Wouldn't have happened on Lord King's watch.

David Masu, Zürich,

Looks like I will keep my money here in Houston, Texas and skip coming to the UK until you guys get all that mess sorted out. You guys loose again.

George , Houston, Texas, USA

I have laughed & smiled at the debacle caused by BAA & BA (deep down I knew all the promises were too good to be true).
Forgive me, but Australians love seeing English suffer or lose at just about anything. It's a shame others are tangled up in the mess.
You poor UK citizens.
Why did you even contemplate the idea that things would improve with a new terminal???
To use some Australian sayings to describe your government, BAA & BA..."they couldn't run a hot bath" nor "win if they bought every ticket in the chook raffle".
Staff with less than 20 minutes training, staff not having ever visited parts of the terminal they were directing people to, workers not being able to "log-in" for work, baggage handlers not being abble to handle baggage. What was the testing & training period used for if these vital things weren't tested & people trained???
Wait until the Olympics come around.
P.S. I know my punishment for these comments will be BA losing my bags on my next trip.

Andrew, Sydney, Australia

This whole fiasco reminds me of the chocolate conveyor belt episode from "I Love Lucy". All I can say is BAA "you got a lot of s'plainin' to do!"

Donald Abodeely, Pepperell, MA, USA

Willie Wonka should go back to running the chocolate factory!

Simon, London, UK

This is embarrassing for England as a whole. Absolutely Pathetic!

Carl, London,

BA have been a lousy airline for decades -poorly managed and arrogant.
BAA have run airports very badly for quite a while. So why does anyone think that a piece of imposing architecture will change the habits of a lifetime?

David, Bromley,

Heathrow is a terminal case, so is Gatwick. For long-haul travel its much better to use Amsterdam or Frankfurt as a hub and get a connecting flight from your local regional airport. But *of course* London is more important than everywhere else in this country, so heaven forbid that the investment should go into Birmingham or Manchester instead.

Paul, Coventry,

Why am I not surprised ? I suffered 20 years of Heathrow - and BA - as a business traveller. After an tedious experience changing at Heathrow to and from the US last November (BA is the only airline flying direct from Europe to Baltimore), I was told by BA and BAA staff that all would be different with the new terminal. Well now we know.

david, Ligneyrac, France

BAA has been, is and will continue to be incompetent.
T5 is the latest proof.
I had the discomfort to travel on 27 Mar 08 from Washington via T4 by bus to T5 and then on to the continent. T5 has been planned and built for the retailers and the passengers are considered a bother.
The management of BA has badly failed with T5 as well. It seems to me that the CEO a former pilot really lost his check sheet, we all know that pilots only know how to fily if they can get hold of the check sheet.
To express that as a CEO he is very sorry , is not good enough. I am still waiting for my baggage, which might be somewhere between T4 and T5. I wonder how I shall be compensated by BA should it not show up any more. That much from a Gold Card Member.

Hans , zurich, switzerland

I will bet that every one of the 147 shops was fully tested, manned and ready to receive the weary travellers money.

Why the airlines persist in the myth that we want to spend money, waiting around in their soulless airports, for them to provide the travel service that we have already paid for, is beyond me.

I would no more buy an airline ticket from my tailor than a suit from an airline. Airports are for passengers, not customers, and BAA and BA should be focussing their attention on providing travel, not retail services.

George Saul, Brookfield, CT USA

How depressingly familiar. What should have been a triumph for Britain turns into humiliation - doesn't bode well for 2012 does it!

BA and Heathrow Airport have been a joke for a while now, how many more knocks can the customers take before we start voting with our feet and using alternative airlines who actually care about their customers!?

If a new terminal was built at Frankfurt would there have been as much chaos? I very much doubt it. Basket-case Britain!

Jonathan Main, Kuwait City, Kuwait

It's a management failing from top to bottom.

No staff training.
Rushing into the opening without proper testing.
A dry run for the luggage handling system with cardboard boxes first perhaps ? Naaaa, let's not bother
No contingencies in case of breakdowns.
No information to customers.

Laughable if it wasn't so embarrassing.
And all T5 represents is a huge glorified shed.

£4.5 billion? Don't take the mickey.
You could get a couple of nuclear power stations for that.

A. Kirk, Manchester,

Why didn't BA build up the number of flights instead of going big bang - sounds pretty basic to me.

