Warning for those travelling with British Airways -- Important -- Please read!

[Globaliser]

On Wednesday night, i connected through Heathrow on British Airways. I started in Amsterdam and had a 2:45 connection at T4 to Bangkok and Sydney. Because of the way my ticket was written, my bag had to be tagged to connect in London and again in Bangkok, even though at the latter point it was coming off the aircraft and going back onto the same aircraft.

 

We were about 45 minutes late in to Heathrow because of weather problems earlier in the day.

 

Nevertheless, my bag made it to Sydney with no fuss or trouble. I've been the victim of mishandled baggage at Heathrow as well, but this now makes it two complex transfers at Heathrow in successive trips that have both gone well. (Last time, because of an inbound delay into T1, my bag had 55 minutes to make it from T1 to T4 for Sydney. That made it too.)

[pacmom]

We have just returned from Europe. Flew AA to Heathrow--arrived at terminal 3--connecting flight out of terminal 1. Flights leaving H on Ba will only allow ONE piece of carryon. If you have a purse and a small piece of luggage, they have to be combined. It was sad seeing people trying to decide what to take and what to pitch. Thanks to advice fromCC we knew about this before we left and planned accordingly. To get on our fligt to Berlin, we had to go thru security 3 times. We had been on a bus between terminals and gone from one line to another. This was on June 13. On the way home we flew from Vienna to Heathrow. Bussed again from terminal 4 to terminal 3. The time span from getting off our flight into the departures lounge at terminal 3 was over an hour. We made our own flight arraingemants. Standing in line I told DH that doing this again would be grounds for deviorce---no judge would side with him.:D Travel safely and prepared--enjoy Pat

[FlyerTalker]

It could happen with ANY Airline on ANY Airport of the World.

 

So if you check the Lufthansa-Frankfurt Thread...

so if you check the Air France-Paris CDG Thread...

 

Nobody will write how good it works if it worked well (some exceptions...).

 

But everybody will write if something is bad. And it appeared as others confirm these experience that it is bad.

 

It's the minority!!!

 

Well written words!!! In any group of travelers, you'll find those who say "never fly X airlines" or "never go through Y airport" and so on. If you take the combined list of never's, you would likely have to walk to your destination -- someone somewhere had a bad experience and wants to tell the world.

 

Yes, there are some airports that are more problematic. Yes, there are airlines where customer service is an oxymoron. However, there are thousands of people who also fly those airlines, through those airports, who have a perfectly acceptable travel experience. The trick is to be an aware traveler.

 

Now, when a major incident is occurring, know that things will be different. London had an averted disaster and Glasgow airport took a hit - both from terrorists. Those kinds of events will not be going away any time soon, regardless of what we may wish. We will have to be able to adapt and cope with the changes. And to deal with the issues that faced travel in/through the UK recently. Same with a blizzard that closed the Denver airport. Trust me, United sure didn't want to have to cancel flights and deal with disrupted travel plans. But it happens, and I'm not going to blame the snow on UA.

[dusababy]

My sentiments exactly ! A friend who hasn't flown internationally in about five years will join me LAX/LHR/LIS -- BCN/LHR/LAX -- for a cruise in September. She's been cautioned....."do you really want to go through Heathrow?" Of course she's going -- I said said good girl! I simply will not let the threat of terrorism control my life.

I'm not going to wander off in Casablanca or some unfamiliar port on my own -- screaming with my entire being -- Here's an American for you! -- but discretion, common sense, and trusting the odds is enough for me.

 

An old lady from California -- with a lot of travel miles on her...:cool:

And hopefully miles to go before I sleep....

[xcountry]

My point is not to fly through LHR, but to let others know that there is the potential for problems and to let others know what our experience has been should a problem arise. Our bags (and the bags of other passengers on the ship who flew BA) have now been flown to Milan, where there is a warehouse for processing delayed luggage. We still have not had any direct contact with BA and it is likely that we will not see our luggage any time soon.

[greatam]

My point is not to fly through LHR, but to let others know that there is the potential for problems and to let others know what our experience has been should a problem arise. Our bags (and the bags of other passengers on the ship who flew BA) have now been flown to Milan, where there is a warehouse for processing delayed luggage. We still have not had any direct contact with BA and it is likely that we will not see our luggage any time soon.

 

Were your airline tickets by chance cruise air??? Since there are 75 other people missing their luggage, I assume your flights were booked by the cruise line. Maybe not.

 

BA and LHR have had their share of problems with lost luggage. But other airports are certainly as notorious for luggage problems. And with the problems in London and Glascow the past couple weeks, I am sure things are more backed up than usual.

 

Personally, I would be looking more to the cruise line for booking a 1 hour 25 minutes connection at one of the busiest airports in the world. The normal SAFE connection time from the USA into LHR is 2+ hours. What would have happened had the plane been late??? Not only would you have missed your luggage, you may have missed your plane as well.

