British Airways cancels BA1, London City to New York, and Beirut

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The A318, ‘all business class’ British Airways flight from London City Airport to New York JFK may have met its match.

The last flight (for a while) will be Wednesday 25th March, allowing British Airways to escape its EC261 compensation obligations by cancelling more than 14 days in advance.

In theory, the flight is set to return in September and tickets can still be purchased for the Autumn. Nothing is certain, of course, and we may have seen the end of it.

Of course, when I reviewed the flight last year I titled the first part “Review: Should British Airways scrap BA1, the ‘all business’ London City to New York service?“. I felt that the lack of property IFE and the 2×2 open seating was no longer good enough. The extension of Global Entry meant that the ability to clear immigration in Shannon was also becoming less of a draw, and Crossrail will soon make Heathrow a lot nearer to Canary Wharf.

British Airways drops Beirut

Talking of dropping flights, British Airways has dropped – permanently – flights to Beirut.

This is not linked to coronavirus, and indeed the cancellation does not take effect until 12th May.

As it happens, this is exactly the same time that British Airways gets back 12 daily slot pairs from Flybe. Beirut uses an ex-BMI A321 short-haul aircraft, albeit with proper business class seats, and this aircraft could cover a number of short-haul flights in the Flybe slots.

The economic situation in Lebanon has been troublesome for some time and it appears that the volume of passengers is no longer there to make the route viable. Royal Jordanian will remain a oneworld option via Amman.

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Category

British Airways and Avios

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

Brian says:

12 Mar12 March 08:03

Lack of property IFE??😛
james says:

12 Mar12 March 08:27

Due to fly tomorrow LHR to Atlanta, this is not good news…..will AMEX travel insurance still provide cover?

Nothing on BA website about USA ban
- Rhys says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 08:27
  
  Luckily for you the UK is exempt 🙂
- Lady London says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 14:28
  
  It’s fine but we won’t have you back 🙂
Donal says:

12 Mar12 March 08:35

It’s a pity BA are cancelling Beirut. We’ve just come back from there (companion voucher in Club!). A really interesting destination and the people are great. Lebanon really needs more tourism.
TGLoyalty says:

12 Mar12 March 08:46

In other news 10% off Morrison’s back on my Gold valid until 5/4/20. I think I have enough for a while though.

7% on my Bonvoy.

Nothing else interesting.
- Shoestring says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 08:54
  
  7% for me on Gold as I had 10% on that 2 rounds ago – I’ll ignore it this time round and aim to get 10% next time
  - Shoestring says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 08:55
    
    10% for my wife on her SPG
    - Shoestring says:
      
      12 Mar12 March 09:25
      
      Virgin Atlantic/ Morrisons offer currently nothing offered but worth keeping an eye on it
      - Anuj says:
        
        12 Mar12 March 12:18
        
        ?
        It shows as running till the 25th for me
      - Shoestring says:
        
        12 Mar12 March 12:22
        
        I’ll log in again/ wife’s a/c and see what it says
      - Shoestring says:
        
        12 Mar12 March 12:43
        
        definitely none for myself or my wife, my earlier ones are in pending though – maybe they took the offer away because I hammered it? 🙂
      - TGLoyalty says:
        
        12 Mar12 March 16:55
        
        yup 25th for me too but i didn’t use it the first time round.
      - aDifferentSimon says:
        
        12 Mar12 March 17:11
        
        mine was running until 25th but it’s gone, not sure when it disappeared as haven’t checked it in a while. Shame as I bought some more vouchers last night which prob won’t hit. I didn’t hammer it – £775 of vouchers.
- JRC says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 08:58
  
  How long does it normally take for Morrison’s 10% to credit back to Amex. Bough £150 of Amazon/ JLP vouchers a few days ago but no sign of credit
  - Shoestring says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 09:05
    
    3 days but I am also waiting for the last one to credit, on Day 3 today
    - JRC says:
      
      12 Mar12 March 11:13
      
      Thanks
    - Polly says:
      
      12 Mar12 March 23:31
      
      On day 4 here, so hopes it’s credited tomorrow. Finally got 10% on plat, but ran up several 100 at 10% on the daughters gold, so stocks of GCs cards are high probably til May or June.
- Anna says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 09:16
  
  Amex website and app seem unable to save offers right now?
  - Polly says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 23:32
    
    Just saved the M 10% on my plat
jack bloggo says:

12 Mar12 March 08:47

people need to be careful about the USA. If they are under reporting due to lack of testing, then its highly likely that they are in a similar position in the curve as the UK. When its time to come back in say a week or 2, there must be an increased risk of either travel from the US into UK being banned by UK, or mandatory quarantine.

