[Anonymous]

[SimonS1]

Tonight’s Evening Standard business section.

A newly married couple arrived at Catania, Sicily at the end of their honeymoon for their BA flight to LGW. The flight was overbooked and the couple were told one of them would need to travel and the other wait until the next day. They paid £686 for an Easyjet flight to travel back together.

Story ends “BA recently changed its motto from “The World’s Favourite Airline” to “To Fly, To Serve”. Neither really seems appropriate”.

Oh dear.

[LuganoPirate]

I wonder if they got a refund, or if BA picked up the Easyjet fare?

In this case as they are travelling together, would just one get denied boarding compensation, or would they both?

Did BA offer them both the chance to stay overnight at BA’s expense?

Otherwise, and I’ve not seen the article, seems pretty shoddy on BA’s part!

[BA744fan]

One has to wonder somtimes if the people that make these decisions have been lobotomised. There can’t be any other explanation for their stupidity.

I don’t work for an airline but God blessed me with a bit of common sense. Surely an announcement could have been made to see if a passenger already checked in was prepared to give up their seat and be booked onto the next flight?

Yet another PR disaster that could so easily have been avoided.

[Shearer]

How do you know the story is accurate?

[lloydah]

-How do you know the story is accurate?

Well, as things are going for BA at the moment, it seem highly probable that it’s accurate.

[SimonS1]

http://www.standard.co.uk/business/cityspy/city-spy-funtime-at-the-awards-youre-having-a-laugh-8639042.html

About halfway down.

If it isn’t accurate BA will presumably be on the case.

[TominScotland]

I phoned the Evening Standard news desk last night to tell them that our BA flight was on time, that the service was great and that we all were delighted with the experience. They did not seem over interested……. And I doubt many of the posters here would be either!!

[Edski777]

Sorry Tom, positive news is no news.
Only the negative items will reach the frontpages.

On the other hand: analyze the several sites on the internet like BT, Skytrax, etc. You will find almost exclusively the most positive or most negative reviews. Why bother to report on getting what you expected in the first place?

[KeaneJohn]

I guess BA aren’t having a great time of it at the moment. But I have just had a pretty standard(great) flight. I have just flown from Heathrow to Newcastle with BA. Flight was delayed by 20 minutes because it needed a wheel to be changed. On arrival at Newcastle Flybe have cancelled today’s flight (well pushed it back to 9am tomorrow) to Newquay due to to the aircraft needing a tyre to be changed.

[pdtraveller]

TominScotland….you have valid point. Many millions fly with BA each year and for the vast majority it is fine (or acceptable) with no issues.
.
However it must also be acknowledged that BA dont help themselves. They have huge PR departments and spend millions on marketing yet split a couple on honeymoon. They will leave passengers sleeping in VCE whilst flying an empty plane home and all of this on top of leaving thousands sleeping on the floor of T5 following 2 inches of snow. They also appear to have left people on board an aircraft overnight following the disruption caused when the cowling doors were not checked by their own engineers and crew….not once but possibly as many as 6 times!

It is telling that following the 777 BA38 incident 5 years ago BA paraded the flight and cabin crew in front of the media milking the publicity for all it was worth. They are strangely silent this time.
These incident can happen to any airline and perhaps it is just the torrid UK press that choose to highlight them but even if that is true, why do they have no strategy to deal with these stories.

I fear that the problem is they have no strategy much as they also appear to have lost their way in terms of simple human customer service not to mention slipping down the league tables in terms of product development and delivery.

They remain a force to be reckoned with but I wonder how much of that is due to dominance at LHR rather than the real first choice of passengers.

[BigDog.]

Everything you have described @pdtraveller 15:50 is symptomatic of a company with low moral and no motivation. Gone are the days when loyalty, pride, quid-pro quo from being well led in an aspirational company meant that staff would go the extra-mile to help out their company when called upon.

Recently calls for all hands to the pump whether it is caused by snow, volcanoes, emergency landing backlogs etc have gone relatively unanswered as they see a bullying leadership merely taking, taking, and asking for more whilst lining their own pockets in the process. The goodwill account is empty. Morale is in the doldrums, and no one is inspired by a leadership who prefers a stick/threat and divide approach to building respect based and valued team dynamic.

People will still perform as a matter of professionalism and personal pride though they are no longer prepared to go the extra mile.

[millionsofmiles]

@BigDog

Yes, the great days are gone, the motivation.

I rememeber fondly about flying BA First often within Asia: KUL-JKT, MNL-HKG and such, but also from ORD to LHR and such.

Always, in F, the purser came along, welcomed you personally, asked about any special preferences, about a “libation” he could have prepeared for you. And even on these short flights a usually small hot and delicious meal was served. They gave you an overnight kit that deserved the name, leather and nice useful contents.

I actually looked forward to flying with BA in these days, I could have taken CX or other premium carriers, but preferred BA. Gone they are, these days..

[DontTurnRight]

The sad thing out of all of these stories is that the easiest thing for a company such as BA to turn around is their customer service and PR. Neither of these require rocket science, but just a common sense approach and a genuine care about their passengers and staff. My own experience would indicate that in the main, it is management and policy who are responsible for this and not the cabin crew or ground staff. I would love the opportunity to assist BA in addressing this.

[andystock]

Agree the Management are at fault for this PR mess at BA. Never had a problem with any BA cabin crew at all, always found them to be helpful, polite and hard working.

[Author]

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