Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
CASE STUDY
Customer Service at British Airways
Introduction
British Airways (BA) is the UK's largest intern
a
tional scheduled airline, fl ying to more than 300 destinations
and carrying around 32 million passengers worldwide (2009-10 fi gures). BA completed its merger with Iberia
in 2010 and has a planned joint venture with American Airlines. The company employs just under 50,000 staff
in the UK and strategic global locations, the great majority of whom have customer service responsibilities
such as airport check-in, cabin crew and sales positions.
Customer service
British Airways has a commitment to service excellence and ha
s
emphasised this by signing the Airline
Passenger Service Commitment. BA states that it is focused on delivering a superior product and service to its
customers so that it remains the airline of customers' choice. Safety an
d
security are of the utmost importance
to the airline and is never compromised. The company constantly reviews an
d
develops its products, services
and policies in the light of changing demands from customers and other external factors.
British Airways is part of the Oneworld alliance which was launched in 1
9
99. It is a network of airlines
working in partnership to pool resources, complement each other's services and offer an integrated service
to customers. Currently, the following 11 airlines make up the alliance - American Airlines, BA, Cathay Pacifi c,
Finnair, Iberia, Japan Airlines, Lan, Malev, Mexicana, Qantas and Royal Jordani
a
n. Each of the Oneworld
alliance airlines offers a commitment to:
•
The belief that the customer is at the heart of the business;
•
Outstanding customer service;
•
The importance of its people.
Service standards such as punctuality, check-in, baggage handling and in-fl ight service - a
l
l
o
f which are
monitored constantly.
Every six months, all member airlines measure their performance against an established set of perf
or
mance
standards in order to ensure that the level of service to passengers is consistently high across the a
l
liance.
Customer queries are resolved by staff of any of the members of the alliance, even if this airline
is not
responsible for the sector in question.
BA cabin crew
Approximately 15,000 cabin crew work for BA, the vast majority based at Heathrow and Gatwick. In addition,
the company has international cabin crew based at strategic overseas locations such as Buenos Aires, Delhi