so one has to way up the risk of not going on the trip, with the risk of going
- Rob says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 08:48
  
  But given relevant population densities I think, in general, you are better off there.
  - jack bloggo says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 09:03
    
    “given relative population densities”, seems a weird thing to say, given that many/most will be going to major US cities. Is new York less dense that Edinburgh, Cardiff ?
- jamie says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 08:55
  
  I don’t think UK could ban repatriation.
  - Anna says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 09:18
    
    We can’t even stop people coming into the UK illegally, they are never going to ban people coming in legally. Human Rights lawyers would have a field day.
MarianC says:

12 Mar12 March 08:48

OT: Had a one-way flight with Virgin Sao Paolo-London for september, booked with companion voucher. Just hung up on Virgin as they told me that, since this is a points redemption, the only options are refund or delay my return until October. Re-route options are only for cash payers. Is that right?
- Chabuddy geezy says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 19:04
  
  No a points redemption is eligible for a reroute too. They are trying to fob you off.
Shoestring says:

12 Mar12 March 08:49

just back from the shops – stockpiled another 6 packs of pasta – can’t be too careful 🙂

actually, talking to my father yesterday – he is 80, late onset diabetes, no exercise taken for last 60 years, was obese but has slimmed down now (he was trying to reverse the diabetes), had his big toe amputated LY when infection set in and his circulation is so bad he didn’t notice until it was too late – so higher risk 70+ group – and his strategy is to hole up in his home with no social contact at all until he deems the risk of catching Covid-19 has mostly passed

my job will be to deliver boxes of food and ring the bell 🙂

timing – he’s estimating time to start it might be next week, though he has little social contact except family anyway (through choice – he prefers his computers/ TV)
- Anna says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 09:14
  
  Hope he stays well, I assume he’s ok for NOW TV?!
  - Shoestring says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 09:18
    
    thx, that’s a point, I know he got a NowTV stick the other month, I’ll ask him if he needs Cinema or Ents added
- Peter K says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 09:31
  
  Makes me wonder how long before comments about why you’re not giving advice to your dad to man up and fly somewhere as it’s a pussycat virus and that his chance of catching it is 0.0001% come up.
  - Nyh7 says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 09:38
    
    I agree – I come to these comments mainly for Shoestring’s infinite medical wisdom, gathered no doubt from years of stacking credit card offers, which he dispenses so easily and with great conviction.
    
    What’s your advice today, doc?
  - Shoestring says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 09:38
    
    🙂 they can’t see the difference in risk according to demographic/ state of health
    
    up to other people if they want to worry irrationally when they’re in the lower risk group so I won’t comment and I’m definitely not a Dr lol
    - Aston100 says:
      
      12 Mar12 March 16:21
      
      You have no regard for the impact this will have on people with health issues and dismiss the whole thing as something trivial.
      Your comments the other day along the lines that elderly people will die of something anyway – that was distasteful.
      Very disappointing.
  - ChrisBCN says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 13:26
    
    +1 he changes his tune with the weather, full of nonsense
    - Shoestring says:
      
      12 Mar12 March 13:34
      
      I don’t as a matter of principle ever defend myself from petty accusations but I will defend my opinions – I have been *entirely consistent* throughout the Covid-19 sequence of events – there are people in the high risk group/s – they are at an elevated risk of mortality & their fears are rational – and there are people in the lower risk group/s with an extremely low risk of mortality & their fears are irrational (though understandable enough if you have a tendency to worry rather than analyse and draw logical conclusions)
      - P says:
        
        12 Mar12 March 15:07
        
        Not quite shoestring. You did a swerve from “nothing to be worried about” to “nothing for the healthy to be worried about” a bit back.
        
        Some of us do read the comments and remember.
        
        You also have been advising people, even within the past few days, to not worry about travelling etc without caveating it with “if you are healthy”.
      - ChrisBCN says:
        
        12 Mar12 March 18:28
        
        Maybe you can’t see what you have done. Either way, wind your neck in and stop causing harm.
The Man says:

12 Mar12 March 08:59

Kind of related. Can someone remind me the rules of cancelling a redemption using avios on BA and AA? E.g. how long before departure you can cancel, what you get back and what you lose out on etc.
- Lev441 says:
  
  12 Mar12 March 09:05
  
  Avios on BA is 24 hours before outbound flight..
  - Lev441 says:
    
    12 Mar12 March 09:06
    
    You get full Avios refund and cash refund minus £35 per person
    - Anthony says:
      
      12 Mar12 March 09:18
      
      Can someone confirm if this refund policy is the same if a BA flight is booked using Avios with the Avios.com website? I understand that the cancellation can only be done on the phone with Avios.com. Thanks in advance.