British Airways Reviews 

Arrived at Athens airport almost 4 hours early. No online checkin, BA not available in check-in kiosk, and hours long queue to get boarding pass (and that’s before security and passport control.). BA only airline with this line, all others have no or reasonable queue.

A few years ago, after returning from a holiday in Istanbul, all three of our suitcases failed to arrive and took three days to be returned to us. What frustrated me almost as much as the missing luggage was the complete lack of proper communication. After that experience, I decided to stop flying with British Airways.

This year, we decided to give BA another chance and use some of our accumulated Avios for our trip to Spain. Unfortunately, I now regret that decision.

Our return flight was cancelled at very short notice, causing considerable stress and effectively ruining the final day of our holiday. We managed to rearrange our journey for the following day, but our flight was then delayed by around two hours. At Heathrow, we had to rush to make our connecting flight to Glasgow. We made it. One of our suitcases did not.

It is now Sunday, and we are on the fourth day since arriving home, yet our suitcase is still missing.

I completely understand that Heathrow experienced a major air traffic disruption and that many airlines and passengers were affected. However, our journey took place several days into the disruption. By that stage, I would expect an airline of BA’s size and experience to have contingency measures in place to deal with the aftermath.

More importantly, Heathrow is British Airways’ main hub. If BA cannot manage this kind of disruption effectively at its own home base, where exactly can passengers expect it to do so?

British Airways is not a budget airline. Customers choose and pay for a major full-service airline partly because they expect better operational resilience, communication and customer care when things go wrong. The true test of a large airline is not when everything is running normally, but how quickly and effectively it responds during disruption.

I can understand a suitcase failing to make a connecting flight during a chaotic day. What I cannot understand is why, with numerous flights operating between London and Glasgow every day, that suitcase cannot simply be sent on the next available flight and returned to the passenger promptly.

What makes the situation particularly unacceptable is that, according to the baggage tracking information we have had to find and check ourselves, the suitcase appears to have been located. At one point, the system indicated that it would be handed to a courier for delivery.

Yet here we are, on the fourth day since arriving home, and we still have no suitcase, no confirmed delivery date and no reliable indication of when it will actually reach us.

Apart from a generic apology email, there has been virtually no meaningful or proactive communication from British Airways. We should not have to repeatedly search online tracking systems ourselves simply to work out what might be happening to our luggage.

Since arriving home, I have been reluctant to leave the house for any length of time because I have no idea when the suitcase might suddenly be delivered. I also have no idea what condition the belongings inside will be in. There are clothes, personal care items and other belongings that I need to use and wash, and I simply do not know when I will get them back.

The original baggage delay may have been caused by exceptional disruption. However, as we approach 72 hours since arriving home, the lack of effective recovery and communication is becoming increasingly difficult to blame simply on what happened at Heathrow.

Problems happen in aviation. Flights are delayed, systems fail and baggage occasionally gets left behind. What distinguishes a good airline is what happens next: how quickly it reacts, how well it keeps its passengers informed and how effectively it resolves the problem.

This is precisely where British Airways has failed us.

What makes this particularly disappointing is that this is not my first similar experience with BA. I stopped flying with the airline after my previous baggage experience, gave it another chance several years later, and have ended up regretting that decision.

At this point, I cannot recommend British Airways. If I have to accept this level of disruption, baggage handling and communication anyway, I might as well fly with a budget airline and pay budget-airline prices.

Whenever possible I always use BA for my flights, both internal and international. I've had reason to contact customer services to confirm seating, Despite tech issues they continued to support sorting my issues. I’ve always been happy with the service I’ve received over many years. I think with age comes a realisation of what can/should be expected. As far as I’m concerned BA have never let me down and I'm more than happy to support our national carrier. We are flying from Manchester on in Nov 2026 and a hotel stay so we can be ready for our 11 am flight to Costa Rica. Our connection is using BA even though there were budget flights available 👍 keep up the good work. Kind Regards, Graham

Gone downhill. Arrived to the airport 4h in advance. Bag drop wasn’t open until 1.5h before the flight. Arrived extremely early only to be rushing in the end and then for the airport stuff to be telling us we need to hurry up?

Was on Flight BA054, 08 Sept from JHB to LHR to Belfast. Absolute chaos at Heathrow. Although BA cannot be blamed for the mismanagement of Heathrow Airport, they should have stronger contingency plans for their passagers belongings more especially that this has happened several times over the past few years.

Impossible to track online for delayed baggage as there was no reference number given. Finally a mail this morning advising that my luggage was on a flight to Belfast.

It's now been 96 hours without luggage and no further feedback whether I should collect? Or will they deliver?by when?

Heathrow being one of the main hubs to the UK & Europe and BA being UK's national carrier reflects very poorly on the nations ability to handle emergencies.

BA’s WhatsApp support was able to smoothly deal with my query and resolved it without fuss.

I always book BA if I can as they have good leg room and are more flexible on luggage than the budget airlines

As a loyal customer of BA I am appalled by their negligence. Why would BA tell people to check their luggage if they can’t deliver or handle it properly?? They have put our belongings in the hands of EcourierAir, and like BA, they are completely non-contactable to customers using an automated AI voice that cuts off. Instead of helping us the AI voice sends a link to the ‘live portal’ that we already have, that’s inaccurate and out of date. So customers are left without luggage and without any sufficient communication. The delivery couriers did not contact me, and the system was not up to date or accurate but claim to have ‘attempted delivery’ and took my luggage back to the depot. So my luggage has been on a round trip of London and has yet to be returned to me after 48hrs. This is appalling BA. People are entrusting you with their belongings and you have failed them!!