Phil Carter, Hemel Hempstead, UK

Everyone seems to be focusing solely on W.Walsh in regard to this catostrophe, when it would probably be more productive to focus on the overall problem, management failures, and all of the people involved to FIX IT. No doubt Mr. Walsh was the boss, and is ultimately answerable, but it seems that in the country the practice when customer service goes wrong is to immediately determine "whose fault it is," with all involved parties pointing the finger elsewhere, when the first course of action should be to simply remedy the problem! Blame can be assigned after customers have been taken care of. This is demonstrable in everyday transactions. How many times have we been told by a waiter or a call centre person "It's not my fault" rather than simply having them fix it?

In the end, the customer cares more about getting the service and product that they paid for than who caused the problem.

So, everyone stop pointing fingers for a second and FIX IT! Stop being childish!

Audrey , London, UK

What everyone is forgetting is that BA as a corporation actually could not give a stuff about all this. They know -- because they have so many years experience of this kind of chronic failure of customer satisfaction -- that it will all blow over in time for the next round of cost cutting and management bonuses. They have become inured to spectacular public failure and easily resort to their default mode of tardy hollow apologies given through gritted teeth. If you need further evidence, wait until you get their response letter to your complaint. Pity their customers, and pity their loyal employees who want so much to be proud of the airline they love.

David Masu, Zürich,

What amazes me most is the arrogance of many of the comments made here by people who know nothing of the real situation at T5. Jumping to conclusions as to the cause of the problems is as bad as creating the problems in the first place. For goodness sake show some humanity and give people a chance.

Martin, Dubai, UAE

Forget BA and lousy Heathrow .
Vote with your wallet , go to Luton and enjoy a memorable experience by flying with Silverjet . Double the service for less than half the cost of BA's overpriced offering to New York . THey deserve to succeed and wipe out BA's so-called most profitable( ie rip-off) business class sector .

Gerry Connolly, London,

I hope the travelling public punish BA/BAA in the only way that they will understand.. by voting with their wallets.

But it is one thing to make a conscious choice as a consumer to fly, e.g. Virgin or Emirates as opposed to BA. It is another entirely to try to boycott BAA, a monopoly that runs London's three main airports.

The sooner that BAA is broken up, the sooner an effective market solution to these sorts of shambles can be found and better, more efficient competitors can compete for the travelling publics pounds. The perenially downtrodden British traveller can then choose to travel from alternative airports. I for one would love to be able to say "Never will I travel from a BAA airport again".

Patrick Murphy, London,

BA said yesterday that the problems were anticipated because any new terminal needs time to bed-in.

Any well-run business will always look at the risks and impacts of problems should they occur and will mitigate against those risks (for BA the costs will be substantial in terms of lost revenue and damage to brand).

It beggars belief that BA thought that a big-bang transition to T5 was a good idea. No doubt Willie Walsh, in an incredibly optimistic moment thought that it would be great PR to see the grand opening on the news with BA right there at the forefront. A well run business would have started operations with a small number of customers moving to the new service - a soft-launch, i.e. the absolute minimum number of flights that could be moved in one go given operational constraints.

Willie Walsh's transitional strategy was ill-conceived - the risks were too high and not properly managed. It will cost BA share holders dearly - his position is untenable.

Steve L, London,

I recently had to take a flight to London from central Europe. Even though BA was about Euro 200 cheaper I chose to fly with one of their competitors.

These days when I book a flight I always tell the travel agent any airline except BA please.

BA has got to be the world`s worst airline from the management down to the staff.

To think that 10 years ago they were a shining jewel in the European airline industry with high customer satisfaction and record profits while the European airlines were suffering.

The decline in BA is surely down to management for allowing it to happen.

Replace the lot of them. In any other company heads would roll for the continuing shambles that is BA.

If they can`t organise an airline at an airport..... ??

Joe, Frankfurt, Germany

I seemed to remember that when our "suwannaphumi" airport - in Bangkok was opened. We had the "chaos" too... ermmm if am not wrong it kept happening for a week... but it was not as serious as the Heathrow Terminal 5

Riya, Bangkok, Thailand

It makes you proud to be British!!!

Matt, Deal, Kent

Mr Walsh

Potential problem analysis is a tool used in project management - obviously not used here. What a catastophe for BA, BAA but more importantly the country.

