Flights changed by a day to a different airport – what are my rights?

[Mart16]

Hi all
I have been emailed today my LHR flights to/from Heraklion have been moved forward a day (30 april to 1 May) and changed to LGW.
This is a slight inconvenience in terms of airport but not the end of the world. What is frustrating is my hotel is now requiring a payment of £700 to change the dates.
What are my rights in this regard?
Thanks

[Bill]

Ask the airline to reroute you from LHR on the original date of departure

[Mart16]

Thanks Bill – yes, clearly, this is the plan. Sadly as you probably know, less than straightforward with BA.

For context, avios + taxes club europe flight to Crete. Ba have cancelled and moved to the next day for both the out and return (no longer offering flights to Crete on our original date). We have (separately) already booked and paid for accom, so need those dates.

Obviously plenty of low cost carriers we could go with, but we do want to fly biz. No BA partners with convenient flights (my unsuccessful calls to date have included them suggesting an overnight flight via Helsinki – hardly ideal).

There *are* flights with Swiss in business, via Geneva, that work for us (from original airport, on original dates, only 40 min stopover). These are what we want, but on the phone, BA not entertaining whatsoever (usual stuff about being impossible/not showing as an option/not entitled to it). I think we are entitled to rebooking and therefore, how should I progress this?

Thanks to all in advance.

[Lady London]

I’d (1) book the Swiss flights, now if cashflow allows. They are looking quite cheap so before they increase. I know BA is going to end up paying whatever your replacement flights end up costing travelling in similar conditions as close as reasonably possible to your original time. But if your hotel arrangements mean you have no date flexibility there’s no point hanging around as the outcome here is clear -from what we know has been required to sort out BA’s illegal refusals on a constant basis.

I’d (2) pay Swiss only with UK credit card. Not chwrge card. This gives you Section 75 rights. Defo needed with Swiss as their behaviour on EU261 claims was already reported to be to ignore and refuse to pay even pre-Covid. That got even worse in Covid. Despite the fact that Swiss recently signed up to somw agreement promising refunds when due, I wouldn’t believe Swiss will behave correctly on this for one second, if they mess around with your flights. You are of course taking Covid rulechange risks that Swiss won’t help you out of and neither will card for that but the only thing for that is try to get some decent insurance.

Get BA to say “No is final answer ” if it’s not been 8 weeks you trying to resolve this or you haven’t asked 3 times. Secure your Swiss flights and follow the procedure on threads on this forum in the Flight Cancellations section and on the Daily Chat threads preceding the forum on the website. This topic is covered around every 2nd day constantly.

Basically send a tracked/recorded/signed for Letter Before Action to BA at Waterside address giving them 14 days to provide your rights as stated above as due to ground arrangements already made, you do need to travel as reasonably close as possible to original time and depart on same date failing which you will take further action.

Then mcol or go cedr on Day 15 or if you’re feeling kind on day 21. I’d do it on Day 15 as it’s really clear BA has made a commercial decision here as to which destination on which day is going to make them more profit for the use of the aircraft. Neither mcol nor cedr is likely to be decided by your travel date so make alternative arrangements now if you can.

On the return you have same rights but you could also accept the 1 day later flight and BA is fully liable for the extra hotel night (same place as you’re staying or something comparable at reasonable local rates at the time). Plus the usual 3 meals a day with nonalcoholic refreshments depending on your new flight timing, any extra transport to and from the extra day’s hotel if required, and internet. I’d book this extra night as a separate add-on asap in that destination (remember to tell the hotel you want to keep same roim if it’s the same hotel).

@SamG has said it should work to just keep the return they”re proposing aa the airline can delete the outward segments on your ticket and kerp the rrturn but be very, very sure you’ve told them you are not accepting the outbound but accepting the return change only, and being forced to buy a ticket elsewhere for the outgoing which you will be pursuing reimbursement of from BA via cedr or mcol as they,’ve refused to provide your legal right to reasonably close timing etc. Be absolutely documented on this as to calls and in the LBA.

Let us know what happens. EU261 was invented for cases like yours.

• This reply was modified 55 years, 3 months ago by .

[ChrisBCN]

Everything that LL says is correct of course, but I have one concern. Because returns are always cancelled if you don’t fly the outbound, you are relying on the right people taking the right actions at BA to keep your return alive. If they don’t, which is entirely possible and highly probable, you’ll be stuck at the airport trying to get home.

I don’t know how you could reasonably reduce this risk, so I would be tempted to come back on your original date via Swiss.

[Lady London]

ChrisBCN wrote:

Everything that LL says is correct of course, but I have one concern. Because returns are always cancelled if you don’t fly the outbound, you are relying on the right people taking the right actions at BA to keep your return alive. If they don’t, which is entirely possible and highly probable, you’ll be stuck at the airport trying to get home.

I don’t know how you could reasonably reduce this risk, so I would be tempted to come back on your original date via Swiss.

Yup @ChrisBCN that was my concern which is why I mentioned what @SamG said on another thread. Hopefully she’ll see this and confirm. Unfortunately this forum software doesn’t seem to send alerts to another poster when you mention them with @ .

