British Airways

Not Verified | I flew from Malaga via LHR to Boston on the 4th May 2024 and on arrival in Boston discovered my luggage was still in London. Filed a report and now 4 days later no sign of the luggage. The baggage customer service is a joke. Not interested in the clients or giving a good service. Updates are useless. I know my luggage has been sitting in Boston since the 5th as I have an air tag inside it. The airline seem to have no intention of getting my luggage to me. The robots on FB messenger & twitter are useless. I opened a complaint & when I checked the update of my complaint the case had been closed despite never been contacted by a human!! This airline is now a joke and if I ever get my luggage back I doubt I will ever fly with them again. They are now worse than Air Canada in my book and that is saying something.

✅ Trip Verified | Milan to Miami return via London. Worst business class ever. The layout of A380 of BA is crazy. The width of seats is outrageous (aisle seats are a shame for BA). Length is ok but you have to JUMP over the legs of another passenger when he/she is in sleeping mode. Unbelievable. The system of dividers up and down to reach all seats by crew is absurd and awful. Never again with this layout. Meal was below average from LHR to Mia, while the return was quite good. Unfortunately for BA, I flew in March with Qatar Airways business class, and not comparable. Just to highlight the difference: BA row has 8 seats, while QR has 4 seats! That’s it. On top of that, the service is quite strange (mainly due to dividers above). Boarding procedures look well organized at the beginning, then during boarding become quite messy.

✅ Trip Verified | BA created a new low-cost subsidiary in BA Euroflyer for flights out of London Gatwick. From a passenger point of view this is meant to mean no difference in service from BA mainline short-haul out of Heathrow. However it is most definitely inferior. Firstly is the seats - BA promised to keep their old much more comfortable Pinnacle seats up to row 12 in their refurbishment of these planes with slimline seats, however at BA Euroflyer it seems the whole plane has these installed on some planes. Despite snagging a seat in row 10, we ended up still with those horrible back breaking seats that have no lumbar support and no headrests. One positive of the new seats was meant to be at-seat power to charge devices, but this didn't have that either. The onboard service is meant to include some complimentary food and drink, namely a sweet or savoury snack and a small bottle of Harrogate Spa water. What we got was horrible Nairn's Raisin Oat biscuits, without asking if we'd like the other choice and no water. On the return flight it was explicitly announced we'd be offered a glass of water for free, but this was not offered during the service. The snack was sole choice of a pack of McVities Milk Chocolate digestive, hardly premium and downgrade from some of the more alternative and upmarket offerings we've received when flying from Heathrow. On the way back we did have non-refurbished plane with pinnacle seats, this was welcome, however clearly the plane is not maintained, as one toilet had no water flowing from the tap - very irritating when you soap up to wash your hands after going to the toilet. I went to rinse my hand in the other toilet, luckily it wasn't busy, the tap was working but the sink wasn't draining and almost overflowed. Lastly the cabin crew on BA Euroflyer are very unpolished, look miserable and extremely demotivated. A lot of them a very young, we're talking late teens and clearly very inexperienced and not likely to stay long under the conditions offered to them. BA really needs to rethink its product offering in short-haul - ultimately people choose to fly with them for variety of reasons, but invariably there is a reason like us they don't fly with their low-cost rivals because they want peace of mind, less stress and to be comfortable. So replicating the likes of Ryanair, easyJet or Wizz Air is just alienating as a customer, because we choose BA to avoid the kind of experience they offer. We were on an award ticket, but looking at cash tickets they're not even cheap nor offer better timings than those rivals, despite all this bean-counting!

✅ Trip Verified |   I flew with British Airways from Heathrow to Hannover. Although the check-in process was relatively quick, there was a noticeable lack of staff—another apparent cost-cutting measure by BA. Upon arriving in Hannover, I found that my luggage hadn't made it to the airport, and there were no staff to assist. I had to file a report online. The following day, I received a call saying my luggage would arrive on a later flight, but this didn't help me since German shops are closed on Sundays, leaving me without essential items. As a result, I was confined to my hotel, unable to attend any planned events because I didn't have suitable clothing. When my luggage eventually reached the Hannover airport, I got a call from BA informing me that they couldn't deliver it for another day or two. They advised me to take a taxi to pick it up and said I could claim back the cost, but when I submitted my claim, BA refused to cover the taxi expenses. They also declined to offer compensation for the inconvenience caused by the delayed baggage, even though it disrupted a full day of my trip. Service on my return flight from Frankfurt was also below par from the ground crew at Frankfurt airport who were slow & rude at check in. BA's customer service has declined significantly, now resembling the level of budget airlines like EasyJet and Ryanair—but at a premium price. Given my recent experience, I will avoid flying with BA whenever possible.

✅ Trip Verified | Manchester to Copenhagen via London on 30th April 2024 Aircrafts were A319 and A320, respectively, both in decent condition. I arrived from Africa, and had to transit and change terminal to T3, which is very cumbersome and tedious. Check-in was quick, easy, and professional, got my desired seats due to silver status at BA. From T3 I had to go through one of the worst security checks ever encountered, fragmenting almost every item in my carry-ons. Their Escape Lounge in T3 is quite decent, particular beer choices and prosecco sparkling wine. Food was very poor, neither any savoury snacks nor meaty food at all. Good tarmac view. First flight was delayed, forcing me to catch the 2nd in LHR within ½ hour. However, I was informed clearly at gate upon arriving in LHR, assisting me on next gate and the airline managed to transfer the luggage in this extremely narrow timeslot. Onboard, only a mini-bottle of water and some bagged crumbs were given, fairly useless and superfluous. No IFE or WiFi. Annoying charity beggings from FAs on both flights are intrusive, annoying, disrespectful, and degrades the airline. Offerings onboard like discount carriers, except being pricier. Arrived final destination on time and so did my luggage.

