bmibaby review :  6 June 2009 : by Steven Kirkwood  (UK)

Had booked a flight for my family from Belfast to East Midlands back in February, for a family birthday in April. My wife had tried to talk me out of using BMI Baby due to problems she had with them before, but I got on my high horse about the only alternative - Ryanair - and smoothed over her concerns. We were walking up towards departures, when out of the corner of my eye, I saw a small notice asking for passengers on our flight to contact the BMI Baby booking in desk. We were informed the flight had been cancelled for 'operational reasons' and our plane at that moment was sitting in Edinburgh. We were given little to no assistance from the guy at the desk, and we were not prepared to pay another £290 for a later flight, considering we were only staying one night. Cue one annoyed mother and father,and one extremely upset son who had been looking forward to seeing his cousins for the first time in a year. We wrote off for a refund, and finally got a letter back from them today, stating we now had a credit account with them of £128.44 - minus the £15 booking fee. They claim the cancellation was now due to 'adverse weather conditions' - a blatant lie! Tried to phone the number on the letter, only to be told it was for BMI, who had nothing to do with BMI Baby - so why was it on the letter?? There is no way on earth I will be using this airline again, so the last thing we wanted was a credit note - we asked for a full refund. I have never complained about anything in my life, but this company have even managed to make me mad. I always thought it would take something to ever make me use Ryanair again, hating their whole business ethos, but BMI Baby have managed it. Surely they can't stay in business much longer. Will now have to write another letter demanding my money back, including the booking fee.

bmibaby review :  3 June 2009 : by P Monney  (UK)

The free flights offer with citi cards is nothing short of a scandal with very little on offer. The card service is dire and the charge systems for even the slightest underpayment are staggering. Needless to say it is impossible to speak with anyone, well with a modicom of intelligence anyway, in their annoying call services. bmibabyoft used good service has gone down the pan.

bmibaby review :  29 May 2009 : by K Sharpe  (UK)

I travelled bmibaby for a long weekend in Malaga. The price was very reasonable, flights were on time, comfortable clean aircraft and had seats allocated which makes a change for low cost. The food sold onboard was of a good standard and a good price.

bmibaby review :  28 May 2009 : by Ben Handbury  (UK)

EMA-JER return. I booked the flight only 3 days before travelling. Outbound a B737-500 with clean cabin. Not a full flight, approx 40% load factor. Flight back a B737-300 and pretty much full. Again, left Jersey slightly early and arrived at East Midlands just ahead of schedule. Flight attendant on the flight back was funny on the PA system! Made the flight really enjoyable!

bmibaby review :  25 May 2009 : by Lynnette Rackley  (UK)

Early April we booked a flight from Cardiff to Almeria for August for 4 people. After securing the flight we went ahead and booked accommodation. At the end of April we received an email saying that the flight had been cancelled (no explanation) and there was no offer of an alternative just a statement that the company was not responsible for any costs incurred and that a refund would be made within 28 days. When the refund was received this was minus the £20.00 charge for a debit card payment. It is bad enough that the service was withdrawn with no offer of an alternative flight but that we were being charged for a service which cannot be provided. I would not consider booking with bmibaby again and would advise all passengers considering using this company to explore all other alternatives and to use them only as a last resort.

bmibaby review :  21 May 2009 : by John Lomas  (UK)

I booked flights from East Midlands to Majorca in January for May 8th. We turned up at the airport to be told the fights had been cancelled in March. We received no notification from BmiBaby. We were told by the manager at East Midlands that he could do nothing for us but he could sell us another ticket for a later flight. I asked to speak to head office. Not possible the system does not allow it but he did give us the address to write to No telephone number, no email contact for "Customer Services" (what a joke title). We came home after having paid £23 for 30 minutes in the Long Stay Car Park. Two letters and twelve days later here we are without even an acknowledgement. This company is very close to taking money from people under false pretences. Never again!

