[SergeantMajor]

Nanny has been fired for cavorting in an unseemly fashion with the under-butler in the pantry, resulting in some distressing handprints in my camembert.

Well, I fear you’ve fallen into the trap of misreading the stats, Mme Butterly.

No-one said 20% of BA’s flights were cancelled, cityprofessional wrote more like 30% were cancelled (95/310), hence more than 60% (nearly 70%!) actually did operate. Pretty impressive.

The quote about 70% cancelled related to the period 10am-5pm, a slower period of the day for BA departures as the airline has a lot of the higher value business-focussed slots which depart early in the morning and return late evening (the ones business people use).

Hence you could have a higher rate of cancellation during what appeared to be a large part of the day, but in fact end up with a relatively low percentage of total cancellations (and, of course, many flights simply operated later than usual, rather than being cancelled altogether).

No-one said anyone should “shut up and get on with it”, just that one can’t complain that it’s BA’s fault when the issues which might have sorted the situation (weather, ATC, runways, parking slots, safety constraints) simply are not within BA’s control.

Did BA get you where you needed to go?

[rferguson]

BA changed it’s policy on cancellations in IROPS’s a few years ago.

It used to cancel very few flights – instead nearly all flights would be delayed for hours and hours, often leading to the cancellation of the flight as the crew ‘went out of hours’. The result was an operation that took days and days to get back on track as aircraft and crews were all over the place.

As others have mentioned on this thread LHR operates at 99% capacity on a normal day. When that reduces to say 75% capacity 24% has to be taken out of the operation. HAL usually works with BA in cancelling tactical flights.

Although it is far from ideal and i’m sure painful for those on the flights concerned it does allow the operation to snap back to normal by the next day pretty much instead of impacting on people days later.

Thanks to technology that wasn’t used years ago: mobile phone APP’s with live flight information etc the pictures of people camping on the floor at the airport terminal are becoming more rare.

[Papillion53]

Never been called a tub of marg before!

Poor nanny has such low standards, under butler indeed! Mind you after a day with you, I’m surprised it was only the Camembert that had hand prints in it!

I wasn’t quoting cityprofessional either! if you read most reports of Saturdays flight cancellations, including the official report from NATS, the figure of 20% cancellations was proffered and even a suggestion that 90% of flights operated. I simply don’t believe that from what I saw!

The answer to your last question – NO!

[Matinée-Allstars]

I would echo rferguson’s last point

On Saturday I was due to go to BCN for a daytrip when the ATC problems hit

I checked the BA app at 0730 on the tube at Sloane Square on the way to LHR and found my 1000 flight had already been dalayed by 2 1/2 hours. A quick call to BA who allowed me to cancel my flight meant I was back home by 0900 avoiding the whole LHR experience on the day of disruption

Yes, I lost my flights but I wasted as little time as was possible, given the circumstances…. thanks to the BA app

[Papillion53]

Rferguson. – I do understand all of this, but what I just don’t get was the need to collect our already checked in bags, and then go landslide to be rebooked, yet again?

The wait in the baggage hall was horrendous, with no-one seeming to know what was going on, including the baggage hall manager. Now at some point, someone must have made the decision to get people to go get their bags, so one would like to think it was done after consultation with the baggage people, so it would be an organised collection, and not the shambles it actually was.

[Papillion53]

Matinee-all stars @12:47

Yes, we had the app ping too, but unluckily for us we had just arrived at T5 border control off a US flight and were still enroute! But it was around the same time, so it does work very well with the app and email notification too once we got to the lounge. And we were rebooked very quickly at the ticket desk before border control. But that all got cancelled in the end.

And by the time we got to the lounge, calling BAEC was another long queue on the phone!

