BA Have Cancelled Our Flights

A snowHead

After posting on here weeks ago that we have booked to go to Aspen (at the end of January), BA have cancelled:
- The outbound leg of our trip from Dallas to Grand Junction, Colorado.
- The first leg of the return flight (reverse of the above).

The best of it is that the airline's suggested alternative:
- Had us departing Dallas for Gd Junction 90 mins before we actually arrived at Dallas.
- Showed no return flight at all from Gd Junction - only from Dallas to LHR.

However, the good news was that an email from our travel agent (Omega Travel) advised that if we accepted the changes(!!) we needed to do nothing - we'd be all set to fly!

Completely nonsensical.

Cue much stress during a very busy day at work and a total of about 90 mins on the phone to:
- BA (who refused to help as we'd booked through an agent.)
- Omega Travel: Call 1: On hold for 17 mins then cut off by the call centre in Asia with nothing resolved. Call 2: 50 mins in length - to find choices were a refund or booking us onto alternative flights. The alternative flights would (a).Go a day later than our original flights (now a Sunday...rubbish as it wastes a weekend day and means more time needed off work as a result) and (b). Return either 3 days later or one day earlier than the flight we originally booked.

If we took the refund, new flights would have cost us about £600 in total more than the two of us had originally paid. Also, as accommodation has been booked for part of the trip, we have had little choice but to go with one of the revised flight options offered by BA.

So we are now going for 12 nights instead of 10 and skiing 12 days instead of 10. We're sure it'll be fantastic but we will now have to shell out unforseen expenditure for the extra accommodation, food and drink, ski passes and car hire - probably £600 or more in total.

Given the above, the time, trouble, stress and inconvenience - and the fact that none of this is of our making - it would seem on checking the BA website that they owe us absolutely nothing.They can effectively do as they please without recompense.

Marvellous.

A snowHead

They can do that until 14 days before departure. Is the flight stilll scheduled? I E what was the reason for cancellation?

Is it all on the same ticket or is a travel agent booking multiple legs. Are all on one world codeshares?

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

This is a risk of booking with a 3rd party rather than direct with the airline. 99% of the time you will be fine, but when there are problems its often hard to get a decent resolution. The airline tend to take no responsibility referring you to the agent. The agents usually lack any kind of customer service.

There are shuttles from the airport direct to aspen, which are likely cheaper than the flight.

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@mountainaddict, I presume the flights were operated by American Airlines? American have a bad habit of changing flight details.

When that has happened to me, BA have been very efficient at altering other flights to suit, but I appreciate that's not much help if you've booked through an agent.

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Well that's a bit poopoo. Always booked with BA as changes seem to be few and far between.

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It won't be BA it'll be whatever regional jet AA use. Personally I'd have pushed for a replacement flight to Aspen or Eagle as an alternate.

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I’ve never used a travel agent and never seen the need to

After all it is free

Thanks for the responses. Definitely a live and learn scenario - after 30 years of DIY flight bookings, I didn't know that you can be in a potentially worse position by booking them via an agent... Embarassed

So this wouldn't (or couldn't?) have happened if I had booked via the BA website?

I had thought that a booking was a booking - and still don't know why that wouldn't be the case. The agent has advised that it's BA who have cancelled both flights. So might that not be the position? (ie the agents could be behind this...but why would they be messing with individual legs of a single booking?)

The original and revised flights are all on one BA eticket; the booking is under a single BA reference number; all are shown (including the flights to and from Grand Junction) as BA flight numbers (no mention of any other airlines operating the flights, or any other flight nos.); and the booking is visible on the manage my booking section of the BA website...

?!?!?!?! Confused

As an aside, it seems to me that this sort of things where the Snowheads Flight Club as suggested by GlasgowCyclops could be very useful - there are people here who might have been able to offer alternative flights/routings which could have been suggested to the Travel Agent. If the new timings have been accepted, it's probably too late Sad

.

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@mountainaddict, the flights from Dallas to Grand Junction would, I think, have been American Airlines codeshares (i.e. American Airlines flights marketed by BA with A BA flight number). This is common and why you often see flights on departures boards with a collection of different flight numbers. BA don't go to Grand Junction themselves as far as I can see.

