[Wanderlust333]

British Airways has THE worst loyalty program EVER. My friend and I will be traveling together to Asia and back this winter on the same Cathay Pacific flights. He had 92,000 miles on American Airlines and I had 97,000 miles on British Airways. We booked through our respective reward programs simultaneously. AA, BA, and Cathay Pacific are all partner / alliance airlines, mind you. My friend was able to get the trip for 90K miles with $60 in taxes. British Airways required 112,500 miles for the same trip forcing me to buy 15,000 miles for $438 and then charged a whopping additional $329 in taxes. So bottom line: booking thru AA rewards program got my friend back and forth to Asia for just $60 while BA took $765 from me for the exact flight even though I had more reward miles in the bank than my friend. That is a difference of $700, folks!

I wish I could say this was an isolated incident, but sadly BA pulled the same BS last fall when we traveled to Australia....yes 100,000 miles + an additional $800 give or take in "taxes". My friend booked the same trip thru his AA reward program and paid $30 in taxes. BA Executive Club is NOT a loyalty program...it's a disloyalty program. For 25 years, I have carried a BA credit card and used this as my "go to" card for all things large and small. I have purposefully travelled BA on transatlantic routes so that I might accrue more award miles. Sadly, what awaits Executive Club Members at the end of the day is chicanery and price-gouging.

To make matters worse... BA doesn't even have a mechanism in place whereby you can speak to a live person about issues such as these. You can speak to a reservationist (no help whatsoever) or resign yourself to sending a fax / email and then never hearing anything in response (which is what happened to me). The mailbox to their "customer service" line was "full" and gave no options to redirect or leave a message....lovely

So long, British Airways. Your Executive Club stinks like bad fish 'n chips with a mess of mushy peas. I'll be traveling the world instead with American Airlines and my new American Advantage credit card.