I fly a lot and collect Avios points with British Airways. I have been a loyal customer for almost two decades and at the last count, I had almost 650,000 points.
However, five months ago BA locked me out of my Executive Club account – the website which customers must use to collect and spend their Avios points.
In October 2022 I received an email saying that the company had ‘noticed what could potentially be some unusual activity’.
It said it had temporarily blocked access to my account ‘to protect me’ and give it time to investigate, and that someone would be in touch within two weeks.
Points problem: Frequent flyer K.A had amassed hundreds of thousands of Avios before his account was blocked by British Airways
I didn’t hear anything by December, so I logged a formal complaint on the BA website. No one from BA got in contact until March, when I was simply told that someone would be in touch once it had completed its investigation.
I haven’t committed any fraud and I haven’t done anything that is in breach of the Executive Club terms and conditions. The only thing I can think of is that I changed the email address associated with my account.
I have attempted to call BA customer services on numerous occasions. Each time, I am told it’s something that only the account maintenance team can deal with – but I can’t contact them directly and have to wait for an email or letter.
I feel I am being fobbed off without any sort of explanation. K.A, Manchester
Helen Crane of This is Money replies: To the uninitiated, losing some loyalty points might not seem like that big of a deal.
But collecting Avios points is an Olympic sport among frequent flyers, and with almost 650,000 you are an elite athlete.
According to points website The Point Calculator, your points could be worth more than £13,000 if you spent them on business or first class flights, or more than £16,000 if you spent them on upgrades. With those sums of money involved, I can see why you are eager to get them back.
As always, the monetary value of your points depends on how you spend them – and you will usually need to pay extra fees on top. Anyone who is interested may want to read our guide to squeezing the most out of your Avios.
But as well as money, it is also an issue of loyalty. Serious Avios collectors will eschew flights with cheaper airlines in order to fly with BA and keep boosting their points. I don’t know how much you have spent with the company over the years to build up those points, but I would bet it is in the tens, if not hundreds, of thousands.
BA benefits greatly from customers like you, and it needs to keep up its end of the bargain and treat them fairly.
I understand that lucrative points schemes are open to fraud, and that BA needs to protect itself against that – but leaving you up in the air for months with no explanation as to why your account was closed was unacceptable.
What’s more, the service you received when you tried to sort it out was far from first-class. You told me the call centre was overseas – not a great look for the UK’s flag-carrier – and that the staff were mostly unhelpful.
At one point you were told your account would be reinstated within two hours, but this never happened and you suspect it was just a lie to get you off the phone.
I got in touch with BA to find out what was going on.
It told me that it regularly monitors Executive Club accounts for suspicious activity, and that is why your account was locked. It might have been because you changed your email address, but BA did not confirm this.
When this happens, BA says it will usually contact the customer shortly after to tell them what they need to do to get the account up and running again. This normally means providing proof of address and ID.
But due to human error, that failed to happen in your case and this was what caused the long delay.
A BA spokesperson said: ‘We’re in contact with the customer to apologise for the inconvenience caused and to reinstate their Executive Club account.’
Unfortunately more delays followed, as you told me BA had not reopened your account more than a week after you sent it the required documents.
But I am pleased to say that after I spoke to it again, your account was almost instantly up and running again.
Customers of loyalty schemes need to be able to trust that they will get the rewards promised, or else they are simply pointless. But with your balance reinstated, at least you no longer are.
Got your back: Reader Michael was happy to be given a £75 voucher for a new backpack, when retailer Tumi was unable to repair his old one
Good service? Tumi’s got it in the bag
It has been a while since I received any positive news, so I was pleased when reader Michael emailed with bags of praise for the luggage retailer, Tumi.
He bought a backpack from the company around 15 years ago, but recently the zip finally gave out.
Michael got in touch with Tumi to ask if it could be repaired (top marks for being eco-friendly) but unfortunately due to the bag’s age, it no longer had the right parts.
However, it did give him a voucher for £75 – 50 per cent of the original purchase price – to spend on a new one.
‘I have to say I have rarely encountered such top notch customer service,’ he said.
It sounds as if Tumi has gained a customer for the long haul.