Mr Walsh and the management team who told him what he wanted to hear with regard to the opening of T5, rather than reality, should pay the ultimate price and without golden handshakes. Do the decent thing - Go.

Mr Walsh should know , as with landing a plane (which he did many times during his previous job) there is no room for error on a massive project like this. The world was watching you so now accept the consequences. You enjoyed the potential glory
so now admit liability.

P Baker, Andover.,

Thank God I chose Virgin Atlantic years ago over BA. Luckily I've never had a particularly bad experiencewith them, except one business class flight from Dubai where nothing seemed to work.

However I've never warmed up to anything they stand for. Go BRANSON!

PS: I do feel though that BAA should get much for flack for this T5 disaster than British Airwas

Will, London, UK

Actions speak louder than words. He should get this fixed or resign.

Liz, London,

this is another example of extremely poor british infrastructure building. as i'm sure has been asked a hundred times - "why are 'developing countries' like china, india, brazil, malaysia able to pull off opening of sites without a hitch and yet a 'developed' country like the uk can't do it?" just seems bizarre and continues to highlight the ineptitude of the UK which for a while was brought back from the brink by thatcher but has returned to the ineptitude and lack of understanding of quality or customer service that drove the economy into the dust in the 70's!

people worry about the US being a problem and their economy going to pot. i have no worries about the US - they will reinvent themselves and come out of their problems stronger. the uk will not, people will complain, people will then complain a little more, but nothing will happen and the uk will fall further into the quagmire of laziness and lack of self or national respect. just wait for the housing crash!

adrian, London, UK

The T5 catastrophy, a day after the FSA report on it's own failings, comes on the back of endless other debacles (foreign prisoners, loss of data, Northern Rock etc).

In this country, the more incompetent you are, the higher you will rise, until your incompetence is finally found out,. At his point, the golden handshake sends you off into retirement. Meanwhile, the customer, consumer, the taxpayer, continues to suffer and fork out left, right and centre.

Tony, Leicester, England

Why don't you show your collective remorse by taking your esteemed self and your senior management team down to the terminal, spending time and the night in absolutely the same conditions as your hapless passengers, Mr. Walsh (or more aptly, Willy)? Your collective incompetence has never been and hopefully, will never be matched or bettered. Unless those all-conquering genii at BAA give it a good try, that is...

Subin Paul, London,

Where are the people who were commenting about the take over of 'British Proud' Jaguar and Land Rover by India's TATA?

Where are those people who were not even capabale of running a Lemonade stand commenting about India's multi-Billion company TATA???

BAA is not even qualified to run an Indian Tea Stall. Full Stop.

Be proud about the 'British' BAA.

Uma Shankar, UK,

The whole Munic airport moved in one night from the old to the
new location more than 50 miles away. Not one flight had to be canceled or delayed. It's therefore just a question of management quality.

Andrew, Berlin, Germany

As an employee of BA I am sick and tired of apologising to passengers left, right and centre for things that are beyond my control; and should be left in front of W Walsh's door at BA HQ because this is where all the axe-wielding costcuts started out.

I'm all for doing my job to the best of my ability but without the right tools, it becomes neigh on impossible. Especially when passengers take out their frustration on you because you are in uniform.

Willie Walsh has got some answering to do, but will not go anywhere until he has achieved the 10% profit margin which would trigger his supposedly £2m bonus... Compared to the £600 I can expect, he doesn't have to put up with much does he?

The company is being run by mercenary managers with only one intention, and that is to achieve their targets over a 2-year period, add the gloss to their CVs, move on to the next job AND forget all about the people they have screwed over with policy implementation against common sense.

NC, Reading, UK

I agree with Antony Lewin. Don't believe the BA hype.

They're overpriced, overrated and out of focus with customer needs. What kind of airline writes off a whole demographic of customer, a frequent flyer one at that, by refusing to carry surfboards??

Alex , Bristol,

Sadly, this is symptomatic of the UK these days. We get so little right and is reflected in the state of our road, railways, hospitals, banks, streets, manufacturing ........... the list is endless. Certainly in England we seem to have lost our sense of pride.

AWilliams, Cradley Heath,

One thing that BA seems totally unable to appreciate, despite the many chaotic situations that it has recently faced, is the importance of communication. Passenger will forgive a lot more if they are given timely and accurate information in a courteous mannner.

It is simple, not costly and just plain common sense - BA LEARN THE LESSON.

