New
York Times
"After weeks of advance hoopla trumpeting the opening of London’s
Heathrow Airport new, high-tech Terminal 5, the facility opened in something
less than glory. Initially, British Airways, which has sole use of the $8.7
billion terminal, boasted to customers that “everything has been streamlined
and designed to make your journey through the terminal calm and relaxed.”
But after a series of baggage delays in the morning, the airline canceled 34
flights and suspended baggage check-in."
Forbes.com
"Glistening, gleaming, state of the art. They are some of the ways that
British airport operator BAA’s Terminal 5 at Heathrow Airport is being
described. In truth, however, it is more akin to a band-aid applied to a
severed limb."
BusinessWeek
"As travelers streamed into the soaring glass-covered atrium, reports
emerged that opening-day computer problems in the new high-tech baggage
handling system were causing lengthy delays at the facility Queen Elizabeth
II recently dubbed a "21st-century gateway to Britain." Then
hundreds of campaigners showed up in the face of a large police presence to
protest the proposed construction of a third runway at Heathrow, which is
scheduled to open in 2020.
All in all, not an auspicious start for a terminal tapped to play a vital role
in boosting one of the world's busiest—and least popular—airports."
Washington
Post
"Opening day at Heathrow Airport's grand new Terminal 5 turned sour as
severe baggage handling delays led to numerous flight cancellations,
stranding many irate passengers on what was supposed to be a day of glory
for British Airways."
Al
Jazeera
"Dozens of flights at Heathrow airport's giant new Terminal 5 have been
cancelled on its opening day after "teething problems" which also
involved several cases of misplaced luggage."
USA
TODAY
"Many passengers at Heathrow Airport's new Terminal 5 experienced some of
the same old "Heathrow hassle" during the terminal's first day of
operation Thursday."
New
Zealand Herald
"British Airways cancelled a fifth of its flights from Heathrow airport's
cavernous new £4.3 billion Terminal 5 yesterday as the chaos of its
shambolic opening spilled into a second day."
I had a shiver when I saw my baggage go down the hole at the T5 fast track check-in on the 3rd April. Tens days on and no sign of my luggage. It was 8 days before the lost luggage reference number could be used on the lost luggage online checker. The 0800 number keeps telling me to try again later!!! I cant believe BA was till taking luggage at the check-in when they must of known they still had problems from the previous week. I was reasonably sympathetic to BA to start with, but now I fear heads must roll at th highest level.
Peter Hunter, Wigginton, UK
A week on and no bags, no contact from BA, a tracking number for a website that does not give information.
I can claim on my insurance but this was a holiday of a lifetime to family we may not see again. Bags were full of items of small value but meaning a great deal to the travellers.
I am sure there must be an ambulance chaser out there looking for a percentage and national media exposure. Yes, I want cash, taken direcly from the dividend and 6 figure bonuses paid to the clowns in charge. If there is any left over then I suggest you give it to the poor souls you abandoed on the front line last weekend. BA must accept that this was negligence, it was their plan, their management, their project, their fault, failing to control an exclusive tier 1 supplier is not an excuse. You spent 5£bn on this glorified greenhouse, airports need to be functional not pretty.
BA's terminal, with open skies and the current clowns in charge it probably is.
What then, Air France the British flag carrier
P Jones, Bagless, UK
I read in your Q & A section that baggage is classed as lost after 21 days.
I am still waiting on three bags which were checked in on Thursday at T5. Our original flight was cancelled but we rebooked on a later flight with no hold baggage. When we got to our destination, we filled in forms and were given a reference number.
I have been checking on BA's baggage tracking system for five days and phoned their central office again tonight. They still don't know where thay are, but when I asked about when baggage would be classed as lost, the BA member of staff informed me it was after 45 days. Maybe 21 days is not long enough to get to the bottom of this case.
Bruce, Aberdeenshire,
QUOTE "All true. But these reports conveniently overlook the fact that BA provided a 0800 number for those encountering problems. Kudos to BA! Always thinking of the customer!
Carson, Leatherhead, UK" UNQUOTE
Yes BA are much better than easyjet or Ryanair in this respect. I still wish they hadn't changed their regular numbers to one with prefix 0844 which are premium rate from mobile phones and many telecom providers. It is now cheaper for me to call their reservations centre in US!
