Another weekend, another BA disaster

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Viewing 8 posts - 1 through 8 (of 8 total)

  • SimonS1
    Participant

    So this weekend its 25+ flights cancelled and hundreds of people left without bags. Truly BA has become some form of bad joke….makes Ryanair seem classy.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10632557/MORE-chaos-Heathrow-Hundreds-British-Airways-passengers-forced-home-without-luggage.html

    3 users thanked author for this post.

    Tom Otley
    Keymaster

    It does seem to be a BA problem, although some reports say it is a Heathrow problem as well.

    I flew through T2 yesterday (with ITA Airways) and the airport at 4pm was quiet with no queues at Border Control and none waiting for bags either. Strange to think only a few hours later there is such a scene at T5.

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    esselle
    Participant

    [postquote quote=1206812]

    I think it is just hopeless for them to say their teams are working “incredibly” hard; it’s as if it is somehow supposed to balance the inconvenience being experienced by their customers, who of course expect them to be working incredibly hard.

    My view is that these poor customers would have been expecting the airline to be working “incredibly” hard to avoid these situations arising in the first place……….


    MartynSinclair
    Participant

    If the airline knew in advance about baggage and passengers not meeting in a timely manner at the destination, do passengers have the right to cancel or change tickets? Is the airline required to tell passengers at check in… ?


    SimonS1
    Participant

    [postquote quote=1206812]

    I thought BA did its own ground handling. The delays weren’t at the border, and the rest is down to them.

    What this and the Manchester debacle shows is that having moaned and whinged loudly for months, when it comes to getting the industry moving again those involved incompetence is front and centre. Quick to lay people off, slow to re-employ, penny pinching the name of the game.

    7 users thanked author for this post.

    StephenLondon
    Participant

    All of these issues (IT failures, flight delays and cancellations, inability to deliver baggage, inability to connect a jetway to an aircraft, inability to answer a phone, inability to process a refund, and the list goes on and on…) are all making BA one big laughing stock in the aviation industry. AF/LH/KL/AA/UA/DL/QR/EK/TK leadership (and many more) must be in fits of hysterics watching BA slide into an abyss. Are the BA senior leadership team and the IAG board so high up in their ivory towers these days they can’t grasp what a joke BA have become? Most people are still laughing at the CEO’s email to their “valued customers” about restoring BA to a premium carrier. How about functioning as an airline? If the board want BA to be a LCC, that’s fine…go right ahead. But let the customers know BA is going to be just like Level. But charge honest Level prices for the shambolic service that is sometimes being delivered. Meanwhile, previously loyal customers have discovered (or rediscovered) what a quality carrier is…elsewhere, not on board BA!

    6 users thanked author for this post.

    AMcWhirter
    Participant

    In another thread “Maccboy” said “As in all of these cases Manchester Airport are blameless. Handling agents are fined and could lose their operating licences should Manchester Airport and CAA seem fit.”

    Manchester Airport shambles continues

    Ought this to apply to Heathrow T5 ? Or is there a difference in that it appears BA itself does the ground handling at T5 ?

    I ask because ever since T5 opened there have been baggage issues of one sort or another.

    The Independent report dated March 2008. Registration required.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/disastrous-opening-day-for-terminal-5-801376.html

    Then two weeks later Evening Standard reported that T5 passengers’ bags “will be burnt if owners cannot be traced.”

    https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/thousands-of-lost-terminal-5-bags-will-be-burnt-if-owners-cannot-be-traced-6631364.html

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    FormerBA
    Participant

    Sadly this is not a surprise and has been building up for over a decade. In 2008 they fired hundreds of managers many of who had been there for 20 plus years and whose operational knowledge and dexterity had seen BA navigate the worlds most congested airport. The failure of T5 when it opened, was primarily a failure of senior staff who neither listed to, nor engaged with those doing the work. Heathrow Airport were equally culpable by not opening car parks and providing transport.

    Having lost the operation expertise, it was never recovered. Check-in agents became nothing more than supermarket checkout staff with no real idea of what they were doing and more importantly why they were doing it. I lost count of the times I have had to tell an agent on First check in desk what a 3 letter code stood for.

    Powers to act were stripped away leaving staff who were once capable of doing almost anything to recover a situation, entirely impotent to act.

    The pandemic saw many semi experienced staff desert the airline for rolls that were better paid and had less grueling hours.

    Just last week to my utter astonishment I discovered that there is no ticket desk or ticket servicing facility in T5, anywhere. I have a complex F class ticket that I need to make some adjustments to and was curtly advised they don’t have a ticket desk, I need to do it on line. When I pointed out the inability of most people to do anything on the BA site, the glazed look of disinterest descended. Just to be certain I asked in the lounge if I could get help and was told no

    BA needs a root a branch reset and on the performance of the last few weeks it is not going to happen any time soon

    10 users thanked author for this post.
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