this site and wish you all success in getting customer justice in your dispute.

in my view as a seasoned traveller, the problem is not with employees who do their best, but with executive leadership team who seem out of touch with customer reality.

Last week on a flight from Amsterdam to London, my cabin bag was put in the hold as the overhead lockers were full.

On landing in London, as the aircraft was waiting for the aerobridge, I watched with curiosity and trepidation (Murphy's Law!) from my window seat, my cabin bag being taken out of the hold and being left on the tarmac by a handler. I was appalled to then see a careless baggage/food trolley carrier vehicle actually reversing in the direction of my cabin bag... watched with complete helplessness this vehicle run over my cabin bag and dragging it for a few feet before the handler alerted the driver and they pulled my bag from under the vehicle.

As expected when i collected the bag, it was crushed (soft luggage), and had got holes and was torn. We filed a damaged bag complaint but the response from British Airways staff reeks of arrogance. The response, the tone, the reasoning is nothing but scandalous. (They are offering us a generous 25 pounds compensation because we flew economy!) I am thanking my stars that on this trip I did not have my camera or laptops/tablets etc in the cabin bag. My husband is filing a case in small claims court.

Mrs Venkatesh has emailed through the following update:

Your site information was really useful. Following what I read in your website my husband lodged a claim in small claims court here in London by paying £25 fees. We had claimed £60 for the bags that BA damaged. BA said they would contest the claim in court. But finally their lawyers called us and offered us full compensation (which was more than our initial claim). If only BA's outsourced baggage handling thug company K Global and BA's own customer service were not so nasty, they would have saved themselves a good amount of money. I am very pleased with your website. more power to you and small claims court. Kind regards, Mrs Venkatesh

My friend Doug and I flew from Orlando to London, via Miami. We arrived in London to find that our golf clubs and suitcases had not made the trip with us. The Customer Service agent at Heathrow told us that the bags were in Miami. She gave us a claim form to fill out and told us that the bags would be delivered to our hotel. This was a bit of a problem, in that we were on a traveling golf vacation and the first four nights we were booked in separate accommodations, in different locations.

We trusted that the luggage would arrive the next morning and that it would be delivered to our hotel in Sandwich, Kent, where we were playing golf at Royal St. Georges and Princes golf clubs. However, when we called BA customer service the next morning, they could not verify that our bags had made it onto a flight that day.

We went on to play golf at Royal St. Georges and after the round we received a text message from the contractor that BA uses to deliver delayed or lost luggage. The text message stated that they had our bags and would schedule delivery. The problem we had was that we were to go from Sandwich to Coventry that afternoon, and then on to play golf at Royal Birkdale the next morning, staying at Lytham the next night. So we tried contacting the delivery agent, but couldn't get through to them. We called BA again, but the CS agent couldn't even determine whether our bags were in the country. Eventually, we talked them into giving us the phone number that they used to contact the delivery agent. We called this number at about 18:20, and found that they did indeed have our bags, but they wouldn't be delivered until the next evening. We asked if we could pick them up at their warehouse, which was acceptable, and they were open until 21:00. We jumped in our rental car and drove like maniacs to their office near Heathrow, arriving at about 20:59, and they had our bags set out for us.

On the good side, I would say that BA did reimburse many of our expenses for things like golf club rental, purchase of rain suits, clothing, golf gloves, golf balls and other associated materials. They refused to pay for the loss of our prepaid green fees for the first day of golf at the Princes Golf Club.

I've flown BA for many years but this year that has changed. Along with Flybe, they are the worst airline I've ever used.

This year started with a family holiday to Tampa, from Jersey (via Gatwick). Our flight from Jersey to Gatwick was scheduled to be on-time, however the bag drop staff reluctantly told us that the flight would be an hour late, however this information was not put on the boards.

We boarded very early, but were forced to stay seated until we had our landing slot at Gatwick. Why couldn't we takeoff and just hold over Gatwick? That would have been better than being sat there worrying about whether we would make our connection.

The flight landed at 9am, about an hour late, which gave us two hours for our connecting flight to Tampa. 10am, 11am went past, and the boards still said "Boarding [time]," until it got to that time, when it said "Next info 11:50." I've had 'next info' delayed and know they're never good. Once it got to 11:50, the boards were now saying "Next info 12:50", then "Next info 13:50."

At that point, we were unhappy about the lack of communication so went down to the BA customer service desk to ask what was up. We were greeted by a very angry croud who were on our flight. The lady at the desk told us that flight was delayed due to aircraft technical problems, and we would be scheduled to takeoff at 3pm, over 4 hours late. BA never put this information on the boards. They knew there would be no 'next info.'

We were also confused as to why several other Boeing 777-200s (the aircraft we were on) were taking off. Surely it would be logical to put us on an aircraft which is available and do that for all the other flights, until it gets to the last one which could use the aircraft we would be on. It felt like BA didn't care about us. This process repeated, and eventually we took off at just after 5pm, 5 hours behind schedule.

Both of the Boeing 777s we were on during the trip were in a horrible state. The seats and floor were dirty and the aircraft walls were very discoloured. The IFE is not worth using with the window blind open as the screen is so bad you can't use it. The content was poor, the food was fairly poor, staff service was ok, but overall it was an awful experience.