If you had booked via the BA website then (a) you would have known who was operating the flights and (b) BA wouldn't have refused to help you.

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Whilst BA would have "helped" if you booked with them, they're also based offshore and hard to deal with.
I'm failing to see how the result would have been different, other than the OP being £140 / person worse off.

Sure it'll be a code-share, but that doesn't affect your rights, or what they're likely to do for you, I'd say.

My own concerns with flying into places like that would be that changing planes with hold baggage, TSA delays, and weather issues at a regional airport in the mountains.

@philwig, BA have call centres in Newcastle and Manchester and have a major office in Heathrow. Not very off shore. Out of UK hours are in India but there is a USA t of hours office number if you are in the know.

You know it makes sense.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

What many Brit's, who are habitual early planners, don't realize is many American airlines have a habit of changing their flights every quarter. So beginning of October is the ripe time to fiddle with flights in the winter!

Accepting the assumption that the so called BA flight is actually operated by American Airline, it's not at all surprising to find yourself in that situation. I'm not sure booking directly vs through an agent makes that much of a difference.

I once booked a BA flight from New York to Hong Kong to New Delhi with connection in Dhaka. The ticket spans a 3 months time frame. While in Hone Kong, I got a call from BA that their Hong Kong to Dhaka was changed in such a way that the connection to New Delhi couldn't happen!

I was offered the option of waiting at Dhaka airport for 23 hrs for the next flight! Shocked

I had no choice but to take the refund and try to re-book with other airlines. Fortunately for me, I found a direct flight on Air India which is actually cheaper than the BA flight! Granted, I was in a better position since my lodging and car hire wasn't paid for yet. So I was potentially able to change the date without cost. But the new flight actually put me at the airport on the same date and a couple hours ahead of the old flight. So I got to keep the same schedule as is.

Strangely enough, I ran into another couple who didn't know enough so they took the BA's "offer" and waited at Dhaka airport overnight. The woman was not amused that she's the only one who's not wearing a veil and all the men were staring at her with disdain!

A snowHead

Since then, I've learned to not change plane in countries I'm not comfortable in staying. Just in case something happens to the out-going flight and I got stuck in there for extended period of time.

A snowHead

I am not convinced booking direct would have avoided the problem. A friend had a similar problem over the summer when out visiting us. He was on a return flight from Heathrow to Zürich, and due to fly back at 7am on Monday morning. At 2pm on Sunday, they sent him an email informing him his flight had been cancelled and he had been re-booked on one for the evening. As he had to be at work on Monday, he didn't consider this a suitable alternative. There was a Swiss flight at 7am which was a perfect substitute, but they would not book him onto it as they are not partnered with Swiss, and nor would they offer anything earlier than the evening, despite it appearing that BA had availability on earlier flights on the website. BA's attitude was basically just to shrug and say "not our problem". In the end, he booked the Swiss flight himself, with the intention of claiming the €250 compensation to cover it.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

I use an agent for all my business travel. They may not have special access to the airline, but their access to the whole system and knowledge of how it works make their service well worthwhile. In fact, I, not sure how many ‘travel agents’ are still left. There are aggregators like Skyscanner and what one might call ‘concierges’ similar to what I use. The latter works well for me. I can ring up and get a flight completely booked by saying as little as ‘Hi, it’s FZ. Can you book me on the early flight to Berlin?’ They know which airlines I prefer, which airports to use, the fare/flexibility basis I will be happy with and have payment details on file. If I am early/late for the return flight they can often change my booking while I’m in the taxi to the airport. I can reserve a seat on a flight at a specific fare and then ticket it much closer to the departure date when my trip is confirmed. Obviously there is a fee for their service, but it’s well worth it IMO. I wouldn’t say it’s the right thing to use for everyone in every situation, but I was just making the point that ‘agents’ do have their role and there are good reasons to use them sometimes.

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Have you already accepted the new itinerary? If so, you may not have any further flexibility.

