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British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures

bbc.co.uk

1–10 of 117 posts

Re: British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures

#5
I was stuck in exactly this situation with my father last year going from UK to Portugal via Heathrow. Hundreds of people past immigration counters joined the lines to get back into the country, stuck in there for about 5 hours in an extremely congested, slow moving crowd. Some of the younger people were so outraged they took to Twitter and Instagram and began a campaign to refund and sue. About 3 hours in, BA decided it might be prudent to provide water bottles and a pack of biscuits to their customers. It was a pretty grueling experience TBH.

An exact repeat of this situation makes it seem like such failures are becoming routine for BA.

Re: British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures

#7
post #5

I was stuck in exactly this situation with my father last year going from UK to Portugal via Heathrow. Hundreds of people past immigration counters joined the lines to get back into the country, stuck in there for about 5 hours in an extremely congested, slow moving crowd. Some of the younger people were so outraged they took to Twitter and Instagram and began a campaign to refund and sue. About 3 hours in, BA decide…

We were scheduled to fly from Edinburgh to London last year, when the previous meltdown happened.

Luckily we got notified well before anyone got to the airport and managed to book train tickets instead.

Re: British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures

#8
post #5

I was stuck in exactly this situation with my father last year going from UK to Portugal via Heathrow. Hundreds of people past immigration counters joined the lines to get back into the country, stuck in there for about 5 hours in an extremely congested, slow moving crowd. Some of the younger people were so outraged they took to Twitter and Instagram and began a campaign to refund and sue. About 3 hours in, BA decide…

did you get compensated?

Re: British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures

#9
A failure of IT systems shouldn't stop the plane flying...

The gate staff should just let anyone onboard with a legit ticket or a sufficient story about buying one.

Sure, some people might get a free ride, or a few legit ticket holders can't get on because the plane is full, but overall, most passengers end up happy.

Simple things like "the pilot can't log in to the HR system so he gets paid for the flight" should be fixed with a combination of process changes and "let's just fly now, make paper records, and fix the computer records later"

Communication systems should have a backup of a large box of walkie-talkies in every airport so that, for example, the baggage staff can radio to the pilot to let him know they are done loading.

Re: British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures

#10

A failure of IT systems shouldn't stop the plane flying... The gate staff should just let anyone onboard with a legit ticket or a sufficient story about buying one. Sure, some people might get a free ride, or a few legit ticket holders can't get on because the plane is full, but overall, most passengers end up happy. Simple things like "the pilot can't log in to the HR system so he gets paid for the flight" should be…

In yesterday's world, yeah. Today, when you have to take off your shoes to get onto a plane in the US, I don't see that happening.
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