Why are British Airways cancelling so many flights?

[cathyj77]

I’m honestly at the point of swearing off them for life. Just back from holiday (no thanks to them) and on the way out, our flight was cancelled when we were at the airport with no apology, explanation or decent alternative given. Had to spend loads on replacement flights or lose the holiday. Will now start the fight for compensation which I’m sure won’t even touch the sides of the extra flights we had to pay for.

this is the third BA flight I’ve had cancelled this year at very short notice. Others were for work so mattered less and I got replacement flights easily at no cost.

What is going on with BA? From social media, I can see I’m not alone and they seem to just be regularly cancelling several flights a day with zero notice. Why??

You'll be able to work out how much compensation you'll get based on the length of the flight; so at least you know what you'll get. They paid mine within 2 weeks a couple of weeks ago. There wasn't any fight needed at all.

They don't have enough pilots since Covid and they keep selling the flights to make up for financial losses. Same with a lot of airlines

Good news on your compensation @YouveGotAFastCar thanks! They clearly are overselling flights without enough pilots but why? If they have to pay out compensation every time, they’re making a loss…

This is good to hear as we've just filled in a claim. Did you do it through their website?

Looking at twitter, it seems like not everyone is being dealt with so efficiently.

The main thing I wonder is why BA seems to be so much worse for this at the moment than other airlines?

They aren’t flying from Heathrow to Florida in November so we are taking Virgin.

And to be honest I’m still fuming at how we were informed at the airport - standing there with two kids and just told ‘your flight’s cancelled’. Not even a ‘I’m so sorry’ or an offer of help just ‘go on the website and see if you can find another one.’

It will be a while before I fly with them again…

Except from Gatwick

YANBU - I avoid them at all costs

@BlueKaftan My experience of Virgin has always been a delight…

@HermioneWeasley i actually considered putting this in AIBU… 😀

BlueKaftan what do you mean 'Except from Gatwick'? What was that a response to?

BA have largely quite an old fleet of planes with an increased risk of associated mechanical issues. They're also short staffed across the board.

Not enough decent planes in service, or the people to staff them.

Should improve off-season though.

I've just clicked on Gatwick Arrivals and it looks as though easyJet has cancelled way more today than anyone else.

@ThreeLittleDots i find the thought of ‘old planes with mechanical issues’ even more alarming than cancelled flights. 😂

We went with BA; got back from Copenhagen to Heathrow to find the flight back to Newcastle was cancelled, as was the Glasgow one. This was on Tuesday and they claimed they had no more flights til Thursday. We were able to get a train back that night, thankfully
It will be Eurostar in future as BA also managed to lose some of our luggage on the way out and we had to ask them to send the luggage after us on our return. Singularly unimpressed; hadn't flown for years and won't be flying again, especially not with them!

cathyj77

Yes! They're old birds, but they are safe. Apart from the one that had to turn back the other day with a cracked windscreen 😱

We're going with BA for Jan hol and would prefer Virgin for comfort, just crossing fingers for no issues.

They're short of flight crew. Most airlines are.
Pilots nearing retirement age left during covid, and no new pilot training took place for nearly three years, hence the shortage sadly.

They've got cohorts of new cabin crew trainers waiting to start, but they can't until they've got enough pilots

So sorry @Judellie - it really impacts the holiday doesn’t it and the reason why I asked if anyone knew why is because I suspected they are overbooking flights in the knowledge that they’ll be ruining some people’s holidays which is flat-out unacceptable to me. Also, a human being saying ‘sorry’ when things go wrong would go a long way..:

I get that @punnetofcherries but then the obvious solution is only sell tickets for the number of flights you know you can staff, regardless of the impact on your profit line.

Ah, good old BA. I’ve had more trouble with them than with sodding Ryanair… including cancelled flights and one memorable Christmas when I flew in laden with gifts, only for them to misplace my luggage until January. Crap.

We just flew to Edinburgh with BA today and I noticed on the board that there were three to four cancelled flights, including the one I nearly booked to Edinburgh (an hour later than the one we did take)

As it was, we had to put cabin baggage in the hold as it was so full so I assumed they’d amalgamated two flights into one.

It was good though - took 50 minutes from Heathrow instead of 1.5 hours! Pilot must have had his foot to the floor (or whatever the pilot equivalent is) the whole way.

BA customer service is utterly shocking ime. And friends had their flight cancelled at short notice and had to cut their holiday short by two days for the replacement flight. I won't be flying with them again either.

@Ozgirl75 Yes same. Before we were told our own flight was cancelled, I noticed about four other BA-cancelled flights on the board. Really rubbish.

Loads of flights were cancelled last night due to thunderstorms on the airfield. EJ have a massive presence at LGW abd as a result most of the flights departing north terminal are theirs. Hence when then runways are closed (for a time last night it was only arrivals) easyJet is badly affected.