Later that year I was booked on a BA flight to Malaga, which was the exact same experience. It was late and uncomfortable. The flight attendants had run out of such basic things like water and cola whilst serving the first 10 rows of the aircraft. How on earth can you run out of bottled water? Overall, BA are absolutly dreadful and not worth using. Choose another airline.

Dear BA,

I am sitting on a flight from Tel Aviv to London.

It is half way through the journey and in my many many years of flying BA I had the worst meal experience I have ever had. In my silent debate with myself I was wondering if I should stay silent or use my limited time telling you about my struggle. I decided the latter hence my letter.

Pardon me for being facetious for just a moment but I would like to 'congratulate' BA for conforming. You used to set the bar and show others the standard, but now have sadly gone the way everyone is going.

Truthfully, I would not feed my dog with the food I had on this plane today. BA had always had great food in economy.

Those days are gone. The bread was old, the pasta not edible and the dessert hardly seeable. Our well defined 'one Drink' policy now which helped us numb the pain before, now actually has perhaps opened my eyes a bit wider to the seriousness of the situation.

Do I have sower grapes not flying First Class, hardly. Once you have been on Mission stations in Africa you can hardly be a picky eater even if you tried.

I don't fit your profile, I get it. You want the high fliers only and the boys with the big bucks and actually wish our time wasting economy fliers would fly off the planet while you graciously tolerate us and whilest scheming to buy planes that only 'serve' business customers.

We now get 60% less air miles on an Economy flight and you need to fly around the globe about 40 times before getting any benefits whatsoever.

God forbid one of the creme de la creme of BA are to fly 'World Traveller' for one day. Then things would change I am sure.

All I know is that the BA we have been supporting and flying is gone.

We had great friendships, great laughs and BA has been the best Airline worldwide hands down. We have proudly promoted BA wherever we go. I have even wiped your restroom floors and toilet seats when dirty out of embarrassment for 'our' faithful British Airline.

Goodbye old friend....

I'll never fly BA again. They charged me $800 when I had to cancel one leg of my flight due to a change. And they routed me to an Indian call center where they clearly do not speak intelligible English!

I booked two business class return tickets from Costa Rica where we live to London Gatwick via a call to the UK and using a UK credit card for a sterling transaction. They added 120 pounds foreign transaction fee and refused to change it. We will use honest airlines in future.

Such a shame to see the ongoing demise of this once known as 'worlds favourite airline'. I won't spend unnecessary time explaining in minute detail what's happened but instead focus in key facts.

1. Went to change date of paid bus class ticket. Cost £150. System crashed twice. Call BA told 'systems not working try later'

2. Try again within 12 hours, price to change now £500. Call BA explain situation told someone will call me back. They never did.

3. Check online account next day and can see new flight details so feel happy and assume BA changed flight for me hence why no one called me back.

4. 2 days later I try to check in but can't. Call BA only to be told that need to pay £2,000 for increased fare. Explain to them, wait over 1 hour no help.

5. Next day before travel explain again. No help.

6.Have to return home so pay the £2k and travel home but only after log complaint to BA customer service. Who promise to call me back in next day or so.

7. Customer service call me back 3 days later to advise they are looking into it and need to trace the call I made in step 2 and they will call me back before end of the week.

8. End of week arrives no one from BA has called.

9. I call BA - wait 15mins on dedicated GGL line - to be told someone will call me back.

10. BA Call me back and advise they found the call can clearly hear what happened. They can't explain why no one called me back and can neither tell me what I could have done differently, I explain that I've ended up spending more because of their systems not working (this includes human system). Told 'sorry' but that's the end and I can't escalate any further...

So, Dear BA above is a great example of how to lose a loyal, 20 Bus class flights pa, head of a business that spends approx $1mn pa with you. Travelling BA, Virgin, Emirates, Singapore is largely same - has become commodity. Customer service is the only differentiator.

Oh, the good news. Above is great content for a case study that we can use with OUR clients across 5 continents - thank you BA, you're a real class act!

British Airways and the sarnies saga:

http://cyprus-mail.com/2017/03/19/british-airways-sarnies-saga/

Thanks Brian, this is an interesting read on the current status of BA. I had no idea easyJet and Ryanair both now carry more passengers than British Airways. It sounds to me like BA staff are as unhappy as BA passengers and this is surely a recipe for disaster.

I booked Business seats for my wife and me on British Airways via the Destinia travel agent from Cairo to London Heathrow and return from London to Cairo (BA154 & BA155). I booked the flights online two months before the traveling date. I have received an email from BA to confirm my booking as business class, and full payment made successfully.

On the return journey in Heathrow Terminal 5 at the checking in desk they astonished me by telling me that my class will be a downgrade from business to the economy they didn't say why. After more than 2 hours arguing with BA’s staff in a very stressful environment full of frustration, they allowed me to meet with the customer service manager at the lounge of Terminal 5.

The BA customer manager told me that British Airways usually oversells the seats of business class.

The BA customer manager in Terminal 5 lounge has promised me to refund the fares difference within one day plus 300 GBP compensation if I accepted to move to economy class on the same day of traveling day.

My wife and I became so frustrated, exhausted and stressed due to this argument lasted for 2 hours. Therefore I had no choice to accept the offer of BA customer service manager. She gave me 300 GBP compensation.

However till now British airways did not refund the fares difference, this is completely unfair since business seats cost more than $2000 each.

