Capetonian
Just curious, but does the customer service you received at least 5 years ago mean that one should expect the same service now, under a different CEO and economic circumstance? I appreciate you are a lost cause to BA, but does saying "BOAC were bad to me under RE, I will never fly with them again" mean a great deal?
Once you become a lost cause your opinions no longer really matter to the company in question as there is nothing they can do to woo you back.
What this does illustrate is that once a customer is lost for good they can be bitter and will tell everyone they once had a bad experience. As time goes by this matters less as people stop listening when they find out that the experience was so long ago as to be a virtually different airline. For example moaning about T5 from its opening is now so irrelevant as the place is very different, it works well and is a pleasant place to transit, so continuing to moan just demonstrates that that person likes to moan.
Ultimately I guess what I am getting at is that because you think they are past caring because of an experince some 5 years or so ago does not mean that they do not care now.