British Airways has yet another IT glitch

By C.R.

AUGUST IS one of the busiest months for London’s Heathrow airport, Europe’s biggest, as Britons fly off for their summer holidays. On August 7th its terminals became more congested still when British Airways’ (BA) computer systems crashed, resulting in 138 flights being cancelled and a further 260 being delayed. At least 35,000 passengers had their travel plans thrown into disarray; long lines of stranded BA passengers could be seen milling around the airport for the rest of the day.

More disruption is expected later this month as BA’s 4,000 pilots have voted to strike after rejecting a three-year pay deal. The two crises are not outliers. They stand among a steadily growing list of mismanagement woes at the airline. Last month BA was fined £183m ($229m) for allowing hackers to steal around 500,000 customers’ credit-card details from its website. It also suffered at least four debilitating IT glitches in 2016 and 2017. Its online-ticketing system often sells first- and business-class fares at economy prices by accident, creating bad headlines and disappointed customers when it retrospectively cancels the transactions.

Now that a pattern is emerging, major investors are getting fed up with the management of BA, as well as its parent group, IAG. Although IAG made record profits in 2018, some aviation analysts are increasingly concerned that BA’s sloppy management of its computer systems could create big unexpected liabilities in the future, such as claims for compensation when things go wrong. In the words of one IAG investor, BA’s executives “should put in the time making the IT work, not partying with bloggers on the A350”. Ouch.