For the past year, we have scrimped and saved in expectation of the trip of a lifetime: a month’s stay in Europe for our children’s French III class. Our class of seven students was given the opportunity to visit Geneva, stay with a host family and take a full immersion course in the language while touring the countryside. Six of the seven committed to the excursion and our two decided to tack on a few days at the beginning of the trip in order to visit our 70ish year old friend, Granny Willow, in Keith Scotland.

The other students chose to use buddy passes in order to save a few dollars since the cost of flying has skyrocketed. We didn’t feel comfortable sending our children overseas by themselves for the very first time without a specific itinerary so we chose to hoard our Skymiles and pennies until we had enough to get our teens over the “big pond.” Continental accepted the Skymiles for one ticket, to and fro, and we purchased a second for our other child. We then made reservations with British Airways for the other legs of the trip: London-Aberdeen and back, London-Geneva, and Paris to London. We specifically chose BA because we wanted an English speaking airline in case there was a problem. Breaking the communication barrier seemed one way to make things a little easier. The kids saved up their spending money while all other preparations were made.

The day of departure had finally arrived and we were so excited! We had sat the kids down the night before to warn them about ism: don’t pack pocket knives and finger nail clippers, no liquids more than 2 fluid ounces, and never leave your bags unattended. We cautioned them against losing their passports and had copies just in case. We instructed them as to how to find their terminals and that sometimes flights were delayed. In those situations we advised, “Find someone who works for the airline. They will help you. It is their job to do so.” Little did we know how wrong our advice was.

The flight from Atlanta to Newark was uneventful, but upon waiting to board their transcontinental flight it became obvious that something was wrong. As the time for departure came and went, the ticket agent’s voice boomed through the lobby explaining a delay for one reason or the other. Finally, two hours later and a changed gate, the plane was boarded and the journey continued. Upon arrival in London and encountering customs as well as bus ride to a different terminal, the kids realized that they were not going to make their flight to Aberdeen.

Once they arrived at their terminal they, as instructed, found the ticket agent to explain their predicament. The agent proceeded to explain that since they hadn’t flown British Airways to London, “it wasn’t BA’s responsibility.” The only way to keep from being stranded was to pay an additional $600. With his sister in tears, my son found a pay phone to call us on another continent and tell us that they were stuck in London with a ticket that British Airways refused to honor. I knew there had to have been some mistake and assured them that we would get it worked out, to call us back in fifteen minutes.

Upon hanging up, I promptly found the number for BA and sifted through the numerous prompts to finally locate a real person and explain that my children were stranded in a foreign land and needed help. Our agent looked up their information and let us knows that the ticket agent was actually being “generous” to allow them access to their flight for the additional $600. She then repeated that the fact that the Continental flight had been delayed “was not their responsibility.” Besides the fact that since we had gotten a good rate on our airfare ticket, they certainly couldn’t honor it now. I was flabbergasted.

We had done everything we were supposed to, to the letter, but since another airline had been delayed BA chose to hold my children ransom in London rather than honor the tickets we had purchased from them. Where have the days of customer service gone? They no longer exist according to the BA customer service rep I spoke with on the phone. Their job is “not to take care of their customers, only to get them from one place to another. They do not have the staff to do otherwise.” Continental, likewise, explained that they bore no responsibility in the fact their airplane had problems and prevented dozens of their customers from making their connecting flights. No wonder the airlines are in trouble financially if this is how they treat their bread and butter. When I had purchased those tickets, I entrusted my children’s lives to this airline that couldn’t care less about anything except the additional $600. On top of that, they refused for me to make the reservations for this additional flight and pay for it by phone or internet. They wouldn’t even accept my credit card. Cold hard cash at the Heathrow ticket office was the ONLY thing they would take and thank the good Lord, between the two of them, my kids had enough with $12 left over. I guess they would still be sitting at Heathrow had they not had that $600 cash.

According to Frommers.com, airlines now routinely charge a fee to change your reservation that ranges from $25-$100. British Airways charges $300. I can understand the airlines charging a fee when a customer decides to delay their departure out of convenience but have never heard of the fee being applied when a connecting flight causes the problem. According to Money.com, the airlines use these fees to squeeze additional funds from their customers, especially in the case of low ticket holders. Apparently, holding a lower price ticket (not that low I can assure you) marks its bearer as someone to milk for additional funds without the courtesy and care afforded those who purchase more expensive tickets up front.