[cityprofessional]

And the answer for me was also NO. And I’m still waiting for compensation for my costs to get to my destination (and the costs that were not incurred by BA – including taxes and fuel surchages)

SM, are you suggesting that all the other airlines at LHR which operated full schedules did so unsafely? I am just questioning why all other airlines managed such a full schedule and with so few delays

rferguson’s post is insightful. BA would rather cancel you and give you no hope of rebooking (MMB not working, telephone line hangs up), than delay you 2 hours, like other airlines. I certainly know which option is more customer friendly…

@Matinée-Allstars. Glad you could get through to BA. The number they gave me – an 0800 number, i.e. premium charged from mobiles – kept hanging up on me. And MMB doesn’t work from mobile browsers on Blackberries, Androids or the BA app on either – it kept asking me to check a box which didn’t exist

[rferguson]

Papillion totally agree – I don’t know why they cannot have more customer friendly arrangements allowing automatic rebooking for themselves and their bags allowing them to stay airside if they wish.

In the past there was just NO contingency. It was a case of just ‘let’s see how bad the weather gets and just get away which ever flights we can’. Of course it led to chaos for days and days. And even greater frustration for passengers who ended up sitting on a ‘departing’ aircraft for hours only for it to be cancelled anyway.

Again, the current situation is not ideal. But it’s a step up from how it used to be.

[SergeantMajor]

So, what should BA be doing?

Let’s please try and recognise that there is a genuine (and entirely reasonable) cost constraint in place, as well as take into account the operational and safety constraints imposed on BA by dint of Heathrow’s capacity problems.

Off you go:

[rferguson]

I think the rebooking process should be more automated. There may of course be constraints that I am not aware of IT wise – but I don’t see why people should be forced to collect their bags and then line up for hours (yes I have seen the snaking lines in T5 as I have passed through) to re-book. It would be great if the technology existed to text the passenger their alternative flight details and be able to just reply ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to accept or deny the new flights.

[canucklad]

SM.

To set the record straight, I’m not a BA basher

I’m definitely a neutral, if you’ve read my comments I praise when praise is due.

I’m instinctively a positive person, so I try and find positives in a company.

If other people on this forum believe I’m a BA basher then please let me know, so I can change my behaviour when it comes to BA.

The simple fact is this, many of my colleagues who used to fly BD now elect to use the train (albeit 1st class) to travel between Scotland and our London offices ,located just 10 minutes away from a big hub that’s home to our so called national carrier.

The primary reason is they can not trust BA to deliver a service that they have handsomely paid for.

In many cases this is down to BA repeatedly taking the easy option and cancelling, or rather shutting down their entire short haul network
.
And Tim, your last point is totally relevant- Squeezing blood out of a stone comes to mind, short term profit for shareholder dividends.

[ImissConcorde]

So glad to see this thread re delays/cancellations/bad customer service etc etc. The positive BA story re changes to Gold membership can be ignored!

[cityprofessional]

OK, SM, you asked…

First reduce cancellations:
1. Negotiate more slots from NATS – fair share of cancellations vs other airlines
2. Force cancellation of all freight flights (other airlines included – EK, SQ and CX’s 74Fs all went out on time – wasting slots)
3. Keep flying into night curfew – good way to catch up
4. Put slack in crew hours, so they don’t time out – crew are paid by the hour, so why make them fly in 5/6 hr blocks, rather than always being so close to timing out?
5. More flex from crew to work beyond hours – like all the Asian/Gulf airlines do
6. Spare (working) aircraft, so there’s some slack in the system (there should already be – it’s winter)
7. Fewer cancellations, more delays

Then if cancelled, make it easier for passengers
1. Automatic rebooking, by status order
2. Automatic endorsing onto other carriers and trains – this will reduce the backlog
3. Automatic refunds of services unused
4. Always keep last fljght of the day so that some pax (higher fare class/status) can get home
5. A working MMB on all devices
6. A working call centre
7. Hotel booking service – e.g. amazing service from United when I was stranded in IAD due to weather
8. Integrated IT system, so I get my SMS immediately, not 2 hours after I found out about cancellation online

[SergeantMajor]

Good stuff.

1. Negotiate more slots from NATS – fair share of cancellations vs other airlines
– sounds sensible, but then why should other airlines lose out disproportionately (say, asking EI to cancel 50% of its operation, when BA only sufferes 20%). Particularly as BA holds most of the shorthaul slots.

