Browsing back through those first “On the Case” columns in 1998 reveals a very different travel world: air passengers were issued with paper tickets (on which spelling mistakes were corrected free of charge, unlike today), travellers cheques were essential to obtain cash abroad including the new Eurocheque, and readers were largely dependent on the knowledge of travel agents when choosing a suitable hotel, as there were no review sites. There was plenty of iniquitous behaviour to call out, notably by timeshare companies, air ticket “bucket” shops and car rental companies.
In my first column, I took British Airways to task after readers reported that its UK call centre staff had no knowledge of a newly launched seat booking service on US routes. Complaints about BA’s customer service have been a hot topic throughout my tenure. The airline was not alone in communicating poorly, but eventually its “world’s favourite airline” crown tarnished as call centre phones went unanswered and agency-contracted airport staff advised customers to make fallacious refund and compensation claims just to get rid of them.
As airlines started ignoring customers with reasonable claims, the CAA set up a voluntary Air Dispute Resolution (ADR) scheme administered by independent arbitrators: CEDR and Aviation ADR. These are working very well for the most part. However, not all airlines have signed up to ADRs (airlines must pay a fee for the service; customers can access it free). Getting a response to a justified complaint from Iberia, Qantas, Singapore Airlines, Emirates and Turkish Airlines, among others, remains very difficult, even for me.