Even in light of the almighty bottom dollar, isn’t there a bigger issue here? Two minors, two children were stranded in a foreign country and no one would help them. The s put in place to help refused, washing their proverbial hands with the callous remarks,” It is not our responsibility.” As the mother who purchased the tickets and trusted this corporation with her children, I beg to differ.

Who in their right mind has been to a mall, at the park or a public event and seen a lost child, crying in fear as he searches the crowd for a friendly face, and can walk away shrugging his shoulders. Obviously British Airways does and holds it as policy for their ticket agents to refuse access to ticket holding kids, knowing their parents will pay whatever is necessary to ensure their safety. Funny to think that the last time I flew BA, all of their literature, their name badges, and posters proudly exclaimed the motto, “Putting People First.” That has certainly not been our experience.

I write this letter to warn parents who are contemplating the “trip of a lifetime” for their progeny. It doesn’t matter if you follow the rules and do everything necessary to ensure your children’s safety; if you put your kids on British Airways, don’t make the mistake of believing that they are safe- they are only hostages to British Airways’ bottom line.

Tone it down. BA did nothing wrong. As you explained, "Continental accepted the Skymiles for one ticket, to and fro, and we purchased a second for our other child. We then made reservations with British Airways for the other legs of the trip..." So, there were two separate tickets. BA didn't sell you a ticket from EWR to Aberdeen. They sold you a ticket from London to Aberdeen. The kids were no shows. BA had no idea where they were and simply treated them like anyone else who doesn't show up for their flight.

I agree with <b>Eric</b>,

You had kids flying on 2 separate tickets.

What were you thinking?

As far as BA was concerned, your kids were no shows.

Blame yourself, not the airline.

One ticket, even with multiple airlines, they will get you to the final destination.

2 tickets and the problems associated with that are:

No airline guarantees schedules - PERIOD.

The first airline got the kids from ATL to LHR - end of contract.

The second airline sold you a cheap ticket to get you from London to Aberdeen. I'm sure there were many restrictions with the ticket. The kids missed the flight. BA has no responsibility at that point to get them to the final destination.

It's your fault, not the airline(s).

First, how distressing for you and for your kids to have this happen.

But I agree with the other two posters above. Plus, change fees have not been $25-100 in some time. They are more like $200-300 these days, hence the $600 your children had to fork over to change the flights they missed.

&quot;<i>We had done everything we were supposed to, to the letter</i>&quot;

I'm sorry this happened - BUT you did just about everything <b>wrong</b> that was possible. Bad enough if the travelers were adults - but unconscionable w/ kids.

It is a warning - but not maybe the warning you intended. For folks who don't travel often, it is REALLY important to know how to arrange things. No airline would have honored those second flights. One just should not book separate legs like this unless they have a FULL day for the connection (and an overnight would be better). Neither airline owes you anything.

Since you registered to post this - I assume you are looking for sites all over the internet to vent your complaint. I'd be careful - since many sites won't be as gentle as here on Fodors.

Agree with above - plus - if you had purchased entire itinerary on one ticket and had missed connection, while BA would have gotten you to final destination without additional fee, overnight lodging in London would have quite likely have been your responsibility to locate and pay for. Depends on nature of delayed flight, but unless it is truly the fault of the airline (weather, for example, is not the fault of the airline) often you foot the bill for the hotel.

While I can understand your concern, &quot;held hostage&quot; is a bit of melodrama.

I am truly sorry to hear of the ordeal that your children were put through! How stressful for them it must have been.

You are of course correct in wondering where customer service went. I personally would expect an airline, any airline, even British Airways on their own home turf, to pay some decent attention to youthful travelers. Their indifference was appalling!

You have already heard from the self-designated corporate mouthpieces on this board; a few more will chime in, no doubt. I will not add anything on that front, except to say that travel nowadays is fraught with problems even for adults.

I trust that your children made it across safely to their final destination in Geneva, and home again to you as scheduled.

My thoughts are with you.

Hope this doesn't sound like piling on, but the previous posts pointing out the error of your thinking are bang on accurate. The Pollyanna in me says be glad the kids were in a country where English is spoken. The realist in me says get a grip and drop the drama - you did not put your kids in the hands of the airlines, you bought them tickets. If you had paid an additional fee for unaccompanied minor services that would be different, but you didn't say you did that. The humanity in me says what an awful feeling it must have been, thank goodness it all worked out in the end.

