[Nogbad01]

A quick story to illustrate how easily staff attitude can completely change ones attitude…

A few weeks ago I was scheduled to fly to Pisa to collect a car and travel on to Genoa for a meeting. This was all fairly last minute and the best option for me was a MAN-LHR-PSA routing with BA.

All was fine until the day before the flight I got a text alert from BA saying the LHR-PSA flight was cancelled.

Bit of a panic as getting everyone to Genoa at the right time had been a nightmare and it would not be an easy reschedule. So, I called the number on the text.

The woman who took the call was an example of how to do customer service (I wish I had taken her name). She talked me through options to get me to Milan instead (which would have been ok), but when I mentioned that I was actually trying to get to Genoa, she sorted me a route via Amsterdam on KLM which took me into Genoa. She was also able to reconfigure the car hire to be a one-way (Genoa to Pisa) for the following days return. Brilliant! No fuss, and as it was a full fair Y ticket on KLM, not without some cost to BA.

So the day of the trip arrives. I arrive at MAN and collect boarding cards for MAN-LHR, LHR-AMS and AMS-GOA.
Do the first 2 legs fine and have a couple of hours to kill at Schipol. Now comes the jobsworth.

I decided to wait in the BA lounge for the KLM flight to Genoa. Now I know, that lounge access is for people flying on flights or codeshares of the owning airline, so I did expect to have to explain myself (which I did) and no, still no chance. So I called the team who had rescheduled the flights for me and asked them to explain (they asked me to hand the phone to the lounge dragon so they could explain, and tell her it was ok for me to go in). However, she insisted she was not allowed to take calls from other companies. I explained that it was not another company, but it was her company. But no joy. She would accept emails however.

So. by the time the email came through, there was no time to sit in the lounge anyway.
First world problems, I know. But…

Exactly the opposite of the impression given by the first person.

[openfly]

That is an interesting comparison. Generally I find, like your experience, the Exec Club staff also very helpful and have actually given two Golden Tickets to the staff there.

It doesn’t surprise me that there was a problem at the BA AMS lounge. I use that lounge frequently. Over the last year BA has “eased out” it’s own staff there due to cutbacks. There are only 4 BA employed staff there now who BA is desperate to get rid of. The “welcome” desk is now manned mainly by the handling agent staff…many of whom were obviously trained at the United Airlines Passenger Handling school! If you are lucky enough to meet one of the original BA staff they will move the world for you…just like the old days of BA customer service! The handling agent staff….forget it. They have the knack of smiling at you and also letting you know that passengers are a nuisance…same staff at the gate!

[FDOS_UK]

TBH, I think BA managed your disruption well.

Personally, I wouldn’t have expected lounge access after re-routing on a different airline in Y.

FDOS, well known BA apologist 🙂

[Author]

Posts