Airline departs with no passenger baggage loaded. Captain tells passengers on arrival

Spice007

Had the recent appalling experience of flight to Vancouver being loaded with passengers at Heathrow T5.  It was then held at gate with explanations of awaiting baggage and freight to be loaded. Capt then pushed back 2 hours 56 mins from the official take off time cleverly avoiding the 3 hour take off delay compensation risk.
On arrival in Vancouver he then informed everyone that NO baggage had been loaded. It caused chaos then at the airport as all passengers ( approx280-300) had to process delayed baggage claims. 

Many passengers were going to ski hols and have none of the needed ski clothes or equipment .
any advice or input at how pre meditated this airlines action was as no one could believe that the captain couldn’t know that no luggage had been loaded (best guess 4000kgs of luggage) and apart from delayed baggage claims best course of action to get compensation from the airline.
thanks

Westin

Welcome to the new streamlined British Airways (presumably it was BA).

It seems BA cut back so many staff during the covid pandemic, preferring not to use the government furlough scheme and instead clear out those on old contracts, the airline now finds it difficult to recruit on new terms/reduced salary.  Staff morale seemingly at an all time low in a recent staff survey. The new guard are trying to clear up the mess left by the old management  but this still leaves a big hole in the airline and passengers suffering.

Your situation is completely unacceptable and annoyingly could have been resolved earlier.  I hope you can buy a new ski wardrobe and be healthily compensated.

PS - I’d drop the travel editors of some of the U.K. newspapers your story.

Thrugelmir

Was this during the recent bad weather? 

theoretica

I am sure the captain knew  but would telling the passengers at take off have made any difference?

daveyjp

The airline also has to bear in mind working and flying hours for pilots.  A further delay could have resulted in cancellation and no flight until later in the week.

Sandtree

Nice idea but a little simplistic, there are many more considerations than just compensation for a delayed arrival on a single flight.

Not sure when your flight was but there were plenty of pictures of meltdown at LHR on Friday with baggage being delayed hours. Maybe you were caught up in that? Exactly how many hours would you want them to sit there? Would you rather have not flown because the working hours would have been exceeded? 

Given the Capitain made the decision to go it makes perfect sense to wait to the end of the flight otherwise the cabin crew with have hours dealing with obnoxious customers... timing is everything with bad news. When did the baggage actually arrive? Seems to be something missed from your story. Did it get delivered to you or you had to go back to the airport to collect it?

The airline will be liable for covering the cost of essentials needed to be bought to cover the gap in luggage plus any cost in picking up the delayed bags if not delivered to you. https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/consumer/holiday-cancellations-and-compensation/get-airline-compensation-for-lost-or-delayed-luggage/ 

CKhalvashi

The crew would have been under FTLs as well as the delay. A flight to Vancouver with a 2 person crew would likely have been pushing the limit on working hours had the flight not left when it did.

Crew are very often given a batch of paperwork at about the same time as passengers board. Assuming the bags would have been reasonably evenly distributed there was no risk to the aircraft for CoG reasons and therefore the crew genuinely may not have known, even if a new loadsheet was passed to them, as it's not always known what is where in the aircraft save for Hazmat.

Spice007

Flight was the Saturday after the big uk storm . Weather was calm at the airport . Many passengers would have preferred to not fly to a ski holiday without luggage . Many were flying just for a week ski holiday and the luggage has not arrived yet and unlikely to until later this week . If at all , given the lack of information via the ba web sites . Temperatures has been -18 at night to just below freezing during the day in whistler and to ski higher it is even colder . Insurance allows for a small amount of emergency spend but that won’t go far in a ski resort . Try getting basic toiletries and clothes for 250,if your lucky . For necessary clothes and equipment packed in our luggage you need to spend sig amounts for the basics.
 We would have opted for a quick plane exit taking off on board hand luggage as obviously nothing to find in the hold. 

The issue faced at the airport was obviously more of overall lack of staff issue. Re the crew issues on working hours … yes get that , but many passengers have a minimum of a week significant financial outlay and / or loss of holiday. In the worlds current issues this may seem a first world issue but ba still operate in that world and charge what they do to provide the service that they advertise . They have failed on many counts during this week. Blaming the winds and the storm is a cop out and a very convenient timing. 

CKhalvashi

Spice007 said:

Flight was the Saturday after the big uk storm . Weather was calm at the airport . Many passengers would have preferred to not fly to a ski holiday without luggage . Many were flying just for a week ski holiday and the luggage has not arrived yet and unlikely to until later this week . If at all , given the lack of information via the ba web sites . Temperatures has been -18 at night to just below freezing during the day in whistler and to ski higher it is even colder . Insurance allows for a small amount of emergency spend but that won’t go far in a ski resort . Try getting basic toiletries and clothes for 250,if your lucky . For necessary clothes and equipment packed in our luggage you need to spend sig amounts for the basics.
 We would have opted for a quick plane exit taking off on board hand luggage as obviously nothing to find in the hold. 

The issue faced at the airport was obviously more of overall lack of staff issue. Re the crew issues on working hours … yes get that , but many passengers have a minimum of a week significant financial outlay and / or loss of holiday. In the worlds current issues this may seem a first world issue but ba still operate in that world and charge what they do to provide the service that they advertise . They have failed on many counts during this week. Blaming the winds and the storm is a cop out and a very convenient timing. 

And that wouldn't have been a reasonable situation either.

The cabin would have to be re-secured in this case for the safety of all remaining passengers, which on a widebody plane would routinely take more than an hour.