Well, here we are, all set with the family to depart LCY this afternoon to Palma on holiday, and guess what - cancelled by BA about 2 hours before departure. Just as we were preparing to leave home.
Cancelled. On me. BA and LCY's longtime supporter, here and elsewhere ... ! ! !
I hadn't quite appreciated however how far BA irregular ops procedures had sunk. We were only advised by SMS text, and that we were auto rebooked one day later - from Heathrow. This was despite there being on the website seats still available that day from LCY. So a call to bookings was eventually answered, where it was apparent that the (non-UK, non-English first language) BA irregular ops agent had no idea (or was fed by their computer screen) that LCY and LHR are separate airports, I'm just requoted flights from LHR and only by reading the timetable out to them with flight numbers etc do I manage to get rebooked out of LCY.
Seems to have been a right shambles developed, with a string of cancellations. The parallel Ibiza round trip was also cancelled and their originally booked aircraft sent off at the same departure time to Frankfurt instead.
Meanwhile the website showed our outward flight cancelled, but stated in no uncertain terms that there was no compensation payable for the costs of getting to a different departure point. The spirit of Alex Cruz seems to live on. I suppose we will have to see what the three of us get out of EU261 etc, the loss of our prepaid hotel for us all, etc.
Now I've had cancellations before (way back in the PPRuNe history somewhere is an account of being stuck on the wrong side of the Atlantic during the 'volcano' episode quite some years ago), but really the whole thing is now just treated as an admin exercise in changing reservations, nothing more. Oh well, see you on the afternoon Palma tomorrow,
They had never even noticed from the data on the reservation that 27 August is Mrs WHBM's (
) birthday ....
