I really don’t understand how we get to this point with a company that sells itself as a nation’s pride. After leaving Alison and me stranded in India for almost 48 hours without contact or care – British Airways deny any wrongdoing.
Vegetable Talis
Because I wrote to my M.P. to ask for help at the outset of my campaign to get some recognition of their culpability from British Airways (BA) and because he, Jason McCartney, forwarded my enquiry to the CEO of BA (Keith Williams), I did eventually get a phone call which said sorry, ‘send us your expenses receipts and we’ll pay them’ – along with an £80 voucher to fly with BA again.
The voucher had enough conditions attached to make it worthless to me. So, I wrote back via a ‘web form’ (there’s no way of phoning back and speaking to the one person who seemed to care) to say that this resolution was not satisfactory and to please try again.
I’ve heard nothing back. So I have had to write to them (via ‘web form’) once more. The letter (snail mail) I sent at the outset has been ignored completely.
Lufthansa lunch
On two separate occasions my application for compensation under EU law has been rejected out of hand. This is despite BA’s negligence in not repatriating me as required by international carrier standards. Because BA did not contact us at any time that we were in India and because we could get no response from them through any of the channels open to us; Alison and I had to take our own steps to repatriate ourselves. We finally left India almost 48 hours after the scheduled departure of BA118.
Following social media comments, I realise that Alison and I are not alone in our disappointment with BA. Even discarding the complaints about lost or late luggage and inability to contact BA on a variety of more trivial matters, there is enough evidence to suggest that the company simply do not care about the human cost of cancelled flights or overly long delays. If they do, I’d like to see some evidence of that.
I’m sure that all of the complainants, like me, understand that these things happen: problems do occur. However, once more like me, they all feel that the company has a duty of care to ticket holders and their families when flights are delayed or cancelled. They are quick enough to deny claims when these are made, yet extremely slow to react (or don’t react) to enquiries and updates.
All they had to do to appease us in India was give us timely, accurate information – but they were unable to do that.
What is the role of a social media team if not to give timely, accurate information?
Perhaps British Airways are simply understaffed?
See https://saturdaywalks.wordpress.com/2014/03/02/british-airways-unforgivably-poor-customer-service/ for story.
Saturday Walks 