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AIBU?

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Original poster

To be really p****d off with British airways and my travel insurance

159 replies

NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 13:08

Long story short our flight on Monday into Gatwick was cancelled. Instead we were booked to fly into Heathrow.

So we lost £250 on train tickets from Gatwick to home - train company and ticket issuer won't refund. Travel insurance refuse to refund as BA should be refunding. BA have refused to refund. Same with the £250 we spent on new tickets from Heathrow into London and then on to home.

So now we're basically £500 out of pocket without any recourse to receive a refund! Wtf do we do?!

OP posts:
Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:54

MollyButton · 29/08/2024 14:53

I had some sympathy until you said : "Not being funny but they can't expect us to get a coach across London when they cancelled our flight in the first place?"
You wouldn't travel across London between those two airports, just around the M25. And I have no idea where you were going that cost £250 for 2 people.

Yes they should pay your extra transport costs.

Seeing as we then had to travel back into Clapham junction I'm not really arsed the route, we shouldn't have had to do it, they should just refund us

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MollyButton · 29/08/2024 14:53

I had some sympathy until you said : "Not being funny but they can't expect us to get a coach across London when they cancelled our flight in the first place?"
You wouldn't travel across London between those two airports, just around the M25. And I have no idea where you were going that cost £250 for 2 people.

Yes they should pay your extra transport costs.

Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:53

Northumberlandlass · 29/08/2024 14:52

BA are shit & I avoid travelling with them where possible.

I'm going to in the future, we had really good experiences with them 10 years ago but they've clearly gone way downhill!

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Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:52

@Gogogo12345 have you been to a Grand Prix? They're expensive and a great experience and I wasn't about to miss out on that to DM BA on Twitter!

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poptake · 29/08/2024 14:52

Same thing happened to my husband - if you accept a new flight after a cancellation, it is in their T&C that they won't cover getting you to your original destination.

I'm not sure this is true, we accepted a new flight (well not the one they offered originally, we found a better one and requested we were put on that instead which they did even though it was with Virgin) we could still only get to Heathrow not Gatwick, so we had to Uber back to Gatwick and they paid for that Uber no questions asked.

One thing I've learned, I'm never flying from Gatwick with them again.

Northumberlandlass · 29/08/2024 14:52

BA are shit & I avoid travelling with them where possible.

Gogogo12345 · 29/08/2024 14:52

NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:49

@Gogogo12345 again - at a Grand Prix.

If you mean the twitter whyever not. Surely you a toilet break. Could send message then

Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:51

@Businessflake they should reimburse as much as they can though no? Not say no to it all

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Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:50

@Gogogo12345

You seem very aggressive.

We booked flights late (our own fault), a couple of months out. Everything was mega expensive - £200-+ per person when we looked. Sorry not all of us can afford to drop hundreds more on flights. These BA flights were the cheapest by quite some mile.

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Businessflake · 29/08/2024 14:50

NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 13:51

@Carwashcath

They should reimburse for both surely?

Why should they get you home for free?

You could have got an Uber to Gatwick for less than £100 and would have been quicker. We had no problems getting BA to pay for extra hotel and any extra travel expenses (including Uber to Gatwick to collect our car) when we had to be re-routed last year. But I wasn’t cheeky enough to claim our petrol home from Gatwick too.

But if you are requesting that BA reimburse your original train ticket as well your replacement no wonder they are saying no.

Carwashcath · 29/08/2024 14:50

NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:48

@DappledThings it would also cost a fortune and take an hour, and again mean going back on ourselves! Why should we have done that because BA couldn't be bothered to run our flight?

Couldn't be bothered?

Gogogo12345 · 29/08/2024 14:49

NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:45

@Gogogo12345

I was with my 70 year old father. We'd just had an active weekend. We were both exhausted and wanted to go home, we weren't going to spend another two hours traipsing across London to just go back on ourselves.

A taxiing traipsing. So you chose to drop your original train ticketsfor your own convenience. If lhr never home why did you fly from Gatwick anyway as if it was to save a few quid than that didn't work well did it

Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:49

@Gogogo12345 again - at a Grand Prix.

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Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:48

@DappledThings it would also cost a fortune and take an hour, and again mean going back on ourselves! Why should we have done that because BA couldn't be bothered to run our flight?