If not, then the basic BA rule (which should reflect through to the travel agent) is that you can either a) refund in full, b) change dates to anything you want, and/or c) change airport within +/- 300 miles. As such, the best thing to do is figure out an alternative routing/dates that work for you, maybe with a different routing (Denver? Salt lake city?), and propose this to the TA, who proposes it to BA, who should accept if its within the above rules. I find ITA matrix and Google flights very good for this.

The problem with using a TA is that they may impose their own rules on top which restricts the degree of flexibility. If you book with BA then the negotiation around re-routing etc. is a relatively easy one (I have a few a year, and had six to resolve last week alone as a bunch of LCY/GVA schedule changes were put through). For example, last month I had a notification of a change to a December London-Bangkok-Singapore flight where the BKK-SIN leg underwent a small change, as a result of which BA let me change to the direct LHR-SIN without any charge. In particular, BA doesn't hold you to the original fare class on the re-ticketing, tho' it does hold you to the same cabin. As an aside, if you book the same flights direct with American Airlines (using its code shares with BA where necessary) then the negotiation is even easier; AA is incredibly flexible and allows you to change flights simply because the aircraft type has changed even if date/time are the same.

I remain totally unclear what value a TA _ever_ adds to the process and I think at least 50% of the time it makes it harder, particularly if something goes wrong.

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"I remain totally unclear what value a TA _ever_ adds to the process..."

As Mountainaddict says, he saved money by booking with an agent.

I've done the same on numerous occasions over the years, without problems, and have done so for our Calgary/Denver flights in February. Booking via an agent was £300 cheaper (ie £150 pp) for me than booking direct with BA & there was no charge for using a credit card (unlike BA) - so that saved me another few quid.

I'm also confused by the mixed messages above. Some suggest that you are no worse off booking flights via an agent, whilst others suggest that the airline has a greater obligation to you if they cancel the flight and you have booked direct with it. Puzzled

Either way, it's bad news for Mountainaddict as it looks like he's stuffed for claiming any recompense for additional costs. Sad

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@Bergmeister, a lower price for a lower quality product isn't value add to me. The TA lowers the quality of the product as demonstrated here. I fly quite a lot, and I've almost never found an agent to be materially cheaper. If the price is much lower with a major airline, I'd worry about them splitting tickets or selling on a package basis.

I don't think the messages are mixed at all - they reflect the varying reality - you might be fine, and save money, with an agent, but the TA could have rules that says it counts all changes <12hrs as significant whereas BA says 2. e.g. if you book flight + car or hotel with expedia, see 3.6.4.3 of the Ts and Cs about Expedia's right to change almost anything (including flight time >12hrs!) and not compensate you if you get 60 days notice.

After all it is free

@abc,

Is there any actual come back at all if BA (or others cancel a flight)

Everything crossed yesterday as Daughter was going to Vancouver via Heathrow from Leeds/Bradford. Morning flight was cancelled last min. I assumed the afternoon flight would be full to overflowing but no. So did they just cancel it because there were not enough people booked on it? Or am I being silly.

Maybe we are getting too casual thinking of flights as busses nowadays

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EU law is pretty good on that, but as someone pointed out, it all depends on he timing. Before 14 days, they can do what they want ... but this is not really an issue almost all the time, not something to stress over in my opinion.

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@Jake43, BA are very fond of "Operational Reasons" as an excuse for minor changes, I've had it for seat changes and flight time changes, for no obvious reason. There does seem to be a reluctance by the flight authorities for force airlines to provide details.

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You know it makes sense.

But...but....I was advised that it's BA who have cancelled the flights - so not sure what (if any) part the agent has played.

So if I had booked the same trip on the BA website I wouldn't be in this position??

If the Grand Junction flights are now cancelled and no longer running that's BA's doing is it not? ie outside the control of the agent?

And yes, we have now accepted alternative flights to/from Grand Junction. Going one day later than originally planned and staying 3 nights longer at the end of the holiday. So 2 days extra skiing.

Mustn't grumble... rolling eyes

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

For some airlines, they have a different customer service specially cater to agents. Whether that's an advantage or disadvantage is not clear to me. Perhaps no different in the way it's handled.