A terrible airline that treats customers like units, takes greed and rudeness to another level, and their so called customer relations managers are an utter disgrace, to think they are Britains flagship carrier is a very sad indictment as to how this nations world wide reputation for fairness, understanding and empathy with others must be seen first hand, and when i turned to the big sign at terminal five that says A WARM WELCOME FROM BRITISH AIRWAYS and said to the two unbelievably rude customer relations reps, that sign makes me ashamed to be British after the way you have treated me, the response i got from them was WE DONT CARE!! Thats the gods honest truth, says it all really.

Just a rip off to say the least, a family member called direct for a flight between Vancouver to Rome to British Airways, (her friend booked early and got it for 650 return) and got quoted a high $1990 fare, and due to the agent saying it was booking up, she booked it. I thought that was a bit high, and checked British Airways site, expedia, and various other sites, and the same flight (exactly) was $1100.00, 36 hours later. Of course Bristish Airways would not make a adjustment on the price- claim it was not agent mistake, and one has to wonder about them, shameful indeed. Not a way to retain future customers, I know I will never book with them.

My story is so long in only 3 1/2 days I can't give all the details.  Short story is flew from Glasgow to London/Heathrow on BA 9:15 AM 9 July 2016.  They left every single bag for passengers terminating in London in Glasgow, every single one!  We had two bags. It is now, 12 July 2016, 16:00 London time and I received only 1 bag in the US 9 hours ago.  They have no idea where my second bag is (even though they are on the same claim) and they closed the claim!

I have spoken to them close to a dozen times and their customer service is the absolute worst I have ever experienced, not just in airlines, but any industry.  They have cut of my call once, and twice while talking to a rep, put me in a loop where you get a male voice repeating 2 words you can't understand every 5-10 seconds.  I believe they do this purposefully when they get passengers that are too upset for them to handle and they don't want to deal with you. 

Anyway, I highly recommend that people avoid flying BA if at all possible.  Still waiting for the whereabouts of my bag and an hour ago the customer service rep told me to "be patient, don't get irritated and give us another 24 hours."

Words cannot describe how inept they are.  DO NOT FLY BA.

Just booked flights with BA - first of all website journey was shocking (actually Easy Jets is much much better) and it kept booting me out half way through and it took 5 attempts to book long haul from Glasgow to Vegas. When it finally let me book lots of hidden costs only presented at the after purchase that are not made explicit before booking - £37 each person each way to reserve seat and £120 if we want to put luggage in the hold!!! What's happened to you British Airways...you've changed! Not a good customer experience at all

BA sells "airport upgrades" from one class of service to next, I discovered.  They're not cheap, but to avoid the back of the plane ...

1. Go to Biz lounge.  Can't do it. You've done it too many times this year.  (The mind simply boggles at that idea.)
2. Go downstairs to "customer service".  Can't do it. Full
3. Go to First lounge: No problem, but an even huger sum £649 to TLV, while it's $599 from TLV to LHR.

$600 for a five-hour flight is quite enough thank you.  $1000+, they can forget it.

But what were the first two up to?

Idiots.

Travel on 28/03/16 from Heathrow to Frankfurt 

Summary:

BA have just screwed up big time, totally ruining our holiday. Unbelievable as it may sound, our experience was as follows:

1. Cancel our first flight and push us to next day
2. Block us on their website from rebooking a suitable flight, forcing a 03:00 am start
3. Send us to the wrong gate and fail to give early notice of the mistake
4. Fail to have necessary staff at the plane to achieve a scheduled departure
5. Employ an un-airworthy aircraft, raising questions about maintenance standards
6. Appear indecisive in how to respond causing embarrassing delays.
7. Make a huge debacle of transferring passengers to the replacement aircraft
8. Fail to put our luggage onto the aircraft, and have a record of the second bag
9. BA staff knowingly send us without our luggage and conceal this from us
10. Provide inadequate customer service at Frankfurt
11. Fail to be pro-active in supporting us in a situation of their making.

Being retired, we had saved up for the holiday and special four day treat of a luxury room in the Frankfurt Hilton. While it is accepted there was some bad weather on the scheduled departure date (28/03/16). Many flights to Frankfurt went to schedule,  BA could have done more to get its customers to their destination on the day. The abysmal performance of BA in handling our travel completely ruined our holiday. The stress of the cancellation and delays were bad enough, as seniors to be left at Frankfurt with no luggage or proper customer assistance was enough to give my wife and I, a heart attack. Added to this was my worry at the consequences BA losing my important medication.

We were not alone with these problems arriving at Frankfurt. Significant anger was shown by the majority of passengers who struggled to comprehend what was happening to them. The reputation of BA and how they treat customers was extremely low.

From the disaster you have made of our holiday, we will never entrust our travel arrangements to you again

Incident log:

28/03/16

1.1 Travelling to the airport we receive a text message at 09:24 to say flight BA0908 is cancelled. The text informs us we have been provisionally booked on BA0902 the following day (29/03/16).

1.2 We return home.

1.3 Back home we tried to rebook the flight using “Manage my Booking” on BA.com website. Numerous attempts to book a different flight failed, resulting in message “unexplained error”. Faced with being unable to resolve this, we decided our only option was to accept the 07:05 BA0902 booking for the following day (29/03/16).

