Im flying to greece from Newcastle between 31st March and 19th of April...im guessing i wont be flying and im quite upset as i have also booked tickets with olympic airways Athens-Limnos island

DESPITE my anger I fully support 100% the cabin crew's strike and am appalled after reading some comments on this thread! How can people be complaining that were they work they do not have a union to represent them and therefore get on with it?Who dares say we live in a world where if you dont like your job then you leave? Its people like this who make the UK into the country it is today!Where the rich always take advantage of the poor and businesses take advantage of its workforce! If your company does not have a union to represent its workforce then that's not because it's not allowed, by law all workers can form their own union. Its down to the fact that no one has had enough guts to actually form one and stand up for their rights!I admire the courage and determination of BA cabin crew. Since many of you have other views on how to use and respect your rights, lets all then forget the 1st of May and ban it as a bank holiday since it doesn't truly mean more than just an extra day off work and nothing more.

Aleaxandra_gr, we heard exactly the same type of leftist rhetorics about reach and poor from the ideologists of the Soviet Union. Where is Soviet Union now? What you call courage and determination, looks like downright blackmail and extortion to the most of the people I see on the forums discussing BA situation. Of course, you are entitled to your own opinion, but I don't think it will change opinion of other people; I hope you don't seriosly expect them to throw away their tickets and vacations and happily march to join the ranks of these "right fighters" against the rich?

alexandra_gr -- welcome to Fodors! It's lovely to see such a strong union supporter on these boards -- and this is your first post too.

Hopefully your flights on the 31st won't be affected by the strike. However, if you're offering to give up your vacation to someone who's flights are cancelled I'm sure you will find many people willing to take you up on such a generous offer.

Don't know about you guys, but I just went ahead and purchased travel insurance from American Express. At least, I will be able to cover the return trip from Lisbon should BA cancel my tickets home and I have to buyy them at the counter in airport. Surprisingly, it is not that expensive, I paid just a little over $50 total for two people. Good thing, Unite didn't announce strike days yet else Amex wouldn't sell me anything.

Kommers, what does the AMEX insurance cover? I'm very interested! :)

Well, the basic package at $56 for two would cover cancellation of the flight due to a strike up to the entire amount you prepaid for the trip. (In my case total we paid for BA tickets and also tickets for airlines within Spain and Portugal is $1700). Well, medical stuff is covered as well. After some consideration, I also bought an extension to the package that will also cover flight delays, up to $150 per day and it cost me $9 per person.
You can call them and get the entire info, they were quite friendly to me explaining my options and they also said that as long as strike is not officially announced, they will continue selling policies to BA passangers.
Phone number for Amex Shield is 1-800-332-4899. Also, there is a site that lists all major travel insurers so you can select different plans and premiums. I believe it is www.insuremytrip.com

The union was supposed to have a press conference at noon today which never materialized. Everyone is waiting for strike dates to be announced yet this is what was released and published on the pprune boards:

-------------------------------------------------
(BASSA) Press Statement - 11th March

We must urge British Airways to put its customers first, not in the form of press friendly sound bites but by their actions.

We have absolutely no wish to cause any disruption to British Airways and more importantly for our customers.

Cabin Crew are proud of our airline. We implore Mr Walsh to be part of that pride and to listen to our collective voice, not damage the international reputation of the greatest airline in the world.

We are taking this opportunity to ask him to reconsider the formal offer of cuts we have made and to accept the sacrifices that we and our members are willing to make in order to help British Airways to protect on board service levels for its customers, and so prevent industrial action.

To say that this is about the so-called “survival of the airline” is simply not true. Even by their own accounting figures, which we strongly believe are highly creative, the difference between each of the sides’ proposal is just £10 million. This may sound like a significant sum but for perspective; compare £10 million pounds to a £3 billion pounds a year fuel bill - or the £500 million BA were recently ordered to pay out in fines.

It would appear that far more than that sum has already been spent on trying to break any dispute in the form of wet leased aircraft and blocking of seats on other carriers etc.

Press reports indicate a British Airways employee accused of acts of terrorism, was also one of Mr Walsh’s strike breaking volunteers who were employed to work as temporary cabin crew.

