British Airways asked us for feedback, and (as expected) the contents was simply too long for their feedback box.

So - here it is!

We booked the flight from Antalya, Turkey to LGW, UK on 24th August as part of a package via Expedia. Once we received the booking reference, my husband logged in to his Executive Club account and confirmed the flight details, and then paid for specific seats on the plane (two extra legroom seats, and the two seats directly behind these for our children). These seats were paid for on the 13th of August.

After a week on holiday in Turkey, the time arrived to do online check-in via the BA website. We immediately saw that the seats we had been assigned were NOT the seats we had paid for, and our 11-year old child was sitting half the plane away from the rest of our family. At that point, we tried to move one of the adults and our 11 year old such that they could sit together, but the website simply would not allow this. Upon re-loading the page and attempting to start the checkin process again, we were told that we had COMPLETED check-in (which we certainly had not!) and we had agreed to the seats that we had been assigned (not the ones we had paid for).

We then spent nearly an hour on the phone, at £1 a minute, to your “Customer Service” line. The first operator told us that she could rebook us into new seats (10A to D), not to worry, it would show up on the website later. (It did not).

After 10 minutes, without the changes appearing on the checkin page, I rang back. The second operator (Chivon?) told us that there was no way we could have the 10A-D seats because they were restricted, and after a very long conversation and being put on hold, agreed to change our seats to four together near the rear of the plane. These seats did appear on the checkin page on the website.

When we requested some form of confirmation (via email or any other method) we were told that was impossible, that there was a system error, that our emails (both of them!) were not valid, and repeatedly told not to worry, we simply needed to go to the airport and it would all be fine.

On the checkin page, it clearly stated that we were not able to print our boarding passes but instead needed to visit the airport. Clearly, our confidence in changes actually propagating was low, and we were not at all happy with just turning up at the airport and hoping, but by this point it was past 1am in Turkey and we decided to revisit the problem in the morning.

On the next day, we spent approximately 30 minutes on hold, then 10 minutes being told by the third operator that no, no changes had been made, but they could rebook us into different seats. When we clearly stated that the cost of the call meant we had very little credit, the operator told us that was not a problem and that they would ring back if the call was disconnected.

They did not ring back.

At this point (after having exhausted all credit on our phones and not being able to easily add more) we decided to attempt the same conversation again, but this time via the online chat service. We spent over two hours, repeating the same requests. “The seats you have assigned are not acceptable, our 11 year old child is sitting half a plane away. Please sit us together, and please send us a confirmation that you have made these changes”.

After two hours, we had been (apparently) rebooked into yet another set of new seats (again, not the ones we paid for) but were still unable to get any confirmation of this via email or any other method.

We decided to enjoy what remained of our final day on holiday, and deal with the issue at the airport.

When we arrived in Antalya, we were lucky enough to have access to the CIP service who printed our boarding passes (with the seats we had been assigned by the final operator on the chat call).

The flight was called to say the gate was open at 9:50pm (with a departure time expected of 10.35pm). The flight did not actually begin to board until well past 10.45pm. The boarding desk team decided to ask everyone to form multiple queues, and then proceeded to just wave people forward anyway, leaving many folks very unhappy. At no point did the team communicate when we would actually be able to board, or when the flight would be expected to leave, until we had fully completed boarding and the pilot said there was a long delay (we were already way past departure time at this point).

When the flight did eventually take off, after midnight, we were then subjected to a very drunk person throwing up on the person next to him, a lack of available soft drinks, and the smallest seat gap I have ever experienced on a plane in 40 years of flying.

The turbulence was terrible, but that’s one thing you have no control over. It certainly made the flight even more uncomfortable.

We use our AMEX BA card regularly to build up avios and companion vouchers, and we are regretting that decision now - the thought of taking another British Airways flight fills us with dread.

There is no way we would EVER recommend anyone fly with British Airways in the future.