If I could give 0 I would. Booked my flights for my honeymoon with British airways and used Avios for a discount. They took my money and my points and then later told me there was a glitch and the booking didn’t go through. After that there were no more flights available so I am having to change my plans. I called and they told me to complain online, the online team told me I had to call…

I think worst airlines in the world, I did purchase flight this year, to fly from Chicago to split Croatia, what they did I arrive with my family three hours prior flight they told me the plane have issue it’s not going to fly, they give us different alternative plane Lufthansa what was scheduled to go four hours later, we had to wait so long to sit on that plane, the same time original plane from British Airways left on a regular time🤔 somehow they screw us up and then I pay for the special seats what I wasn’t able to use into Lufthansa plane, on the way back my return flight they canceled, I was shocked, I had to spend four days to investigate why they canceled my flight return flight, we went so much stress with this company, first time we was flying with them, and this is the last time, I recommend anybody who looking for the plane to go oversee. Do not even try to go with the British Airways worst company in the world.

My last three flights with BA have all been approximately 2 hours late. I am expecting visitors to arrive late tonight who are unfortunately flying BA, their flight is already indicating a 2.5 hour delay.
Why Oh why are BA so popular ? The service and experience is not a patch on what it was 10 to 15 years ago.

Flew from Heraklion to Heathrow on BA695 on 9 September. Took 2 hours for the bags to arrive. Disgraceful.

I booked BA flight to Ghana on the 6 August after boarding flight for 4:30hrs waiting for my flight to depart to Ghana (Accr) flight was cancelled since we were going to our daughter wedding we requested for immediate flight which BA put us on KLM for the next day but downgraded us from our carbin to economy which we agreed with BA that were they need to refund us for our initial cabin which was business class we have completed our flight return home (UK) and BA is still going back and forth with us by not refunding us our price difference and has not even pay us for delayed/cancellation flight have contacted BA on numerous occasion to no avail

I have been trying to get voucher credit given the fact I cannot fly anymore and they just want to get more and more money from flight change, while at the same time it's impossible to change destination on the website, forcing me to call them. Customer service has been very rude and useless.

This is a copy of my claim form which they denied. Absolute scumbags that left us stranded without care.

AVOID AVOID AVOID.

I would like to make it clear that this claim is around the way we were treated at Heathrow Airport. I am fullv in understanding that weather and acts of God cannot be controlled but the way the public and customers are treated and respected absolutely can. We were due to get a flight in the morning. We ended up later on a connecting flight and we're rebooked for one 9 hours later. We had to get meals etc at the airport in the meantime but I've only claimed for the main one. During this time our alternative flight came up on display as cancelled. 3 hours before due to take off. Had We known this would be the case, we would potentially have sought alternative transport as we ended up having to do and do this early. As it was we were sent into 3 different customer locations and waited in the queue for around an hour each time to be sent somewhere else before we could speak to the representative. We were sent to 2 different help desks then rhe arrivals location before Description being handed a letter with the members of staff about baq collection that we weren't even there for. He was also verbally saying there wasnt going to be anyone at the desk so we were waiting in a pointless queue. This is appalling customer service and this wasnt the only time it happened. The reason in the claim also that there is 2 different travel costings is because of the amount of time it took to be passed from customer service person to person and indeed get out the airport, we missed our connecting train and had to seek an overnight bus instead, Again, I reiterate, weather cant be controlled, customer dignity, respect and information can. Even if it was a case of we would have to wait and clear instruction on where and an estimation of how long even but nothing like this took place, To be told after over an hour of waiting "I dont know why youre queuing, there will be nobody to help when you get there" is a disgrace.

I checked in my bag in Denver. I never seen my luggage again. It is sitting at an airport at Heathrow for two days now. I am four days I’m trip Florence Rome with no word from them besides report filed at the airport. I have had to buy basic necessities and clothes . I can’t talk to a real person to even anticipate when it should arrive. After another person on a train overheard our conversation they said they had a whole group with missing luggage and they were leaving in two days for a cruise. All I know is we will never use them again.

Our flight was cancelled last Thursday from Larnaca to London (technical reasons), and they rebooked us to Athens that evening, we had to find a hotel and then we had an 8am flight Athens to London on the Friday. It was a huge inconvenience and it would have been a one star, however the customer service to resolve it was smooth and painless. After filling in the forms on Monday and submitting expenses and a description of the flight changes (they had it all in the system on the booking number), I expected to be messed around and hardly anything paid back. Imagine my surprise when two days later we received £350 each for the flight and the full hotel booking paid. So despite the generally tardiness of the airline operationally the customer service team were efficient and slick. So in terms of this they deserve the rating they are given

British Airways your customer service is nonexistent. How can you justify denying a claim for a cancelled flight for my daughter? What you didn't realise there were over 40 of them on the same trip and some have been paid. Disgusting!!!!

Would not even give 1 star. Worst customer service I have ever recieved. Back and forth with a refund for a flight which was cancelled on the 26th of June, and still awaiting them to proceed with it.

Case failed to make transit from Heathrow airport to plane so not at Cape Town airport when we arrived. Then discovered that BA check in mixed up the labels to our cases so took ages for Cape Town to identify which case BA had lost. We have been promised our case will be delivered to hotel tomorrw ie from Tuesday evening to Friday. No communication from BA to date.
I travel the world both for business and leisure using a variety of airlines from Easy Jet to Emirates and have never experienced such ineptitude from anybody else.