Flight Cancelled and rebooked on to a different airlines in a different cabin

no.1swimmum

We have just discovered that our British airways Business Class flight to Chicago has been cancelled for tomorrow morning and we have been rebooked onto an American Airlines flight departing 5 hours later and booked into a different cabin, it doesn't tell me which cabin and unfortunatly I am unable to speak to anyone at BA until tomorrow morning.
I wondered if anyone knows what I am entitled to in respect of this change (which I only found out by chance reading an email sent at 8.30pm for a 10.35 am flight,) I really don't want to cancel as this holiday has been booked for ages, but I don't think that AA is equivelent to a BA.

eskbanker

Cancellation of the flight obliges BA to reroute you under article 8 of the regulations, and it sounds like they've done this by getting you onto another flight on the same day.

They're also required to pay fixed rate compensation under article 7 unless "caused by extraordinary circumstances which could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken", so you'll need to find out from them what the cause was.

Upgrading or downgrading to a different cabin class is covered by article 10, but there is no regulatory support for your opinion that AA isn't 'equivalent to BA' - they're codeshare partners within the Oneworld alliance, and if you've literally been put onto the flight five hours after 10:35 then that 15:35 flight is actually operated by BA anyway....

Westin

Does your new AA ticket show a fare type? Often a single letter code.

The cancellation presumably due to the T5 LHR security staff strike.   Options to change and reroute people and get them away will have been very limited.