giro

I fly into Gatwick at 2:55 p.m. and depart Heathrow at 6:05 p.m. on a Weds.
British air says this is "doable". It sounds like an impossibility to me.
If I miss my flight they say they will treat it like a cancellation and if I want to get back to the U.S. I will need to purchase tickets which would cost approx. $4,000 for the 4 of us.
It sounds like British air has me over a barrel. One option is to rebook the flight during the course of my trip at a cost of at least $800 plus additional costs.
If anyone has any suggestions I would like to hear them. Meanwhile beware of British Air!!

janisj

That is <b>barely</b> 3 hours. I don't understand - is this booked on one ticket through BA? It doesn't seem so from what you are saying about missing the flight being a &quot;cancellation&quot;.

If it is on 2 different bookings, you are up a creek w/o a paddle (or a life preserver).

rhkkmk

do you have to clear customs? if not i think you could do it easily...

the actual drive is not much more than an hour +/- at that time of day and there are transit busses very often....

i think i would try it and then put yourself at their mercy if you miss it...they will assist you..

who did that routing for you?? i would be mad at them!!

giro

Well, all the flights are on British Air. One routing. The problem appears to be that all British Air flights from Venice go to Gatwick, then it is necessary to transfer to Heathrow.
They do not take responsibility for missing the connection even though i was trying to book a flight from Venice to NY while they see it as a flight from Venice to London and then another flight to NY.
Since I have to go through customs I don't see how it can be done.
Thanks for your input.

janisj

Customs is a non-issue. Customs take seconds. It is immigration, travel between the airports, and security queues that take time.

But if it is all one ticket (whether or not on the same airline) they would get you to your final destination. So I am still a bit confused. Not whether they are both on BA - But if they were booked together on the same ticket.

flanneruk

I'm as puzzled as janisj but let's get one thing straight.

The connection isn't an impossibility, or anything like one. Assuming you check in for the continuing flight online, you've got till 1720 to get your bags to the bag drop at - presumably - LHR T4. To do that, you need to be on a bus from LGW North roughly an hour before.

Forget the ill-informed claptrap you'll hear on this site about how long this transfer takes: from LGW North to LHR T4 scarcely ever takes more than 50 minutes. In your case, you need to be on a bus that leaves at or before 1615 (they're every 10 mins or so, and you can pay on the bus.). Real delays on the M25, even coming up to rush hour, belomg to the same category of travellers' myths as funding your holiday by selling nylons to the starving natives.

If the flight's more or less on time, you'll do that easily. If it's seriously late, you won't.

I've no advice about what happens if your incoming flight's late: but under normal circumstances, my suggestion is you stop fretting unnecessarily

giro

Thanks for the encouragement. When i purchased the tickets on their website, I indicated that I wanted a flight from Venice to NY. To me that is one booking. They gave me that flight in two segments, Venice to Gatwick and Heathrow to NY.
I'm sure if I said I wanted a flight to Gatwick and a separate flight to NY the cost would have been higher. So in my non-corporate opinion it is all one booking, but I suppose I don't have the corporate mentality figured out.
Again I appreciate the advice.

rkkwan

You'll be alright. If the first flight is late, and you make a reasonable effort to get to LHR (i.e. not going into London and sightsee), they'll put you on another flight back to NY. BA flies LHR-JFK like 7-8 times a day, plus a couple to EWR. You'll get home. Don't worry about it.