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In July, I used my Amex companion voucher plus 52000 Avios on economy flights from GLA-LHR-LAX on 28th Sept leaving LAX on 5th Oct, returning into GLA on 6th Oct.
On Sept 16th – I received an email that our BA1484 13:20 flight from LHR-GLA on our return 6/10 had been cancelled and we had been booked onto the BA1492 18:15 flight. I couldn’t pick any alternative flights and this was the only option given to us meaning we would be landing almost 5hrs later than scheduled.
Sept 17th- – Our 17:10 BA280 LAX-LHR flight on 5/10 was cancelled and I was able to choose an alternative, of which the earliest was the BA268 19:35 flight (that was delayed an hour)
Sept 27th – At 2:30pm I received an email that our flights for the next morning had been cancelled and rebooked on a flight for 2 days later on 30th via KLM GLA-AMS-LAX, If it had been on the 28th I wouldn’t have had a problem but the 30th was just too late for us and we would be losing our first 2 nights vacation and no refund on our hotel. I logged in to BA but it showed no other flights to swap to and my partner ended up phoning BA customer service who said they had no more flights available, so as a last resort we asked if any flights were flying from Edinburgh and as if by magic there was! (eye roll).
3:50pm We got confirmation we would now be flying Aer Lingus EDI-DUB-LAX but would still be flying back LAX-LHR-GLA on the 6th. This meant we would arrive in LA 3hrs 50mins later than planned and also had to cancel our outbound airport parking (luckily we got a refund) We also had to get ourselves to Edinburgh from Ayrshire without a car and pay for a few hr’s stay in an overpriced hotel. In total, that cost us £298 for hotel, train & tram fare, with the journey taking around 3hrs. We finally checked into the hotel and got settled around 11pm and alarms were set for 5:45am. At this point, we were so exhausted and worried the flights would be cancelled in the AM.
Sept 28th- Luckily We made it to Dublin but on our flight from DUB-LAX my entertainment system didn’t work at all, everyone else around me was fine apart from 1 other Passenger, 3 times they tried to reset it and each time it was a black screen. That was a hard 10hr 40min flight.
I want to thank anyone who’s made it this far reading my ramblings. This has only been my second companion voucher that I’ve used. Is BA usually this bad with changing & cancelling? Do we have any grounds for a complaint? I can’t make sense of their policies.
As we accepted the EDI flight does that mean we won’t receive any compensation? I don’t know quite where to start.
Welcome to HFP! What a nightmare. You should get some responses to this, but there’s also a huge amount of useful stuff in the “delays and cancellations” sections.
First off, you can’t claim compensation for any cancellations notified more than 14 days before the departure date, so I think that rules out a couple of yours. Would you be able to go through your post and make a simpler one with any flights which were cancelled with less than 14 days’ notice, including scheduled and actual arrival times, and any reason given for the cancellation (this will determine whether compensation is payable, but you can still claim if you don’t know).
BA is liable for some types of expenses in these scenarios, I’m not sure that expenses incurred getting to EDI would be covered but other readers might know differently. If not, your travel insurance might be the next port of call.
You can submit a separate complaint about the IFE and BA will probably give you 10k or so avios for that.
*BA can be bad for cancelling flights, but it sounds as though you were particularly unlucky here!
Wow! It sounds like if it could go wrong it did. I think, depending upon the reasoning for the cancellation of the outbound flights on 28Sep, you are entitled to compensation. Nothing will be due for the LHR-GLA flight on 6Oct as you were informed of that more than 14 days ahead.
As for non working IFE that should definitely get you some Avios. The snag is that t3chnically that should be Aer Lingus as the operator of the flight but I would definitely first approach BA to pay that.
You should claim separately fir the £298 expenses you incurred. If BA doesn’t play ball then approach your travel insurance unless there is an exclusion for Avios flights.
Welcome to HFP! What a nightmare. You should get some responses to this, but there’s also a huge amount of useful stuff in the “delays and cancellations” sections.
First off, you can’t claim compensation for any cancellations notified more than 14 days before the departure date, so I think that rules out a couple of yours. Would you be able to go through your post and make a simpler one with any flights which were cancelled with less than 14 days’ notice, including scheduled and actual arrival times, and any reason given for the cancellation (this will determine whether compensation is payable, but you can still claim if you don’t know).
BA is liable for some types of expenses in these scenarios, I’m not sure that expenses incurred getting to EDI would be covered but other readers might know differently. If not, your travel insurance might be the next port of call.
You can submit a separate complaint about the IFE and BA will probably give you 10k or so avios for that.
*BA can be bad for cancelling flights, but it sounds as though you were particularly unlucky here!
Hi, thanks for your reply. I will start reading the info here. I don’t see a button to edit my post as i realise some of those flights were notified 14 days out?
Wow! It sounds like if it could go wrong it did. I think, depending upon the reasoning for the cancellation of the outbound flights on 28Sep, you are entitled to compensation. Nothing will be due for the LHR-GLA flight on 6Oct as you were informed of that more than 14 days ahead.
As for non working IFE that should definitely get you some Avios. The snag is that t3chnically that should be Aer Lingus as the operator of the flight but I would definitely first approach BA to pay that.
You should claim separately fir the £298 expenses you incurred. If BA doesn’t play ball then approach your travel insurance unless there is an exclusion for Avios flights.
Hi AJA this was all I got regarding the cancellation.
“We’re very sorry that your flight has been cancelled at short notice today due, in part, to the knock-on impact of some of the operational challenges we’ve experienced in the past few days. These last-minute changes are always frustrating and we know this is inconvenient for you. We will do everything we can to get you on your way as soon as possible. We’ll do everything we can to get you where you need to be.”
You can only edit a post for 10 minutes.
There’s an online form for claims on ba.com, if they refuse compensation they will reply with a reason.
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