 

IF this was cruise air, BA is most likely dealing DIRECTLY with the cruise line to move the luggage to a place it can be loaded on the ship. And since there are 75 other pax who are in the same situation and on the same cruise ship, call Princess air sea dept in the USA and go see the purser on the ship.

 

IF this was cruise air, short connections which mean luggage has a good chance to go missing is just another failure of the cruise lines air sea dept. They KNOW there is a potential for problems, but they continue booking weird connections and causing problems for their pax. The bottom line is the only thing the cruise lines are concerned about.

 

Sorry this has disrupted your cruise, but it sounds like you are making lemonade out of lemons.

[xcountry]

Our flight (and most of the other passengers with BA flights) were not booked through the cruise line. We are all having a great time and again I have to say that Princess has taken very good care of all us and have helped to insure that we have a good time despite missing our luggage.

We cannot thank Princess enough for everything that they have done for us especially with our air not being part of the cruise package.;)

[Globaliser]

We have just returned from Europe. Flew AA to Heathrow--arrived at terminal 3--connecting flight out of terminal 1. Flights leaving H on Ba will only allow ONE piece of carryon. If you have a purse and a small piece of luggage, they have to be combined.

This is nothing to do with BA. All airlines at all UK airports are operating under this rule. If you are originating at, or connecting through, any UK airport, only one item of cabin baggage is currently permitted through the security checkpoint. And "one" means one.

[DougYWG]

I have always had a good experience with BA. However, I have to say that recent press coverage in Britain puts me off. It seems that they do have an ongoing and major baggage problem. Plenty of blogs in British newspapers saying "I will NEVER..." etc etc. (Try Googling 'BA baggage backlog') O.K., so the French don't like Air France, Canadians despise Air Canada but this BA baggage situation does seem to be way beyond a temporary and modest problem. Management is getting the blame for cutting staff too drastically, baggage handlers are working in terrible conditions and knowing your average British unionist is probably taking it out on the passengers. BA baggage handling at Edinburgh was very recently outsourced and is fouled up. Inadequate staff, no training. Anywhere else?

[Globaliser]

However, I have to say that recent press coverage in Britain puts me off. It seems that they do have an ongoing and major baggage problem. Plenty of blogs in British newspapers saying "I will NEVER..." etc etc. (Try Googling 'BA baggage backlog') O.K., so the French don't like Air France, Canadians despise Air Canada but this BA baggage situation does seem to be way beyond a temporary and modest problem. Management is getting the blame for cutting staff too drastically, baggage handlers are working in terrible conditions and knowing your average British unionist is probably taking it out on the passengers.

The problem, I think, is that the baggage handling is already being "right-sized" for Terminal 5, even though the move is stiil some eight months away. And so there is a lot of creaking at the seams, using the antiquated systems that are in place at T1 and T4.

 

One should not underestimate the difference that T5 can make to BA's operations. The entire company has been re-engineered around it. One of the key improvements there is baggage handling. It has been said that T5 is basically a baggage handling system with an airport terminal built around it.

 

Other improvements I'm looking forward to are: no more anxious waits to cross 09R/27L to get to/from T4; far fewer coaching gates; no more waits for other aircraft to come out of cul-de-sacs; and so on.

 

Press coverage is always anti-BA, anyway. It was the subject of a specific article in the recent shareholders' newsletter. BA has the same sort of incidents as other airlines, yet other airlines do not get the same negative press that BA does for exactly the same things. So it's always worth taking this with a pinch of salt. Those who fly the airline regularly know what the situation really is, and where the actual warts are.

[piper28]

It has been said that T5 is basically a baggage handling system with an airport terminal built around it.

 

Those are words that should strike fear into people's hearts :). I remember Denver heralding their great new baggage system when their new airport opened. Was that ever a colossal failure.

[Globaliser]

Denver's opening was one of the things which BAA and BA studied, along with all the other major airport openings of the last 15 years or so. One of the results of that is that BA basically gets the keys to the building in about 6 or 8 weeks from now. Then BA gets six months to test and stress the systems until they are proven to work. That's a phase which many airports have not previously really done.

 

It's still no guarantee. The end of March 2008 will still be an interesting time!

[kitty9]

One of my bags sat on the tarmac at O'Hare for almost a week, before United decided to check into why a bag was sitting there, outside for so long. It had all my daytime clothes, but I did have the bag with my evening clothes. I finally got the bag with only 4 days to go in the cruise.

[xcountry]

We are back home -- flying with no luggage was really easy. We stopped at all the customer relation desks along our route and not a single customer relations agent could answer our questions about what British Airways will do since our bags were missing for our entire trip or when we might expect to see our luggage returned home. Yes, I realize that this could happen anywhere with any airline, but how this situation has been handled and the lack of communication with the passengers that have been affected has not been acceptable.

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6286848.stm

[Globaliser]

Now that you're back, hopefully you can use the online tracking facility to see whether there's any further information you can glean from it.