What price does safety have - £10 million?

This is simply not about “cost cutting” - it is about “union busting” at any cost and that truth is now finally there for all to see.

What company in their right mind would refuse the offer of a pay cut from its own staff to protect the health, safety and service offered to its customers?

Before ordinary peoples travel plans are unnecessarily inconvenienced we hope that common sense will prevail and that our offer is reconsidered. The deadline for calling industrial action is very close. Mr Walsh should not squander that time.

http://www.pprune.org/cabin-crew/404...-mk-vi-127.htm

-----------------------------------------------------

Christina_BA - thank you for your post. I have checked the BA website frequently and I have a very selfish question that maybe you can answer and maybe not. I figured it was worth a shot.

In Mr. Walsh's statement he said: "At London Heathrow, we will operate a substantial proportion of our long-haul flights." Do you know if that includes the Phoenix flight to LHR? Will those routes continue operating or do they not know yet? I would think they would have a general idea of which LH flights would be cancelled or shifted. We leave on the 21st, my sister leaves on the 27th and we are all flying PHX to LHR and are very anxious!! I'm not so worried about getting back! ;)

Question??? I'm flying BA in May leaving Chicago to LHR. If for some reason there is a strike and BA flights are cancelled, would they rebook us to some other airline? I did purchase travel ins. and I would imagine I would be reimbursed by someone, however I did book a tour once in Europe and would hate to miss it.

pauljagman - at this point I don't think you need to worry. The union has until Mon March 15th to announce strikes and give 7 days notice. Right now it seems the flights at the end of March/early April will be impacted. If you read the statement from Mr. Walsh on the BA website, if your flights are cancelled you will be reimbursed. I would advise you to go read the rest of the information regarding his plans IF strike dates are announced.

They are apparently talking again despite the fact that officially it is all over. Strike dates are not announced

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8561352.stm

It is interesting to see how union changed its tone after negotiations ended without result. In their last statement, all offensive and derogatory remarks about BA that spiced up all their previous statemens are gone. Now, the call BA "the world greatest airline" and implore Mr. Walsh to resume negotiations. This clearly shows that union is scared to death to call industrial action as they have all reasons to fear that this will either not achieve its goal because of contigency plan BA is about to put into effect, or because this decision will be struck down in High Court again.

Thanks for all the updates everyone. We are scheduled to fly March 16/17 and return March 24, so will likely be affected somehow, if anything happens. Trying to think positively!

I was expressing my disbelief in some of the comments I read earlier, that's all. Everyone is entitled to have their own opinion on the strike but to say that we live in a world where "if you are not happy then leave your job" is ludicrous as we all have the right to change things its just that people don't exercise their rights anymore because they think in this backwards manner!

To those who think BA staff are being greedy i say this: If BA were to make sky rocket profits do you really think that the company would share a percentage of that profit with each employee individualy as a Thank You? I dont think so! They cannot expect the cabin crew to sacrifice so many things that are already signed in their contract without a fight and negotiations.

Just to clear things I am not a communist hahaha and sorry BKP but I don't intend on giving up my tickets!

"BA cabin crew will stage strikes over two consecutive weekends this month, says Unite union"

THis is a latest from Guardian, they promised more deatails soon

From BBC:

Union members at British Airways have again voted to take strike action.

The dates of the industrial action have been set for three days from 20 March and four days from 27 March.

Gosh, does this mean that the strike will happen in between the dates we fly on BA (March 16/17 and March 24)?

I'm the Original Poster. They just announced that a 7 day strike begins on March 20. I leave the day before. Whew! I have been living with the expectation of the strike since my original post. Hardly believed my trip would happen.

Now it's time to pack. Hope everyone has a chance to escape the strike or have alternate plans. I hate non refundable tickets. Next trip, I'll try to provide more flexibility. It has not been fun waiting out the last two months. This was a close one.

Melissa:

Strike will be March 20,21,22 and March 27,28,30,31. They also said that after April 14 they will try again if resolution is not achieved

sorry, I meant 20,21,22 and 27,28,29,30