✅ Trip Verified | I have never seen such disrespect to a customer. It was the 3rd time in 2 months that I was unable to do a check-in because of their website not working properly. Lost 2 hours on the phone with their customer service team. At the airport I was asked to check in my hand luggage because they had no more space in the cabin. I could not recline my seat and the staff was rude and unhelpful to me. The wifi was also not working. I made multiple complaints and no one ever even contacted me. Never using them again!

✅ Trip Verified | Paid for a 14 hour long flight ticket which includes use of the in-flight entertainment system. Ended up in a seat where the in-flight entertainment system was malfunctioning and could not be used at all. Flight attendants sought to perform a "service recovery" through their customer relations team. Contacted by the said team slightly more than a week later with an offer of an eVoucher that can only be used in purchasing additional flight tickets with BA. Explained to them that I had no intentions of travelling again within the next two years so I had no use of an eVoucher and sought for an alternative form of compensation instead, something that could really be useful instead. Customer Relations simply brushed my request off as them unable to offer any alternate "gesture of goodwill". Compensation in British Airways is a matter of "goodwill". Pay for a ticket but don't get what you paid for in full. Compensation is one that requires you to spend even more money on the airline (so that they can disappoint you further). An ultimately self-serving, inconsiderate, undiscerning and insincere compensation. Which in itself isn't even anything they feel guilty or remorseful about, because any compensation is a "gesture of goodwill", something you don't deserve in their view.

✅ Trip Verified | Very inconsiderate PA announcements were made by a purser who appearingly decided to exchange his career at BA for comedy club acting, although not at the right setting. First pre-landing PA: “My colleague and I had a very long week with British Airways, so we are dimming the lights as we don’t want you to see our faces. If you are afraid of the dark - just look at the passenger next to you”. Although clearly not the purser’s intent, it sounded like a mocking and very careless of people with aero / darkness phobias who may have a panic attack after such a joke. Very inconsiderate and damages BA’s brand as a safe, accessible and a trusted airline. Second PA after landing was: “if you’d like to make a complaint, go call EasyJet”. I felt genuinely insulted by this “joke”. BA charged an abusive fee. In the end, I literally had to beg the rude and dismissive ground staff in Madrid not to check my roller bag at gate because I recently had surgery and needed to hold onto it to walk. Instant noodles which I purchased onboard were barely edible. All cabin crew except from one disappeared at the galley where they were loudly chatting and laughing and looked at me as a nuisance even when I just wanted to pass through them to visit the lavatory. And then the chief purser effectively announces that if anyone is unhappy they can go fly someone else. Wake up, BA! You are already worse than EasyJet and Ryanair in terms of value for money!! I note that only ones who found the purser’s jokes funny were the other cabin crew who made a few vulgar laughs, while passengers remained dead silent. I can understand airlines scaling back services to cut costs. I will never understand how you can allow your staff to openly mock and insult your passengers. I am a BA Silver member and have been a loyal BA customer for years. A disgrace.

✅ Trip Verified | Absolutely terrible, lost my luggage on both flights, delivered 3 days later smashed to pieces. A lete departure caused me to miss the connecting flight, yielding a 7 hour delay. the aircraft was oversubscribed, dirty, with an unpleasant persistent odour. Food was genuinely horrible, I'm ex forces, I'll eat almost anything usually!

✅ Trip Verified | We booked premium economy round trip from Phoenix to Zurich via AA codeshare and operated by British Airway. On our way return flight back to Phoenix February 25th, the first leg of the BA flight 0773 between Zurich and London Heathrow was delayed departure, which cause us missed the BA 0289 connection flight between Heathrow and Phoenix. First problem is that when we dash to the terminal 5 security check point at 12:00 PM, the airplane was still at gate and will not depart until 2:25 PM if it will be on schedule, we had almost 30 min at that point, however the terminal 5 security stopped us and was told we cannot pass thru the security due to airline requirement, we later realized that flight 0289 did not leave until 3:30 PM. We were directed to the customer service to re-book the flight. When we got to BA customer service transfer counter, there was only one agent available, there were least 12 passengers waiting in the lines, we were told BA was short of staffs due to British holiday during end of February and there was a soccer championship match that Sunday, so it took us at least an hour and half to rebook the same flight next day, also it seems there are not much option at all if we want to back to Phoenix on different flight on the same day. Then, the agent who re-booked the flight told us his printer was broken and we need go to Zone 2 of terminal 5 to get the ticket and hotel voucher printed. We found Zone 2 and had our ticket and voucher in hand and assure by the agent that our luggage will be on our next day flight with us as well. We also told there was a shuttle bus around the corner to take us to the hotel, however no map or detail direction provided, it took us a while to find out that the shuttle is at back side of the terminal 5, by the time we arrived at hotel we were very tired. Next day, we arrived at airport few hours ahead our scheduled departed time 2:25 PM, I noticed my checked two bags not in the same spot based on my iPhone’s Find me feature (I had Apple Air Tag in each of my checked bags), so I checked with the gate agent, she confirmed with me that only one checked bag was associated with my flight! Luckily, the flight was delayed two hours, so my other bag made to the same flight. While on the flight, the team of young flight attendants were generally pleasant, but they missed to service me meal, I did not order any special meal, and the popular chicken dish was not available when she came to my row, so I told her any chicken dish will be ok, and she told me give her few minutes and she will bring me a different chicken dish, however she totally forgot that and only when she came back to collect the trash, I mentioned to her she forgot my chicken dish, she was surprised and acting like I was lying to her. Overall, I think my premium economy flight on BA is the worst experience in recent memory. As the British flagship carrier, they seem don't care, I emailed my sent my experience to their customer service, they responded with a standard corporate reply from one of their email templates...