I don't know if the story is genuine but if it is, this is what happens if separate tickets are bought and the first leg gets delayed causing the next leg to be missed. There is no responsibility on the next airline at all. It's not possible to generalise on change fees either, since every fare and airline charges something different and some fares are non changeable/nonrefundable esp the cheaper ones.

It's pretty naive to book all those BA flights and be totally clueless about the fare rules and what would happen if the flights were missed.

If it had been a single ticket,CO would have rebooked on the next available BA flights without cost.

I am wondering about something else, as I reread your post.

&quot;They wouldn't even accept my credit card&quot;. I book tickets for my family using my credit card all the time - not sure what this is about.

And hindsight vision and all that - next time your kids go anywhere, make sure they have a credit card. I can think of 100 things they might have needed a credit card for, unrelated to this story, that would have made me much more secure with my kids overseas. (And both have traveled several times from middle school on, out of US, with groups. It took 48 hours only to get each of them a credit card with me as co-signer).

Also wondering - how old are these &quot;children&quot; since you mention a French III class?

to the OP:

I see that this is your first post on Fodor's. How unfortunate that during your year of scrimping and saving you did not happen upon these forums; the information could have spared you and the children a great deal of distress.

I wish that you had been able to relate your story using language that was a bit less charged. BA, for example, certainly did not hold anyone hostage. Also, I wonder why you seem to be giving Continental a pass: they were the ones who created the late flight, which caused the other flight to be missed.

p.s. to <b>johnwm</b>: you might characterize me as a &quot;corporate mouthpiece.&quot; I prefer to think of myself as an informed traveler. I try to learn the rules of the game as well as possible, and then to use those rules to my advantage when I can. If that's being a &quot;corporate mouthpiece&quot; in your book, then so be it.

There's only one thing that doesn't make sense to me in the way that BA handled this. Why wouldn't they allow the OP to pay for the change fee over the phone with the credit card? That would at least have saved the kids from having to fork over all that cash.

As has been pointed out here many times, it's not just the fixed fee to change a ticket. You also owe any difference in fare. Those discounted fares usually come with advance-purchase requirements. If you miss a flight and need to get on the next one, that cheap fare you originally got is no longer available on such short notice. So, yes, BA was being &quot;generous&quot; in charging only the change fee.

Janisj mentioned other forums. I'd advise not to post this to Flyer Talk. They'll show little mercy over there.

&quot;They wouldn�t even accept my credit card.&quot; - I wonder too.

And as I don't expect the OP to come back to answer our questions... is it possible the OP is not a parent, but a teacher: &quot;Our class of seven students&quot;

So if the names of the students are different from the credit card holder and from each other, can this be a reason for BA not to accept the caller's credit card over the phone?

My kids and husband have last name different than mine - and I book and pay for their tickets all the time. Oldest one (adult) even has different address, so no one would know in this situation that he was even related to me.

One possibility I can think of is the issue of credit card fraud since the flights would take place immediately. It's similar to warnings that some airlines have when purchasing a ticket close to departure that the credit card used for purchase must be available at check-in (doesn't mean they'll actually ask for it but I've seen the warning several times).

My question is &quot;why are you sending two underage children on an international flight across the pond by themselves????&quot;

I'm sorry but this no fault of the airline.

Sorry this happened to your children. I don't recall you writing their ages though, so don't know how traumatic it was for them. I hope the rest on their trip worked out well.

The Newark flight was delayed two hours and they usually make up some time enroute. A delay should always be considered when making connecting flights especially from airports like JFK and Newark; flights rarely get off the gound on schedule.

You really needed to build in more time for delays, customs and transferring to another terminal. It's always better to spend a couple of hours in a terminal than miss a connecting flight. This sounds like it was a pretty tight connection.

I wonder how much time was between the planes initially that 2 hours delay made them miss the next flight.

Unfortunately this was your fault and not the airlines. The children couldn't have been too young if they are in French III, at least high school age I would guess. When my wife &amp; I booked our trip to Bangkok via LHR our original tickets had a 2 hour connection window. After doing research her and other sites we paid the change fee and settled for a 12 hour layover. Visited London and enjoyed the lounges.

I'm glad your children are okay but let this be lesson in future planning.