In late 2021, Mark from San Diego and his spouse had been flying dwelling on British Airways premium economic system from Cut up, Croatia, by way of London and Dallas, however missed a connection. They had been rebooked in economic system on Virgin Atlantic and tried for 2 years to get reimbursed when lastly, in December 2023, they had been informed they’d agreed to the downgrade, which he denies. (It shouldn’t matter anyway, each Mr. Leff and Mr. Radchenko stated.)
They lastly obtained $746 from British Airways earlier this week. However the full value of their authentic round-trip itinerary (two tickets from San Diego to Ljubljana, Slovenia, and again from Croatia) was $5,821, and it’s unlikely that their refund might account for 75 p.c of a premium economic system trans-Atlantic flight. British Airways confirmed they calculated the distinction in fare relatively than utilizing the parameters laid out by the British authorities and provided no clarification to me as to why.
A yr later, Cynthia and her associate had a really related scenario, lacking a British Airways premium economic system connection in London on their method dwelling to Los Angeles, ending up in economic system. They’d booked by a journey agent, who tried unsuccessfully to get a refund. Then Cynthia ran right into a brick wall when she tried herself. She has nonetheless not obtained a refund.
Within the third British Airways case, David of Carmel, N.Y., and his spouse had been booked to fly top quality from London to New York when their flight was canceled. On their rebooked flight, they had been downgraded to the equal of enterprise class. Their preliminary request for a refund was rejected by somebody who nearly comically misinterpret their criticism, responding that they weren’t entitled to compensation as a result of their flight had arrived with solely “18 minutes delay.” Subsequent calls to buyer companies led nowhere. And even after I received in contact with the airline, one other consultant wrote the couple with the coup d’absurdité: They weren’t entitled to a refund as a result of “primarily based on our analysis, your ultimate flight was in First Class, therefore there isn’t a downgrade refund due to your reserving.” (I can attest that their boarding passes say in any other case.)
British Airways did lastly ship the couple a refund, of $1,036, this previous Saturday. However their authentic fare for top quality (plus a brief hop from Amsterdam to London on the return) was slightly below $10,000 for each, which presumably means the return flights from London to New York value a complete of near $5,000. Once more, British Airways stated it calculated the distinction in fares relatively than the suitable proportion of the unique fare. I’ve suggested David to take a look at Britain’s Civil Aviation Authority’s steerage on rejected claims.