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Hillsmakeyoustrong · 29/08/2024 14:47

They know they have you over a barrel and take advantage of that.

DappledThings · 29/08/2024 14:47

NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:45

@Gogogo12345

I was with my 70 year old father. We'd just had an active weekend. We were both exhausted and wanted to go home, we weren't going to spend another two hours traipsing across London to just go back on ourselves.

A taxi from one airport to the other would neither take hours or involve going in and out of London.

Gogogo12345 · 29/08/2024 14:46

Vabenejulio · 29/08/2024 14:38

If I got that text the first thing I’d do is look for the customer service number, call it, ask wtf is going on, and figure out my options via an actual human being.

Come on, be reasonable. Whether I was at Zandvoort or Imola or Silverstone: if a train company or airline or Uber told me it was taking me somewhere I didn’t book, pay or want to go, the absolute LAST thing I’d do is just go there without asking! Seriously. You have to take responsibility for your actions.

Show quote history

BA will sort this out on twitter actually Have done that when abroad with no call allowance on phone

Insidelaurashead · 29/08/2024 14:46

Agree that you're only £250 out of pocket. You were paying £250 to get home. You couldn't get that train, so instead you paid another £250. Getting home (from Point A OR point B) has a cost you £250 more than it should. No insurance would cover both of those-you'd then have got home for free, and would be in a better position than you should have been, which is not their job.

What would your insurance excess be? Worth checking on that before you decide how much effort to put into this. Would definitely raise a complaint with BA though

Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:45

@Gogogo12345

I was with my 70 year old father. We'd just had an active weekend. We were both exhausted and wanted to go home, we weren't going to spend another two hours traipsing across London to just go back on ourselves.

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Gogogo12345 · 29/08/2024 14:44

NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:18

@Gogogo12345

£100 on the train so not much point adding that onto an expensive trip!

We live in the south west, last minute train tickets on a bank holiday are more expensive! BA had seemed like the cheapest option, till they did this

But you had already paid £250 on advance train tickets. - which surely should've been cheaper than the ones bought on the day, so instead of pay £100 for a train or £80 for an uber you decided to pay another £250 on train from Heathrow?

Really makes no sense.

Hillsmakeyoustrong · 29/08/2024 14:43

Oh and to be clear DH was also put in yet another row. The twins were expected to sit together but separated from their parents by some rows (same cabin)

Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:42

Hillsmakeyoustrong · 29/08/2024 14:41

We had a very bad experience with BA this year. The flight was cancelled the night before, and then immediately reinstated, but we lost our reserved and checked into seats (which cost extra to reserve). On boarding, I was told to suck up the fact that i wouldn't be sat with our 7 year old twins, one of whom is ND, on the 10 hour flight. It was shut up or get off the flight. Or ask customers to move ourselves but many were sat in their own groups. We were profusely apologised to after take off and they reported themselves to customer services. The result was a £100 voucher for 'next time.' I've tried taking it further but there is basically one tier of customer service and they aren't authorised to give more than £100. Absolutely appalling company.

I can't see myself flying with them again to be honest

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Hillsmakeyoustrong · 29/08/2024 14:41

We had a very bad experience with BA this year. The flight was cancelled the night before, and then immediately reinstated, but we lost our reserved and checked into seats (which cost extra to reserve). On boarding, I was told to suck up the fact that i wouldn't be sat with our 7 year old twins, one of whom is ND, on the 10 hour flight. It was shut up or get off the flight. Or ask customers to move ourselves but many were sat in their own groups. We were profusely apologised to after take off and they reported themselves to customer services. The result was a £100 voucher for 'next time.' I've tried taking it further but there is basically one tier of customer service and they aren't authorised to give more than £100. Absolutely appalling company.

Ttcagainnow · 29/08/2024 14:40

The maths ain't mathing. You're out of pocket by £250 because you would have paid £250 to get home anyway but ended up paying £500. So that is £250.
Yes they should pay this.

Original poster
NeedSomeAnswersPlease · 29/08/2024 14:40

@Vabenejulio so I was meant to call them in the middle of a race? They said we had to accept or lose our seats, in which case we'd have been stuck in Amsterdam?

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