bmibaby review :  18 May 2009 : by J Hill  (UK)

I havent even travelled yet - BMI Baby very expensive. Am travelling East Midlands to Glasgow. Its costing twice as much as flying to Munich with BA who are always excellent. Far too many rules and regulations - its obvious they just want to catch people out and force them to pay more and more. They are not a cheap airline. Even charged £10 to pay with debit card. How else can you pay to avoid this as they dont accept cheques or cash? Its also impossible to speak to anyone unless you want to pay 64p per minute and have even more money wasted.

bmibaby review :  15 May 2009 : by J Allan  (UK)

A number of people on this site have already commented, and from my experience today rightly so. BMI Baby do not care about their customers. Unless you pay a premium you are put into to terrible middle seats when booking online. A punishment for not giving them more money. When you ask a cabin crew if you can move to a better seat when flights not full, they look at you as if you had no right to ask - this is a low cost airline, what do you expect. And probably the most important, someone had spilt "something" on my pre-allocated seat it was still damp. As the flight was not full they could have not used that seat. Plainly the seat charge is a scam, as their prices dont differ from airline that dont charge. Sorry to be so down on the airline, but this was not a good flight, although thankfully short (Birmingham to Edinburgh) Low cost airlines are cheap and cheerful, and you do put up with a little inconvenience but bmibaby is just too much. Get the cabin crew to smile, treat their passengers as a customer.

bmibaby review :  5 May 2009 : by Ian Wareing

We also booked Cardiff to Almeria with BMIBaby, and had the flight cancelled. Fortunately, we had not got round to booking parking, car hire etc, as that would have been money down the drain. However, when the BMIBaby refund did appear, it was £10 short. I don't want to sit on an 0898 number for 30 mins for £10, so what do I do? What a disgraceful way to try to make money. Don't touch them

bmibaby review :  5 May 2009 : by Kathleen Coffey

My daughter was getting married in Lisbon and our family were flying from Manchester or Birmingham. The flight from Birmingham was cancelled and moved to fly from Manchester. The Manchester flight times have been changed 3 times to very unsuitable times of the day/night. The return flight has been changed to so late in the evening that we have had to pay for another nights accomodation as we have elderly/disabled guests who could not walk around Lisbon all day waiting for their flight home. When we complained to BMI baby, which you can only do in writing a letter rather than an email, they dont have the common courtesy to reply. If you call them, it is 65p/min and then they are rude to you and advised us that we can cancel our flights. This was 6 weeks before the wedding and any other airline flying from other nearby cities, such as Liverpool are either full or more expensive than when we booked 8 months prior, thinking that the flight times suited us and were scheduled. We are aware that flight schedules change but we werent expecting 4 changes in total.

bmibaby review :  5 May 2009 : by Bryan O' Sullivan

ORK-MAN. I wasn't expect very much from bmibaby, but for this flight I was pleasantly surprised. The flight was on-time, aircraft was clean, staff extremely friendly and polite (not chewing gum like my previous encounter). All in all a great flight from bmibaby, given that my previous ones have been complete disasters.

bmibaby review :  1 May 2009 : by P Barros

We have used bmibaby for a number of years flying from Cardiff to Spain prior to and after moving to Spain. At first we found their service acceptable as a budget airline, reasonable prices and good service. However over the last year or so their prices have increased as much as their respect for there customers has decreased. This summer my daughter and her family planned to come out for an extended holiday travelling Cardiff to Almeria, flights were booked some time ago - without warning bmibaby dropped the service and told her that her money would be returned within 28 days - how generous when the transaction could be carried out in seconds. As stated by other users there is nobody you can talk to, and from my own experience they do not reply to emails. We now fly with Easyjet to Bristol at half the price, as will our family this summer.

bmibaby review :  30 April 2009 : by Chris Holland

Flew with Baby - seat allocation with extra legroom paid for, but different ordinary seat given on check in. No obvious method of complaint other than post - totally unacceptable in this day and age. Had problems with overcharging on last booking, despite postal complaint, never received a refund. This is probably the last time I use them.