29/03/16

2.1 Up at 03:00am arrived at Heathrow T5 at 05:00. Check-in documents state departure is from gate C65. Waiting with other passengers at gate C65 is becomes obvious that something is wrong. Enquiries discover the flight is not at C65, it is gate A8. All waiting passengers then rush back from C terminal to A where they started. While waiting at gate A8, BA announce the cabin crew are being sought and the flight will be delayed until all members of staff have arrived

2.2 At this point BA ask for volunteers to check their cabs luggage in at the gate to relieve pressure on internal storage. To try and help, we checked our cabin luggage in as requested.

2.3 Boarding finally complete and ready to depart, the Flight Deck announce that a passenger is unwell and will be leaving the aircraft. This will result in further delays while their luggage is located and removed from the aircraft.

2.4 Passenger issue dealt with, the aircraft is pushed back from the stand. After a short delay the Flight Deck announce that one of the engines is defective and will not start. This will result in delays while engineers are consulted. The aircraft is then towed to a remote standing area. Some time later the Flight Deck announce that the aircraft has a faulty fuel control valve and cannot be repaired for the flight. A change of aircraft will need to happen but there are problems locating another Boeing 767, necessary to accommodate all the passengers. The Flight Deck inform us that the faulty part is the cost of a small house and BA does not carry spares. A member of the cabin crew inform us that the faulty aircraft is 30 years old, inferring the problem is related to the age of the aircraft. With serious delays now evident, the Flight Deck ask for passengers who do not wish to travel, to come forward. The tone of this announcement is friendly. The numbers of leavers are established and are insufficient to allow the flight to continue on a smaller aircraft. Flight Deck now announce any passengers leaving the aircraft are taking themselves off flight and will not get a refund. There is a noticeable change of tone in the second announcement. Cabin crew decide to serve a drink and roll.

2.5 After what seems like another couple of hours waiting for another aircraft to be found, buses finally arrived to transport us. With passengers finally seated on the replacement aircraft, Flight Deck announce there are problems reconciling the passenger numbers. Frantic activity then follows by BA staff up and down the aircraft with passenger lists. It is clear to everyone that there is a problem that staff are struggling to deal with. A seat by seat check is then made of every passenger. To our surprise we are told that our names do not appear on the passenger list. We are reassured by cabin crew that everything is in order.

2.6 The aircraft finally takes off. The atmosphere among passengers was not a happy one and reflected what was considered to be unacceptable performance by BA staff in handling the situation. By now it was obvious to us that the cabin crew were weary and embarrassed with the situation. Many passengers were also victims of flight cancellation the previous day. This 07:05 flight finally landed at Frankfurt at 13:35.

2.7. Waiting for 45 minutes at the baggage carousel it became clear that our, and other passengers baggage was missing and had not arrived with the flight.

2.8 After locating and arriving at the British Airways desk in Frankfurt, only one check-in desk was manned. We had to join the long queue and wait approx 45 minutes to be attended. On handing over the two baggage receipt tags (no’s 013120 and 017684, we were told our luggage was still in London and would be sent over on a later flight. Incident reference FRABA86401 was issued.

2.9 Being stranded at a strange airport without our luggage and unsure how to deal with the situation, our first thoughts were to try and return to Heathrow . The response from BA was that we would have to buy another tick at additional cost.

3.0 Fortunately located in the city centre we had to purchase essential toiletries and emergency items as there was no indication if or when we would receive our cases.

3.1 At 16:28 we receive a text message from Worldtracer to say one bag (tag ref 013120) was en-route from London. No reference was made to our second bag (017684), (the one we handed over to the airline staff at the gate). All online enquiries only showed the original one bag checked in at arrival at Heathrow. As this bag contained important medication, we made several frantic calls to the BA Missing Baggage people at Frankfurt at considerable cost.

3.2 At 22:15 the first bag (ref: 013120) arrived at our hotel. Our other bag (ref:017684) containing vital medication arrived the following day.

3.3 So distraught and upset by the whole experience, we cancelled all our scheduled plans and activities in Frankfurt. The time spent in the hotel recovering from the ordeal left one day for sightseeing.

Conclusion:

Although we were thanked for our patience, no-one apologised for the unacceptable service. A telephone call, text or e-mail with an apology and a token gesture of goodwill would have been much appreciated to lessen the pain and disappointment. You are quick to communicate with offers for us to spend more money, less so when things go wrong. For a moment we thought we were the cast in a movie called Carry On Flying. Not willing to experience anything like this this future, we have decided never to fly again, certainly not with BA. Hard as it may seem, this is a true account of how we were treated by British Airways. It also raises serious questions about the competence of them to operate an airline service.

We suggest your slogan should be British Airways Takes No Care of You.

Ray & Estilla Collington

So it's March 29th, the day after Storm Katie and Flight 778 from LHR to Stockholm is delayed for over three hours.  It's not because of the storm (all the other flights from here are going on time) - it's because there is no crew to fly an A320 available at Heathrow airport, and it's going to take over three hours to call in a reserve crew.  How can this happen at BA's home airport?

I also asked about a meal voucher, because I seem to remember that proper airlines give those out for delays over 2 hours, but was told they are not offering anything.

