Unflexible BA?

[Benjurs]

Bealine, don't take this the wrong way! I love BA and ever since I have been working in Philly I (and my family) have used them for the past three years or so. Even if US Airways were slightly cheaper.

However last week I booked a restricted roundtrip from LHR to IAD. Late last week I received a flyer from BA offering the same fare but with an offer to upgrade to WT+ for £150.

So I called the EC number and asked if I could pay the £150 (I checked amadeus and it shows T9 available (that's discounted WT+ as far as I know)) and I was told that as I had a restricted ticket it cannot be changed!

Now maybe I'm missing the point but surely if I am not changing the flights, times or days and there is space in both cabins (I checked - W9/T9Y9) all I am changing is the ticket type (from Y to T).

I know BA made a profit but I am offering them another £150 and they don't want to take it. In fact if I had booked the ticket this week I could have taken up the offer!

BA gone mad or just me?

Anyone got any thoughts/possible solutions?

Cheers

Benjurs

PS- Anyone going to be on BA225 on 29/5?

[The_Banking_Scot]

Hi,

Certainly on Virgin Atlantic , you can pay at the ticket desk on the day of departure to upgrade from Economy to Premium Economy ( eqv to WT to WT+ on BA) . I think the cost was around £199 o/w.

You could try the same on BA.

Regards

TBS

[Sharjah Night Shift]

Another example of BA's inflexible systems.

I have recently made two bookings with BA, one an online booking LGW-Malta and another through Air miles for LHR-Vancouver. After booking these flights I discovered Executive Club members can check in online up to 24 hours in advance so I joined in the hope of avoiding the window seat with no window next to the toilet that I usually get allocated.

Wanting to put my new membership number on these bookings I decided to call in at the BA travel shop in Bromley as it is close to my office and ask them to do it for me. There were four assistants in the shop but no customers in sight. One of them was able to view my bookings on the system but was unable to do anything as I had not made the booking in the shop.

All the assistant could do was to give me the phone numbers for the relavant call centres.

[Globaliser]

I think this problem is because of what the BA Travel Shops are. As I understand it, they are organisationally set up as a standalone agency. And they account to/from the airline like any other agency. That's one of the reasons why they are now charging fees for servicing bookings, just like other TAs. And like other TAs, they can't fiddle with bookings that they haven't made.

[Benjurs]

The_Banking_Scot,

Many thanks, I tried this once before at Heathrow and all they could do is give me the walk up fare which was around £900 more!

It's a shame because althought WT+ is worth £150 more IMHO, it certainly isn't worth an extra £900!

All I'm trying to do is give them some extra money? I'm not depriving them of extra revenue as the flight is wide open at the moment!

Oh well, guess I'll never understand airline ticketing polices!

Thanks again

Benjurs

PS - Do you reckon I may get more help on the FT website?

[newswatcher]

Benjurs,

Airlines try and "manage" their passenger load. For any flight, previous experience tells them how many passengers they should expect on that flight. They decide to discount some of these tickets in advance, and in return they want to know that you will be definitely flying, so that they don't have an excess of empty seats at the last minute. You agree to this by the fact that such a ticket is usually non-changeable and non-refundable.

Nearer the time they may offer further discounts, if tickets sales are slow. It is your decision whether to wait for that chance, and possibility end up with no seat on that flight!

Looking at June flights LHR/IAD, the cheapest WT is £223 and the full WT is £888. The cheapest WT+ is £538, and the full WT+ is £2082. These costs exclude taxes etc.

I think you will find that the WT+ u/g was £150 e/w, NOT return. Therefore I would have thought that you could upgrade the £223 ticket to the £538 ticket, by paying the balance, but I am sure that a ticketing "expert" will correct me!

[Benjurs]

Newswatcher,

Thanks for pointing out my error, I did of course mean £150 e/w.

I understand the load factor and that they would not want to sell me a ticket for £150 when they could get £315 extra by another way.

My point is (and maybe I am being naive!) is that my flight is wide open (all classes- as at 1400GMT and I cannot see that there will be a major rush to fly on that flight to IAD when there are two previous flights that day) and that if I had booked on a Monday instead of on the previous Friday I could have taken up the offer!

All I am trying to obtain is to talk to someone reasonable in BA to explain the above.

Still it doesn't look like it's going to happen so I guess I keep the £150 and BA lose out! It's a bit of a shame as a BA shareholder I would like to see the company make a larger profit....

Thanks one and all for all your help! It feels somewhat better to get it off my chest!

Cheers

Benjurs::

[PAXboy]

A not unreasonable request. I think that their reasoning would be along the lines:

If we start offering last minute cheapy u/g into WTP+ then folks will come to bank on that and not pay full whack. Over time, we will devalue WTP and not get the return that we have planned for. THEN it makes no sense to keep WTP+ and return the rows to regular WTP.

[Bumz_Rush]

We should have discussed this in detail in the lounge at LTN...enjoy EDI, i hope you did not actually miss the flight. EZI were missing pax like there going out of business.....

[The_Banking_Scot]

Hi Benjurs,

As you stated you may get additional help on the www.flyertalk.com forum ( select miles then scroll down to British airways) ( I'm normally on the Virgin forum but i scroll down other threads )

Regards

TBS

[PAXboy]

Thanks B-R great to have met and chatted. :D

Made the flight and a number of spare seats and we did push back late, so it seems a number of no shows or stuck in the bars!

The story of the whole day is probably a story to be told as I managed to miss trains as well as planes!