NEWS 1


YOU NEED TO KNOW


Passengers at


Heathrow were stranded after the IT failure on Saturday


AT A GLANCE BA’s systems fallout


l BA pledged: “You can rebook [cancelled flights] for alternative dates up until the end of November or have a full refund.”


l Industry estimates it will cost BA between £100 million and £150 million in compensation.


l Passengers on delayed or cancelled flights are entitled to the following under EU rules:


Short-haul flights (under 1,500km): €250 for delays of more than three hours (nothing for less than three hours)


Medium-haul (1,500-3,500km): €400 for more than three hours


Agents slam BA as outage strands 75,000 customers


Ian Taylor ian.taylor@travelweekly.co.uk


Agents accused British Airways of ruining the bank holiday and business trips of tens of thousands of customers after a power outage brought down IT systems on Saturday.


The carrier appeared back to


normal on Tuesday, insisting: “We’re running a full schedule.” But more than 75,000 passengers


were stranded at Heathrow and Gatwick and hundreds of flights cancelled or delayed at the weekend. Passengers were forced to queue outside Heathrow Terminal 5 or to leave the airport without luggage as things got back to normal. Agents acted swiftly to rebook clients. Steve Murray, head


of Focus (corporate travel) operations at Advantage Travel Partnership said: “Lots of our guys were busy over the weekend. There was a lot of rebooking and so little information from BA. The trade sorted passengers out – best of luck if you booked on ba.com.” Paul Smith, owner of WOT


Travel in Twickenham, had five clients booked on BA flights on Saturday.


Smith said BA “pulled the


shutters down” amid “utter chaos” at Terminal 5, adding: “It would have soothed things if BA had kept people updated.” He found replacement flights for his clients and said he would be seeking compensation for all of them. BA had a special message for


the trade, telling Travel Weekly: “We’re extremely sorry for the


4 travelweekly.co.uk 1 June 2017


“We [BA] would like to thank the trade for their tireless efforts during the disruption”


frustration and inconvenience our trade partners experienced over the bank holiday. “We would like to thank them


for their tireless efforts supporting us during the disruption.” Earlier, BA chief executive


Alex Cruz told the BBC he was “profusely sorry”. However, there were calls for


Cruz to resign from some BA staff. Others accused management


of “poor visibility” and “poor communication”, while the GMB union blamed the IT meltdown on BA axing 700 IT jobs last autumn.


Long-haul (over 3,500km): €300 for three to four-hour delays; €600 for more than four hours


l To track bags, go to ba.com


l For info on compensation, go to caa.co.uk/passengers


BA blamed a power outage.


Cruz said: “There was a power surge and a back-up system did not work. We will make sure it doesn’t happen again.” A BA spokeswoman said: “It was


a power supply issue at one of our UK data centres. An exceptional power surge caused physical damage to our infrastructure and many of our operational IT systems failed. We’re undertaking an investigation to find out the exact circumstances.” GMB national officer for aviation Mick Rix said: “This could have been avoided. BA made hundreds of IT staff redundant in 2016 and outsourced the work to India.” Delta Air Lines suffered a similar


systems malfunction last August when a power surge brought down its reservations system.


PICTURE: TOLGA AKMEN/LNP/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK


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