2. Force cancellation of all freight flights (other airlines included – EK, SQ and CX’s 74Fs all went out on time – wasting slots)
– don’t think the freight airlines can or should stand for the disruption this would cause their operations – just because passengers aren’t on them, doesn’t mean important time critical shipments (donation organs, animals etc.) should be inconvenienced

3. Keep flying into night curfew – good way to catch up
– not bloody likley unless the airlines/HAL won’t to pay the cost of night flight noise fines, why should the residents west of London suffer? Another reason to close LHR and build on the Isle of Grain. Night curfew not great for departures as other European airports also close and HAL staff would have to stay late (more union negotiations…). Plus no tube at later hour (until 2015…).

4. Put slack in crew hours, so they don’t time out
– would add massive, massive cost to the operation, are you prepared to pay higher fares? millions in extra costs for the rare disruption day simply isn’t good business sense.

5. More flex from crew to work beyond hours – like all the Asian/Gulf airlines do
– CAA regulations as well as (mostly) valid union concerns to contend with here. Safety should be paramount. Having said that the Disruption Agreement seems to be working better now it’s initiated by BA’s Management and not BASSA goons.

6. Spare (working) aircraft, so there’s some slack in the system (there should already be – it’s winter)
– would be nice, and they are on their way, but extra aircraft don’t help when you haven’t the space to store or park them

7. Fewer cancellations, more delays
– as rferguson artuculated, delaying rather than cancelling flight just stores up problems for the next day

Then if cancelled, make it easier for passengers
1. Automatic rebooking, by status order
– automatic rebooking is always challenging as different pax have different requirements; deffo need to contact customers and speak with them to ascertain their needs, an this can be difficult in a fast-moving irrops situations with many variables. Don’t see what status has to do with it – what about those who paid the most for the ticket, what about those on transfer flights via LHR, people heading to funerals etc. also think about the volume and time taken per call – at least 20 minutes per passenger, 150 per A320 soon adds up to a need for massive capacity at relatively short notice. Do-able (and should be possible) but again not logistically as easy as it may seem to write that bullet point, and would obviously be costly.

2. Automatic endorsing onto other carriers and trains – this will reduce the backlog
– sounds good, but not always available, but this is an area I think BA could do better

3. Automatic refunds of services unused
– again, good idea, but complicated by partial use of ticket e.g. once I was on board a flight and it was cancelled due to snow (at 1130pm) – shown as boarded, system probably takes that as flown, so while possible needs to refine data flags to ensure system is up to speed on this. What about two sector flights where one sector is flown, then a delay hits the second sector? Again, not quite as simple as may first appear

4. Always keep last fljght of the day so that some pax (higher fare class/status) can get home
– doesn’t stack up keeping empty seats which otherwise might get sold

5. A working MMB on all devices
– works fine on an iPhone

6. A working call centre
– better demand management is a key issue, and I think the recent changes will go some way to leveraging BA’s international call centres at times of IRROPS

7. Hotel booking service – e.g. amazing service from United when I was stranded in IAD due to weather
– good idea, though again IAD isn’t one of the world’s most expensive hotel markets like London is so BA is constrained as to what it can reaosnably offer before it hits the £200/night central London rates…

8. Integrated IT system, so I get my SMS immediately, not 2 hours after I found out about cancellation
– this is a key issue, and one which needs to be improved.

[rferguson]

1) Fly into noise curfew – something BA and HAL have been begging for for years.

2) More slack in max crew hours – these are regulated by the CAA. Of course BA would LOVE to be able to use discretion in extending crew hours. But unless it wants it’s AOC suspended, not going to happen.

The emphasis has to be on giving passengers the maximum amount of notice of delays/cancellations and current accurate information – and to ensure that technology is robust enough for them to stay informed and rebook themselves easily to get where they need to go ASAP.

Technology has to play the biggest part. BA (as do no other airline that i’m aware of) have a secret army of staff on standby to come into the terminals and rebook thousands of passengers. This place needs to be taken my automatic systems giving customers information and choice.

[Author]

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