British Airways recovering after weekend cancellation debacle

British Airways experienced another public relations fiasco over the weekend, after thousands of passengers were wrongly told their flights had been canceled. The debacle occurred following the Aug 23 announcement by BALPA that it plans to strike in pursuit of a pay claim Sept 9, 10 and 27. BA immediately said it would offer refunds and rebookings for passengers booked on flights canceled as a result of the strikes. Within 24 hours, however, the UK media was filled with reports from irate passengers who had booked replacement flights with other airlines after receiving emails from BA that their flights had been canceled on nonstrike days. According to the BBC, thousands of passengers complained of being unable to contact BA customer services as the airline attempted to work through a backlog of 40,000 calls. <br/>