In September I was served a premium economy meal on a BA flight from JFK that was so bad it choked me. After lengthy correspondence I gave up on both customer relations and their CEO, Keith Williams, and filed a County Court Claim against them. It reads -

When the booking was made BA had inflated their fares in the run up to a fare sale. That means the transaction breached the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 and possibly also Section 2 of the Fraud Act 2006. In simple terms BA claimed that the fare quoted was ‘lowest available’ at a time when they knew it was nothing of the sort.

To compound the offence BA also failed miserably to live up their promise of service on the flights involved. I flew London (Heathrow) to Boston on 11 September 2015. Our outbound flight departure was delayed, which was a minor inconvenience compared to the abysmal service provided by BA during the return flight on 16 September 2015.

Because it was an overnight flight I booked a seat in World Traveller Plus (Premium Economy) to get extra leg room and better cabin service. The BA description of World Traveller Plus reads - 'small, intimate cabins with expert, attentive service' along with 'delicious meals and full bar service'. The BA website goes on to promise, 'three-course meals crafted to perfectly match the time and duration of your flight' and, 'a premium dining experience, featuring high-quality ingredients, fine china and linen napkins.' What we actually got was the economy meal option served in china with metal cutlery. 
The BA website also claims World Traveller Plus offers an enhanced entertainment package and more leg room, neither of which were apparent – in fact the entertainment package was identical to regular economy. We shared the cabin services and toilets with regular economy, the food was rubbish (in fact the food in Economy outbound was better) and the drinks trolley came round once. I suffered a serious choking fit after trying to eat a disgusting pasta meal that was part cooked/part reheated/part overheated and was then offered no further food until the ‘breakfast’ (a little cardboard box containing inedible snacks - identical to the economy breakfast) came round about six hours later. To falsely describe this as a ‘Premium’ service goes way beyond misleading into the area of fraud by misrepresentation.

I have contacted BA without success. In fact I referred both issues directly to BA’s CEO, Keith Williams. At the time of writing they had refused to refund the £181 overcharge and failed to respond to my complaints about service on the return flight.

Since that claim, which BA are contesting, they have also refused to honour a 20% offer on Avios points purchased with Tesco ClubCard vouchers and tried to bump up the fares on a pre-booked trip for my 65th birthday next February by £300. I'm getting nowhere fast on the Avios, they're just ignoring me. I have now cancelled the birthday trip and re-booked it with Virgin Atlantic but BA are still sending reminders and trying to bill me for the balance.

I've also got another interesting little tale about BA. In October I flew with them to the Cayman Islands on one of their ancient Boeing 767s - this is the same type used on the Calgary route that generated the recent 'Widower made to stand' story. I had an exit seat and was told that because the aircraft was being flown 'short-crewed' the passengers in the exit rows were responsible for evacuation. We then had a briefing that omitted the required visual check for hazards outside the aircraft, like fire, before opening the door. Next thing was the safety video crashed so we went back to the old-style pre-flight briefing. The plane was 25 years old and showing every day of it.

Good luck with your claim John. From what I understand, legal action often seems to be the only way to get BA Customer Relations to respond.

Three years ago we were forced into a downgrade from First to Business on a trip from Phoenix to LHR. Once again, this week on an AA code share from LHR to PHL we were again forced into a downgraded from First to Business. Trying to get a refund of the points we paid for the trip is impossible - you think that they would at least refund a portion of the $1100 in taxes and surcharge fees levied for a First Class ticket.

I had a semi flexible ticket from london to Brussels. I was sick during the night and assumed that I would be able to use the ticket for another flight (ticket was over £338 - I am a gold member) - how wrong was I! BA treats "no shows" as cancellation and passenger is not entitled to either a refund or rebooking. I booked my next flight with LUFTHANSA and will continue to do so. They just lost a loyal customer. DON'T FLY BA!

I hate BA with a passion but this behaviour seems reasonable to me. Unless you let them know within a reasonable time that you do not intend to fly, they can't offer the seat to someone else.

I booked a trip home on Christmas day this year and BA decided to cancel my flight. Meaning I'd not be able to spend Christmas with my family which I hadnt seen for 7 years!

They said there was no flights on Christmas this year. Well why book me one and cancel it...

That's not the worst part. They wouldn't let me move it with out paying over $300 in fees and if I cancelled the flight I'd only get the taxes I paid and none of the cost of the flight back. I was on the phone with them for 3 hours and they basically just kept repeating themselves over and over...

BTW they were Indian so that was a barrel of monkeys there. I just wanted to come on here and tell everyone to never ever book with British airways! And I'm British. FU BA!!!!!

This is with a heavy heart that I write this letter to you this morning. I received a call from my mother in SA this morning to advise me that my father passed away at 6am this morning. No I am fully aware that this is not your problem, but this is where BA’s inflexible policies and serious lack of customer service comes in.

I am trying to book a flight for my son, wife and I to get to SA as quickly as possible.

My wife and I had pre-booked tickets to Washington to visit my son. We booked World Traveller Plus seats and used my BA Gold upgrades to move us to Business Class. I phoned the BA Gold helpline this morning to see if I can change the tickets to fly directly to Johannesburg instead of Washington.

I have now been advised that we have to downgrade to Economy, will lose our upgrade vouchers, and have to pay GBP 1600 per person in addition to the original cost of the ticket.

I am not going to explain any further, this is the worst of the worst. It happened last year as well when my dad had a heart attack and I had to bring my flight forward by a day, it cost me GBP 2000 for a lower class seat.

