While I don't know what the deal [is/was] regarding pilots, none of the management grades in BA took a pay-cut during the pandemic, while all non-management grades took at least a 5% pay cut [some departments more than that as grades disappeared and the new grades were on a lower pay-scale] had their T+Cs changed and lost some leave entitlement, not all of which had been re-instated post pandemic, so while the headline figure may look good, it's wasn't the whole picture.

Everyone loves a bit of FlyerTalk drama… think most are now used to it on other domestic carriers, infact lots are surprised you don’t need it. Will be a storm in a BA tea cup

I've posted elsewhere about Air France putting Concorde trips in a prize draw for passengers - I was on a 727 where it was the prize drawn after takeoff.

I agree CabinCrewe every single outlet (traditional or modern) has to make it seem like NEWS. Very often there is a provocative question to which the answer is most obviously 'No'. They also make a statement as if it is fact and end with (in smaller font) '... according to experts/ XYZ Party news release'

Check-in has gone wrong at Gatwick. Situation bronze.

Well after last week's chaos, I have been looking at BA cancellations, every single day there are multiple canx flights.
I am currently in Rome, travelling back Friday, and saw that the day before we travelled here, the same fight was cancelled, and today's afternoon flight is also cancelled.

What is wrong? I have heard
- crew shortages
- tech aircraft
- long term equipment shortages (jeez can you just order a larger batch of replacement aircraft!!)
- LHR congestion
- aircraft late out of maintenance
- ground crew shortages
and so on.

Can anyone fill me in on the reasons for these daily cancellations?

BA Cancellations yesterday :
BA1472 GLA
BA458 MAD
BA306 CDG
BA714 ZRH
BA816 CPH
BA566 MXP
BA442 AMS

Long hauls :
BA067 PHL
BA203 BOS

It's a combination of all those things. Regarding just ordering more planes you realise they don't just magically appear the next day? BA has planes on order already. It takes time. 7 short haul cancellations out of x hundred is not bad. They are all routes with multiple daily flights. It's a similar story at other major hubs. Take FRA yesterday with Lufthansa.

Cancelled:
LH154 Leipzig
LH46 Hannover
LH126 Stuttgart
LH1026 Paris CDG
LH140 Nuremburg
LH72 Dusseldorf
LH4 Hamburg
LH566 Port harcourt
LH1010 Brussels
LH14 Hamburg

and that's just until lunch time.

Most carriers caught out by Covid drop and resurgance.
No one wants to pay more money for their tickets.
Wet lease costs real money. Accountants don't like that.

Many chickens are now roosting.

I've written on the London City thread about our experiences flying LCY to Palma, which has one or two frequencies per day, over the end-August weekend. Ended up getting there three days late and losing a significant slice of our holiday.

Sunday : Cancelled due to Mediterranean weather.
Monday : Cancelled due to ATC issue.
Tuesday : No more seats available.
Wednesday : Morning flight full, finally got on the afternoon one.

Here if interested : London City-4 - Page 6 - PPRuNe Forums

Now the real issue here is the complete absence of any effective management of issues like this. Given just a rebooking phone number, which constantly played a recording that they were too busy to answer, try later. Eventually got through and asked, on being told nothing on the Tuesday, what about Iberia from Heathrow through Madrid. "Oh, that sort of thing not available to us". For goodness sake, it's the same owners.

Meanwhile the 'cheap and cheerful' holiday flights had all bent over backwards to handle it, with extra flights (BA apparently arranged none, it was just what seats were left on the schedule), subchartered-in aircraft, arrangements of hotac and meals, regular client contact, etc. Worst was a 12-hour delay. I discovered this by actually asking the Jet2 rep in the resort how they had handled it.

I do get the feeling that the BA method of operation now is there's a rotation out of the UK and back, if there's a delay that will upset the next aircraft or crewing rotation, they just cancel, aircraft and crew just wait for the next leg, all passengers back to reservations to make what they can of it,

WHBM - in future you need to pick a better airline for flights to Europe. Try Ryanair or Wizzair instead of British Airways

Indeed, after the way BA treated it's staff during covid, closing the pension scheme and generally p1551ng everyone off its no wonder the service levels have dropped.

All UK departures are now low priority by almost ALL scheduled carriers EZY (and co), WZZ (and co), RUK (and co), BAW (and co). It’s too easy to procrastinate on EU261 pay outs these days, (and politically there are those with the levers of power want it totally gone !)

WZZ have still to settle COVID claims and continue to cancel UK departures as does EZY en mass , Ryanair will also cancel UK ops .

BAW/CFE/EFW are simply following the trend of ever declining service standards accepted within the UK market place .

BTW - Lufthansa group have similar issues with Eurowings in particular and The AF branch of AFKL have to deal with numerous general strikes (manifesting) on a rolling basis ( they may have fallen from UK media but they ain’t gone away !)

Jet2 are a holiday company with an airline attached they can barely afford to p**s off their captive clients especially with bills to pay for that accommodation and meals AND pay delay compensation at the same time and further pay out for their bond to ATOL AND CO.
The traditional inclusive tour still has some advantages and protections afforded to the customer .

Would be interested to know if the person in the call centre was aware Iberia is within IAG, or whether they just didn’t bother looking. When you book on BA’s site they list IB flights and connections via MAD/BCN as options, AFAIK the MAD flights certainly from LHR are all code-shares.

We don’t know the ticketing bundle restrictions or the fact the departure was booked from City as opposed to Heathrow or Gatwick

Yes Heathrow -Madrid is not only codeshare, alliance partner and indeed same parent company but is operated frame neutral as well . That said with Iberia back in T3 perhaps the computer doesn’t immediately identify those -idk

BA started and stopped CitiFlyer and others (not looking them up) and I guess that having them operating under a slightly different name gives them get outs for not sharing seats.

BA318 I get that other airlines suffer too, and yes I know the order time for a batch of A32x aircraft is currently around 5-7 years. But that's what fleet planners do. The point I am making is - should the travelling public accept it? Problem is that there are not many alternatives to BA from the UK unless its FR/EZY or the dreaded WZZ.

On fleet planning, there are about 20 new aicraft allocated to BA, most replacing A319/A320ceo aircraft which are on average 20 years old and have about 5-8 years of life left in them. Taking the Lufthansa comparison, they have about 45-50 narrow body aircraft on order, albeit replacing older aircraft than BA have.

They need to do better, whether they want to f@nny about with Gatwick operations or not.

BA has 49 Neos in service/on order.

They moved back to T5.
Again.