It's entirely possible that when you call BA, the person on the other end of the line couldn't help you because your ticket, bought through TA, should be handled by the "other" department!

(I have indeed had one such experience with another airline. I was politely advised to "call my agent". After I made a big angry fuss, I was then not-so-politely told the simple fact that I should have call a different number instead! - that "other number" is usually NOT released to end customers, only TA's)

A snowHead

The initial result booking direct would be the same, the flight no longer exists (or has been rescheduled). The difference is the resolution process. There might be a routing via Denver, Salt Lake City, Minneapolis, Chicago etc. The problem is that the agent doesn't get paid to look into this so from its perspective, proposing the flights that the BA computer spat out rather randomly is the easy option.

If you'd booked direct the main difference would be that you'd be discussing in real time rather than via a third party so rather than proposing and waiting days for a response, BA would be able to tell you immediately whether an option was viable (tho I still find it best to do my own research and propose options). It took me under 5 minutes to resolve a 6 flight itinerary to the Far East direct with BA following a flight cancellation by Cathay.

However, you've got some extra skiing out of it which looks like a bit of a winner!

A snowHead

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

@snowdave, All of what you say is correct. However, a good TA should know enough to say, for instance, Trump Air have a really good alternative flight so I recommend that you take the BA refund and we can rebook it through Them. Shall I sort that for you?

BA will obviously not suggest this sort of thing as a matter of course.

In 90% of cases booking a flight yourself will be the answer, but a good TA can be a godsend on occasions. To give another example. I’ve been driving to the airport and got held up in heavy traffic and was due to miss the flight. A 2 minute call to my TA had me rebooked on another flight with a different airline from a different terminal that I then managed to catch. There is no way I could have sorted all of that while driving or on arrival at the wrong terminal if I had had to deal direct.

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snowdave,

Until I heard of this fiasco from Mountainaddict & read the comments on here I had no idea that, for the past 20 or so years, I have been "paying a lower price for a lower quality product." That significant point has escaped me entirely.

On the contrary, on the face of it, having booked on numerous occasions via a travel agent, it's difficult for me not to form a view that I have been paying a lower price for an identical product. ie a (significantly) lower price for the same flights that we would have been on had we booked direct with the airline.

So it's so far so good.... The "lower quality product" we've bought has saved us a fortune over 20 odd years.

On reflection, I wonder if we've just been lucky over that period & we ought to be rethinking our booking policy; or whether we continue with our current approach - risking the odd hiccup now and again but accepting that we are nevertheless quids in. Puzzled

Either way, I see that Mountainaddict is still suitably unsure of the situation and is asking if he would have been in a different position had he booked direct with BA. Notwithstanding any confusion, he seems happy with the outcome - extra skiing and all that!
Very Happy

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@Bergmeister, with modern flight search engines I'm surprised if there's actually any significant savings to be had any more. I'd love to see any current example of a BA flight price that is over 5% cheaper via an agent (any route, destination or date). In the 120+ flights I've booked in the last 12 months an agent has been cheaper on a few, but only because I was booking very expensive fully flex tickets on which it is still commissioned so could discount slightly.

@foxtrotzulu, if you're booking fully flex tickets that you can change to another airline then the travel mgmnt company is being potentially quite well paid and can afford to look after you. That's not really equivalent to non flex discount excursion tickets that most holidaymakers buy. Expedia et al are lucky to make 3% on a ticket which doesn't fund much customer assistance.

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@snowdave, re: fully flex vs cheapo fixed tickets. Yes, I agree with you. I was just pointing out that there is still a role for agents in some situations.

With regard to your comments to Bergmeister, I suspect you are right. Agents are very seldom cheaper when comparing identical flights. However, where a good agent comes into their own is that they may be more adept at finding a different flight which offers better value/ better connections etc.

In my limited experience, airlines no longer pay commissions to travel agents. A few do and then only on the most expensive fares. The travel management companies seem to earn their crust through a flat fee charged to the passenger and from other services. e.g. hotel bookings.

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