What a wonderful Company you manage !!!!!! But then you are making the policies !!!!!

I cannot wait to get BA out of my life when I change employment. I am even willing to forfeit my 1.5m airmiles.

I am now flying tomorrow night after having had to pay the excess purely because I don’t have a choice - this is how you exploit your customers.

I will definitely make this well know on social media, you have pushed me too far this time during a very sad period in my life. Knowing how you operate I am more than happy to make a death certificate available to ensure you that i am not making this up.

Disgusting treatment to say the least !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My wife just called crying after boarding because BA staff would not trouble themselves to effectively find 2 seats together for my wife and 13 year old daughter. Our family trip had to be staggered to minimize time away from home so our tickets were booked under different reservations. However, I checked on this in advance and BA stafff told me on the phone "no way will staff not ensure that mother and daughter can sit together". Then 23.999 hours before flight we went online and tried to reserve seats together each time it looked like two seats were together they came up as occupied when we tried to reserve. At check-in we were assured that everything would be done to seat them together. I was not present but obviously they did not try too hard to find anyone to switch, any seats anywhere. WHEN DID BRITISH AIR STAFF not only stop caring, but STOP BEING HUMAN ?

On June 3rd at about 6:30am, I got to Heathrow to catch my flight to Italy. I only had my carry on bag as my main luggage went from Toronto all the way to Italy so I had no bags to check. I went to a BA rep to get my passport checked and whatnot. He asked me if I had any bags to check. I told him no, this is my carry on. He asked me to put it on the scale. I said ok, but it's my carry on. He said he needed to see it. So I put it on the scale. As I was getting my passport ready to give to him, I noticed my bag was gone. I said excuse me, where is my bag? He said and I quote "oh no, I am sorry ma'am" He got his co-workers attention at the next desk over and said "I put this lady's carry on through bag check with no tag" She said there is no way she can get it now. So he called down to bag claim and informed me that my bag would either be at the gate before I boarded or it will be in Bologna when I get off my flight. When I arrived at the gate to board my flight, I spoke to two people. A gentleman and a lady who asked me “did one of my BA reps do this?” I said yes. She took down my information (name, email, phone number, and the contact info of where I was staying in Italy) and told me she would keep me posted on the whereabouts of my bag. When I got to Bologna, we spoke to Antonio in Lost and Found. He gave us the number to file a claim, took the description of my bag and told us that as soon as the bag comes, they will ship it to where I was staying. I still have not heard anything from the lady who took down my information at Heathrow. To this day, I have still not heard anything. Instead of being updated on the whereabouts of my carry on, I had to purchase two calling cards in order to call London because nobody was calling me. The lack of customer service was atrocious. After I got through to a BA rep, they informed that my bag would be delivered to me the next day. I did not receive my bag after 4 days.  As a result of not having my carry on, I could not purchase anything due to the fact that my wallet was in my carry on. I could not eat, store my contacts, wear my glasses and could not take my medication. I complained to BA via Twitter and they told me that they would compensate me for "essentials" and to send my receipts. I did just that and they declined my claim. First of all, they kept saying my bag was delayed. This is not an everyday occurrence where a bag gets delayed. This man failed to do his job properly and put my CARRY ON through to bag check with NO TAG after I told him twice that it was my CARRY ON. I don't think carry on's go missing on a daily basis due to being put through to bag check after he was basically told not too. In a special situation like this, I would expect BA to take ownership of their mistake and go above and beyond and compensate me for the 91 Euros that I am asking for. I could be asking for a free trip or upgrade to first class when I came back home, but all I am asking for is what I had to pay for in the 4 days that I did not have my bag due to an incompetent BA rep. This has been going on for almost a month now and I refuse to give up because what this man did was wrong. It may have been a mistake, he obviously was not listening to me and not paying attention, but BA has done nothing to help me. Attached is my Twitter conversation with about 10 different BA reps (which is also very unprofessional. There should be one rep assigned to one issue). British Airways lack of customer service is disgusting and I am working on going to the media with my story because it is not everyday that an airline rep loses someone's carry on. Goes without saying that I will never fly with them again. They deserve to be boycotted and thrown out of business!

Pre-booked a seat at a price for a friend, and on check-in, seat was not available.  Demanded a refund, and one idiot told me the payment will be made to refund the money, and they were sorry for the inconvenience.

Later, and much later some other moron informs me that it will now not be refunded, because they decided not to.

Complained again, and now have a fourth reference case number issued.  Not a single reply.

These people mug you in every way possible.

Pathetic.  Shambles.  Disgraceful

BA is really the worst airlines to travel in. I cannot make any changes to my online booking! When I call their inefficient customer care service no one picks up. For the cost of their ticket, they ought to be giving a lot more. This is really the limit!

I lost my phone at the business lounge. When I told an aircrew about the lost phone as soon as I got into the airplane, somebody called the lounge. Luckily, I was told that my lost phone was found at the lounge and my name will be attached to the phone. However, the aircrew said that I have to make a claim through the lost and found office to receive the phone. When I made claim through the lost and found office, they said the phone was not received. I learned from the BA customer office that BA contract out the lost and found business. BA said they are not responsible for my lost phone even though BA employee found it and informed me that it was found. As you can guess, the lost and found would not be responsible, either. It means technically, BA employee can have any lost items without any responsibility.