John, london, UK
How much of this criticism of BA is justified? Who runs T5, BA or BAA? Is there not a similarity here to all those peole who complain about the railway companies' late trains when they should be complaining about Network Rail incompetence?
And Brian of Adelaide would have trouble flying from Europe to the USA if he is only going to patronise Singapore Air.
Roger Tilbury, Worthing,
I went through the brand new Changi (Singapore) Terminal 3 soon after it opened. Absolutely seamless. Singapore Air is the only way to fly.
Brian, Adelaide, Australia
If BA hadn't proved themselves to be such a totally useless incompetent bunch of cretins then we wouldn't need an 0800 number. My son who is a trainee deck officer with the Merchant Navy had the misfortune of having to travel through T5 last Thursday 27th. When his flight arrived from Glasgow there were not enough staff to unload the plane so they sat on the runway for an hour. He then missed his connecting flight to LA Some hours later he got another flight to LA but when he arrived his baggage was still in T5. Much more incompetence followed but the final result is that he is now on a ship that will not touch land for over 2 weeks with only the clothes he stands up in. I tried the wonderful 0800 number for over an hour today & eventually got a jobsworth who could not help because I did not have the baggage tracking no;quoted data protection & told me the passenger himself would have to contact them himself when he got back on land! BA - making a stressful situation totally unbearable
Joy MAcFarlane, Ayr, Ayrshire
Well done Ginny McGrath and The Times for this article.
Most newspapers for want of circulation figures and profits are loyal to the encumbant government, big business and advertisers.
Loyalty to the public by giving detailed advice in this manner is something to be applauded.
Something our government should be doing had they any loyalty to us.
BA and the BAA should both be hammered over this.
I hope that every affected passanger seeks recompence to the full and BA is indeed fined heavily for what The Air Transport Users Council (AUC) have said about BA breaching European regulations.
Sadly, many foreign people with little grasp of our language and 'soft' native types who've been far too downtroden over the years by our current government will just leave it.
Just what bullying BA want them to.
Sean Hamerton, York., England.
Carl from Leatherhead- did you actually *call* that 0800 number? The first few tries, you get an engaged tone. If you actually do get through you get stuck on hold for an hour... In an amazing failure in their irony department, you get to listen to a message telling you that "British Airways is committed to excellence in customer service..."
The fact that this torment should be *free* is a tiny, tiny compensation.
Joseph C., London,
Nothing works as it should when it's introduced.
KEPONG station, Suvarnabhumi Airport, Kimpo airport, JFK....
The list is endless.
Phill, The Wirral, England
After T5 trauma, a 3 hour delay, an 11 hour flight to Tokyo, and an hour at immigration BA had 300 or so exhausted and bagless passengers lined up at Narita's Pest Control desk! Appropriate or what?
On a positive note the Japanese BA staff were energetic, efficient and helpful, in other words typically Japanese and quite unlike their British counterparts at T5.
Julian, Mougins, France
Are flights from Heathrow with other airlines affected by the Terminal 5 problems?
No
OH YES they ARE IF you are flying from a UK airport with one of the star alliance BA partners or whatever they call it now then your leg in the UK will be with BA and will go into TERRIBLE FIVE so the chances of your hold baggage getting transferred over for your international flight are not looking good
David, Glasgow,
I'm afraid these reports make BA out to be unresponsive to travelers' woes at the airport. True, they obviously had not done test runs of systems with anything like real loads, and they did cancel flights and disallow checked luggage and skipped providing gate information.
All true. But these reports conveniently overlook the fact that BA provided a 0800 number for those encountering problems. Kudos to BA! Always thinking of the customer!
Icing on the cake: A hundred or so "green" activists used up extra fuel to be on hand, take up parking space, take up queue space, to let travelers know -- why travelers??? -- the airport shouldn't have been expanded. Aren't they a bit late with this demo? They were quite pleased with themselves, nevertheless, and took some telly time to scold us at home who had NOT expanded the airport, traveled from it, or, indeed, even traveled TO it.
Carson, Leatherhead, UK
Interesting to see that the "rest of the world" seems to be reading English language papers exclusively...
KP, New Malden,
Just curious, did they do test runs with a small number of flights to see how things worked or did they just throw open the doors on day one with no ramp up?
terry, roxbury, NJ, USA