bmibaby review :  28 April 2009 : by Kim Shepherd

BMI have just cancelled our flights (family of four) for operational Issues just like that! I have an apartment booked and paid for, hire car booked in Spain and Airport parking booked UK end. I can fly to a different airport for the extra cost of £300. There is an extra 2 hrs drive and extra fuel etc - I cant speak to anyone I have to put it in writing. You have just ruined our 1 family holiday we get in a whole year!

bmibaby review :  27 April 2009 : by A Neary

Recently flew Birmingham-Knock: not impressed by staff attitude on the ground. I observed two staff being extremely officious about the size of cabin bags of other passengers, which were clearly of the appropriate size (the irony being that my duty-free purchases would have put me over the cabin baggage limit). It was even more absurd considering the plane was not much more than half-full. As someone else has commented, a real decline in customer service of late.

bmibaby review :  22 April 2009 : by Linda Litton

I think that the promotional redeem flight offer is an absolute con, I have tried to book since October 2008 to try and claim this free return flight I have even written to customer services with not even an acknowledgement of receipt. I would just like to warn people out there not to even consider wasting their time to even try and book this so-called free flight. My husband and I fly on a very regular basis to Alicante/Murcia and are considering changing airlines as we feel that we have been cheated.

bmibaby review :  26 March 2009 : by C Hooper

EMA to Belfast pleasant enough, drinks reasonable (if you don't mind your Gin in a plastic bag) but what was really infuriating was the muggings, as I was unable to book my boarding pass on line (their web site was unable to perform this function even after several attempts) I was 'fined' £6, when I remonstrated I was told by the people that did the mugging that they did not work for BMI Baby (despite being stood in front of hoarding with BMI Baby in 6ft letters) and given a PO Box number to write to and an (unobtainable) phone number to call.

bmibaby review :  20 March 2009 : by E O'Neill

Belfast to Manchester using this airline. Over the last few years I have seen a steady decline in Customer Service and an increase in almost everything else it's possible to levy a charge for. A new rule introduced on 16th March allows only one piece of hand luggage, otherwise a charge of £20! Also, experienced my first welcome greeting from a chewing gum munching Cabin manager. A rise in prices and a big drop in standards. Never again!

bmibaby review :  16 March 2009 : by J Weir

BHX to GLA and back. Simple, straightforward and efficient. Not a particularly modern plane, but good overall service. One big plus on Baby there is none of the hostility towards the customers that you get with Ryanair. Staff are friendly and efficient. Free twix with the £2 cup of tea - well, can it be free when tea costs that much, but prices competitive compared to Ryanair.

bmibaby review :  10 March 2009 : by Calum Curtis

Manchester to Geneva. Flight departed about 25 mins late due to ATC but made up most of the time on the way. It was very busy - glad I paid for seats in advance or may not have been seated together. Had "breakfast" on the plane - a couple of baguettes and coffee (with free single twix!) plus pringles and nuts for less than a tenner - not bad! Overall it was ok but nothing special - travelling back on Easyjet.

bmibaby review :  10 March 2009 : by K Stowe

Booked a flight to Prague for the 6th July which has been cancelled - no reason why. Have tried to email them and they do not respond. Return flight has been cancelled - we do not know if the outward flight is still going, and very disappointed with them.

bmibaby review :  6 March 2009 : by Bernadette Collins

I recently booked a flight for four of us to travel to Prague from Birmingham airport with bmi baby. However, I received an e-mail from them stating that the flight had been cancelled due to operational reasons. No other explanation was given nor were alternative flights suggested. I did receive a partial refund but not the £28 credit card fee. My husband contacted our bank and was told that the fee was not charged by the credit card company but by bmi baby. I have e-mailed them several times asking for a full refund but they have not been courteous enough to reply.