British Airways Taking Advantage???
Much as BA are my much preferred airline, I can’t help but feel that they pushed their luck last week when they were in negotiations over a long-planned strike by their cabin staff.
I was in San Francisco, in theory the strike was not on the day I was due to fly, but about 6 days before my flight I got an e-mail from them saying that my flight had been cancelled and that I should re-book (at no additional cost).
Needless to say, whatever happened to me and my flight from that point on was going to be sub-optimal as I had chosen when to fly in the first place based on when suited me. But not only did I have to change plans, inevitably incurring additional costs and hassle – but from the minute I got their cancellation e-mail I had the feeling that I was being used as a negotiation ploy by BA in their discussions with the unions….if they could show that they had minimised the hassle factor of having people waiting around airports then the impact of the strike was going to be reduced.
Sure enough, as we all pretty much knew would happen – a compromise was reached, the strike was called off, and both sides breathed a sigh of relief. So everyone was happy…..not quite; as ever the hassle to customers was not that high on the priority list.
