JayPee28bpr and Capetonian,
I'm sorry to have dismissed your complaint in a cavalier manner and agree that it is particularly unacceptable to treat disadvantaged passengers in an offhand way.
When I was in BA there was a company policy of 'Service recovery', that is to say that errors should be handled in a manner which would leave the offended passenger with a higher opinion of the company than they would have had even if no error had occurred in the first place.
Back then I carried overburdened ladies coats, fixed the vacuum toilets on the B744 (not nice) etc.
I regret the changes since then which you describe.
Bas.