I now understand why the Heathrow airport got a nickname “Thiefrow”.  Obviously, this system has something wrong and should be fixed by law I think but I do not know how.

I checked in online but there was an 'error' when printing out my boarding pass so I was prompted to get a print-out at the airport. However when I got there they would not print it out stating that I had missed a check-in cut off time by two minutes.

When I bought the tickets AND when I was managing my booking online there was no indication of a 35 minute cut off. I was mortified. If they had clearly indicated this essential fact when booking/checking in I would have happily complied; even if the flight I was schedule to take was only an hour long. 

They would not let me fly, tried to sell me another ticket which was three times the price of the original, and were extremely rude.

So disappointed BA: NEVER AGAIN

Even when I call BA silver line, wait times exceed 45 minutes in the US. This is ridiculous as no one has 45 min during the day to wait. How poor and uncaring can BA be? Every time you call they say they are experiencing long wait times and they urge you to go on line. If the matter could be resolved on line, why would I call them anyway. And after 45 min, sometimes they transfer you to another agent. The agents are rude and grumpy (Get another job if you don't like what you do). The club world product is 15+ years old and so outdated. Coupled with poor ground and phone service, this miserable airline is best avoided.

British Airways was overbooked so they cancelled our tickets on day of travel. We have been travelling for so many years with many other airlines but this is the first time it has happened to us. Very difficult to reach their customer service hotline to claim a refund on our Best Western hotel reservation. I will never travel by British Airways again.

I'm in Heathrow Airport. Just arrived from San Francisco, waiting for my connecting flight to Milan, which of course, is late.

Just few considerations regarding the 10 hours San Francisco - London flight: 1) Very full, fairly old and slightly dirty plane 2) Entertainment system in my economy seat was the size of a telephone 3) It was broken anyways 4) I asked if any of the hostess could fix it, indeed they couldn't. 6) Food was terrible. Really terrible.

I'm a frequent flyer with Cathay Pacific and Emirates, I flew Lufthansa, Quantas, Asiana, Dragon Air, Alitalia,  etc. in the past and I have to say, British Airways has been definitely the worst so far.

I hope my connecting flght to be boarding soon, it is already more than 1 hour late.

Cheers

I booked a flight from Fresno, Ca to Barcelona Spain and All the airlines gave me my seat number BUT British Airways said I had to pay 86 dollars for my wife and I (in 70's) or wait until 24 hours before flight and then they said we may not sit together.  HOW stupid and Greedy?  If they have seats with some advantage such as more leg room then let people pay for that but give me my seat in economy so I  can sit next to my wife.  Anyway I cancelled my flight with them and took another airline that ended up saving me 500 dollars in airport taxes.  Yep British Airways sucks.

My story can be listened on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVxP0ZCQK1w

Also embedded here for convenience:

I was downgraded from category C to category W in my fight from London to Calgary.

My complete fight was from Madrid to Calgary and I was not informed of anything until the fight was about to take off.

The manager of this fight threatened to me saying if I did not accept the downgrading, she was not able to offer to me any hotel until next fight.

I am a frequent traveler of One World and I am very disappointed with the treatment I received.

Me and my family were going to Dallas from Helsinki on March 2013. We had bought tickets via net. We needed to change flight at Heathrow, London. Both flights were operated by BA and they were sold us as a packet. We were first timers, but we thought that 95 minutes should be enough to change from one terminal to another (T3 to T5) because at that point we had no reason to believe otherwise.

After planning they kept the doors shut maybe 15 minutes. The trip turned out to be an endless series of corridoors, lining, bus trips, lining, running, lining, security checks, taking a train. We really tried our best, never stopped anywhere, never got lost but missed the gate about 20 minutes. They wrote us new tickets but we had to pay for these over 1000 pounds, because we couldn't explain why we were late - that's what we would have liked to know also.

The time from plane to the gate was only 75 minutes + an extra 15 minutes waiting on the plane gave us only 60 minutes to run the 90 minutes route.

Of course we complained but in vain. First response was: 'you must understand the plane cannot wait for you' (of course, that was not the point) and 'please come back soon'. I was not happy with these answers and wrote back and asked about why we were kept on the plane.

This time we were told to phone to a number. I did. We were told there to write a letter and put all papers and receipts to an envelope, this will sure clear out. After six weeks I phoned back and asked what's happening? Why no response? 'You have been answered already ' (and that date was two weeks before they asked me to write my story to them!) That must beat even the speed of light!

I have wrote again and asked what we did wrong, after trying to reach the gate as best as we could, but I must be now on some black list because I get no answer at all anymore. 

And that is the 'best customer relevation' in the world as they keep telling me... I sure don't want to know who's having the worst.

Do I fly again on BA? Well... nooooo.

The worst possible experience with British Airways that took over 36 hours to get to.... no resolution.

My guest was supposed to fly from Granada Spain to Washington DC. She was not allowed to check in because of incompetence of an agent in the Spanish airport, who thought that her documents were not in order (which we later confirmed where perfectly fine - but the boarding closed by that time).

The itinerary is owned by British Airways, who refused to help with the change because their records show a "no show." But before it even got to the point of getting a non-negotiable refusal from BA, we were not able to even get any response from BA.  Why? Because they will ONLY speak with the passenger (independent of who paid for the ticket) - they cit British data protection policy, yet make no attempt to make it convieniet for passangers, who do not speak English.