[meta]

BA will not rebook you on any other airline other than OW unless they have an agreement (rarely). Same thing happened to me several times.

I would just buy Swiss tickets straight away, inform BA in writing of your intention not to fly with them on either leg. Enjoy your holiday and then claim post-flight via MCOL.

I would say that you shouldn’t be trying to leave inbound with BA as you have the duty to minimise the damage. It will also look very good in front of the judge. If it was just the return that was moved then it would be a different story.

If you don’t want to go down the MCOL route, then you could also try S75 claim to get new tickets now before the trip. But you will need some form of final answer from BA for that.

[Mart16]

All, thank you, this is very helpful and I appreciate the detail. Buying the tickets from Swiss now is doable – but not ideal. Before I consider further, Meta, could I ask what you mean by s75 route to get new tickets before the trip? Thanks again.

[meta]

S75 claim is only if you bought your ticket by credit card. Your credit card is jointly liable, so they would have to cover the cost of replacement flight. You contact credit card company and start the claim, but have to first have a final no from BA.

• This reply was modified 55 years, 3 months ago by .

[sara]

I agree with what’s been suggested here, though there may be an alternative if OP prefers:

Is the £700 a flat change fee, or is it the extra cost of adding that final night onto the end of the trip? For how many people? If the latter, OP could presumably fly BA’s proposed rerouting one day later and claim the final night back from BA as EU261 duty of care (or, whether former or latter, as a Section 75 consequential loss on the original booking if paid credit card).

(FYI separately, minor correction to @meta’s last message – you do not have to have a ‘no’ from retailer before choosing to do a Section 75)

[meta]

You actually do have to have some sort of final no, whether it’s in the form of repeated denial or similar because the first thing they’ll ask you for S75 is whether you tried to solve it directly with the retailer and what was the outcome. If you only had one interaction, it will not look good.

[Mart16]

Understood. S75 at least seems a good place to start. My understanding was that this would get me a refund only – how does one go about using s75 protection to rebook a new flight? It was an avios booking, taxes/fees were £190, paid on amex.

[sara]

@Mart16 some of the talk of S75 here has been to say that if you book new flights with Swiss you should do it on credit card so that if they screw you over with something later (unrelated to BA screwing you over) you have the best possible protection.

Whereas other talk here of S75 was to say that if those fees were paid on an Amex credit card you could make a S75 claim for consequential loss for them to pay out the extra £700 after you lay it out for the hotel.

I’ll leave it to the others to say which route is likely to be best. My point was simply that there are options for flying next day and recouping the extra hotel costs, as an alternative to flying same day and recouping the Swiss flight costs.

@meta if you make an S75 claim and they say you must have already spoken to the retailer you point them to the wording of S75 itself which is clear that they are jointly and severally liable – it’s entirely your right to go to credit card company instead of the retailer if you wish (and if they still refuse -> ombudsman).

[SamG]

Agree with LL – this is a slam dunk EU261 and literally why it was put in place to stop airlines messing you about like this with no repercussion! She also gives very good advice re: Swiss – there is another thread here about them royally messing someone about just a few days before travel

BA can usually protect the return – I have travelled back on the return of an outbound cancelled flight before. However here since you’d really need to accept the return flight from BA whilst not being refunded for the outbound (as BA would consider that the end of the matter) I think this will be pretty tricky and I’d buy a new return too on the correct original date.

As much as I love a battle with an airline – out of interest – did you actually phone the hotel and try and speak to a reservations manager or even the GM? I worked in hotels for a number of years and if you got to the right person they wouldn’t bat an eyelid at such a request so far out as long as there wasn’t a special event on or something the night you were trying to move to. I’d also price up a direct flight personally, I just couldn’t be bothered turning a simple 3hr flight to two flights / risk of misconnect etc. If you value an Avios at 0.8p (what you can swap it for Sainsburys at) then Avios CE flights to Greece are quite pricey, pay for the exit row and pre order a panini and champs and it won’t be too bad!

Other thoughts :- S75 (amex version) does in theory come into play here – BA aren’t delivering what you paid for and Amex has joint liability for that. Never heard of anyone playing that card though and getting a new ticket bought but could be worth a go (if you do call in then make sure you are speaking to someone in Brighton)

BA does actually believe it or not currently have a rebooking policy with Swiss – https://www.britishairways.com/en-gb/traveltrade/bookings-policies/policies/askba?faqid=8216 but only valid until 31st March.

[Mart16]

All, thanks again for your help and advice on this. I decided to go one final time to BA with a complaint and they have (as seems common atm) tried to fob me off with 10k per person avios.

However, interestingly the cash tickets for Swiss LHR>HER (via Geneva) have come down pretty significantly. Now at around £350 pp. This compares pretty favourably anyway against the avios+cash price i paid (in fact, at 0.8p per avios, there really isn’t an awful lot in it).

On this basis, I am tempted to cancel the flights and just rebook the Swiss cash tickets. My question is though – is there any data points of going back to BA and saying i dont accept 10k each but will accept e.g. 20k each? And does this generally sound like a prudent approach to your wise minds?

Thanks again in advance.