The Spanish office is only open M-F and there's no other way to get support in Spanish.  They outright refused to have an interpreter, refused to help and deemed the entire itinerary as forefeited (THE ENTIRE ROUND TRIP).

We ended up buying a brand new ticket for $1,000 in addition to the $900 we had already spent. Moral of the story: if you don't speak English, BA will not help. If you have a problem, BA will wash their hands, but will grab your money and run.

BA lost me and my family as a customer. I will tell this story over and over to everyone I know and will use all my power to get BA delisted from available airlines in my company (over 100,000 employees worldwide) from our corporate travel site. Shame on BA!

I flew BA 13 days ago from Rome to London to Los Angeles. The flight attendants where disgusting to the passengers, rude, obnoxious, no respect. The second flight the TVs were the size of an iPhone, it had very low quality head sets (AF has better ones), low movie selection, very very very disgusting meals, overcooked not enough. No seat selection online so no window seat and then I arrive at LAX and what happens? The luggage is still in **** London. It was delivered 4 days later. Worst airline ever. What am I gonna get on the return flight?

Yesterday I took a flight from Dublin to Heathrow, which got delayed by an hour, which I was told is typical for that particular flight route. This in itself was not a real problem, but what happened on arrival was entirely avoidable.

Apparently as the result of only having four ground staff on duty, hold luggage was not unloaded until over an hour after disembarking, which meant not getting out of arrivals until significantly after midnight. For those who know London, Heathrow's bus and train links do not operate between midnight and 6am, so faced with the choice of a taxi and sleeping in the terminal building I opted for the former. And at £110 that was more expensive than the flight.

I hope BA are not serious in being a standard bearer for the 'British' brand, because stuff like this trashes it.

Let me preface these comments by saying that I’ve flown 3.25MM air miles since 1975 on just about every airline, everywhere.  On a recent quick (2.5 day) trip to London I choose British Air because I could split my class of service going Business Class from Boston to Heathrow overnight to take advantage of the ‘flat bed’ sleeper (given a full day of meetings upon arrival) and returned ‘World Traveller’ because I wasn’t going to sleep on the way back and it was another $1,000 for Business Class.

The Business Class experience was at it’s best pathetic.  An offered buffet meal in a cheesy lounge that was near impossible to find prior to the flight.  A claustrophobic cubicle of a seat that while flat came in two pieces (one of which sagged and no one could fix it), a virtually non existent flight crew and amenities you would not give out a ten year old’s birthday.  But props to the marketing folks for making it all look so inviting and ‘rich’ on the web site. (I guess that’s where my money really went to these chaps who deserve a bonus for ‘spin’.)  Then, we landed at the outer edge of the airport (late) only to be bussed around the entire facility and then just disgorged into Terminal 5. Forget any expedited service through customs as the consensus opinion amongst my fellow ‘elite’ travelers was that the ‘Fast (Premium) Lane was actually moving slower than the tourist class queue. In addition they were flying their Boing 777 with not one but two of the Business Class toilets ‘out-of-service.

The British Air Lounge is at best average and the shower rooms tiny to the point that it’s near impossible not to get your belongings wet as the shower leaks throughout the compartment.  So that was a $3,300 experience not to be repeated.

The return flight was full (not BA’s fault) the World Traveler experience weak, the meal something that cost under $5, they ran out of one of the entrees prior to getting half way through the cabin (then suggested an economy meal as an option) and the amenities something you wouldn’t hand out at a five year old’s birthday as a favor.  The plane (or at least the area all around my seat was full of debris from the last flight (despite the plane sitting at the gate for several hours prior to departure), service was almost invisible (the Flight Attendant’s Union must be fantastic at negotiating work rules as there is the absence of flexibility in their ability to respond to anything ad hoc); no one ever responded to the call button/light, they could not get the cabin or seat lights off making watching anything on the tiny screen almost impossible and the toilet was dirty, out of some products and leaking half way across the Atlantic and it took 10 minutes to get a tiny can of Diet Coke (not on the cart).  All for a mere $2,000.

Call me jaded or cranky or nuts but someone will not take customers for granted like this and win my business in the future? Or I’ll spend $50 on gourmet food that I take on board, have a chauffer drive me to the airport, reserve a room at a Heathrow hotel so I can change and be a few thousand dollars ahead.

I am sitting at Nice airport starving hungry and dying of thirst. My flight was canceled yesterday due to the air strike. That I can understand is not BA's fault. But I was told this mroning to make my way to the airport as my flight was scheduled for 13.00. But it is now 20.30 and I am still here. I have been refused food and drink at the BA desk, despite the fact that this is a clause of BA's own "Right to Care" statement, as shown on ther website. I have no money as I used the last of it to pay for my room for an extra night due to the flight cancellation. 

BLOODY DISGRACEFUL!!!!

After years of being a loyal customer of BA and accruing over 500k (now) Avios points over the years AND 2 voucher companions in the last 18 months, I decided its about time I made the most of these 'rewards'.

Having been looking for reward flights for months and having flexible dates I found 2...there are 4 of us. I complained to BA on many occasions and today, they still tell me that they 'understand and thank you for my letter' (but pi** off)!

I for one will not be flying with them ever again.