Chris, Ashford, Middlesex, UK

Why are we so eager to gloat and analyse other people's slip-ups when we have all done/do the same at some point. Critical people tend to be the saddest and most miserable people. Excellent building BAA!!

Ola, Kent,

A fine example for you.

A flight arrived at T5 yesterday at about 1340. First passengers off at 1520...............last passenger, a friend of mine, off after 1700 after a lengthy wait for a wheelchair.

The staff cuts have gone too far and too deep. Morale is at rock bottom. Safety can be linked to attitude, and of course to morale.

Willie Walsh must resign.

Mick Jones, London, UK

Time to bring in Michael O'Leary (Ryanair).

At least the passengers would hear exactly what Mr O'Leary wanted them to hear. No need to worry about baggage either, as he would deal with that as successfully as he has at Ryanair.

And with a little bit of help from John Lennon Airport (Liverpool) Terminal 5 could swiftly make a fortune by introducing 'Fast Lanes' and charging everyone £2 for the priviledge of standing in a queue for security next to the one they would have been in anyway.

Happy Days.......

MarkS, Leeds,

To arrive to Heathrow is a grey, shameful experience. Very few thrid world countries have such a low class, smelly carpeted, ignorant personnel, as very few countries can pride themselves of having the most hated commercial airline by business men, that is British Airways.
Andy, I understand you are so envious of Amsterdam Schiphol that you can just say nothing, but hey let's be honest, the cleaniness, the light, the twenty plus baggage pickups make it to my criteria the best airport in Europe.

Ferdie Roberts, London, UK

The thing that the press reports are not concentrating on, when they should be, is the abysmal customer service BA are offering to people affected by these incidents: refusing full compensation for hotel rooms, advising people not to travel with most of their luggage (as if people would REALLY do that!), not providing real help or real advice. They keep saying that they "sincerely" apologise but their sincerity can be measured in words only and their lack of actions to assist affected people tell the real story about how they feel. Instead of allowing their PR people to read their prepared statements without interruption, the press should be hounding them with questions.

John Tomlinson, Brentwood, UK

It only shows how bad BA has got with the present mangement, they should have open it with 20% of flights in the first week and it proves Ok increase the amount of flights until it was a totally open and running well.

Ex passenger of BA

John, Ventnor, Uk

So we'll have lots of headlines, and then they'll stop, and it'll go wrong again next time.

M.R., Lancaster,

Why did they have to transfer so many flights on day 1? Why not ramp up over say a week or so - spend the extra money in duplicate arrangements - its only for a week.

Deepak, Wayland, USA

Why is it BA's fault? It's BAA are responsible, surely? Another good reason for the BAA monopoly to be broken up. There is no reason why BAA should run all 5 terminals at Heathrow, let alone all 3 of London's main airports

Richard, Bexhill, uk

It'll all iron itself out....in 20 years that is. I am glad I boycotted BA years ago!

E Paroissien, Los Angeles, CA, United States

JAF, an airport terminal does two things - deals with passengers, and deals with their luggage. Its a pretty fundamental problem. A Reid has it correct - project management - the back end of projects is critical (testing, roll outtraining) and if senior management have ignored their own governance processes then there really should be some heads rolling. That assumes they did of course, and being an IT market analyst, I do know that these are the areas taken least seriously and often skimped on when commercial pressures take hold. Shame.

Martin Atherton, London,

And these are the very people assuring travellers that any biometric samples (fingerprints) taken from passengers, before being allowed to fly from T5, will be secure and destroyed after 24 hours. Some hope!!.

pip, Banstead, surrey

BA has done it again. All that the BA can do is issue apology after apology. Is he fit to run the business?

Karan, Leicester,

Looking forward to the London olympics already.

While were at it, why not give Heathrow expansion the go -ahead. That way we can screw up all the nearby residents lives while becoming the laughing stock for the world.

Oh how this mighty country has fallen. Wellington, Nelson, Churchill, Brunel, Newton et al must be turning in their graves.

Andrew, Maidenhead,

I completely agree with BA Gold Card Holder... this is a company that never, ever learns from its mistakes. Exactly 1 year ago I flew BA from T4 - they cancelled 10 flights and I had to spend 8 hours queuing to be reticketed at one of only 5 desks. When I got to the front, I observed that it must have been a difficult day for BA staff too. The employee looked at me, smiled pleasantly, and said "Oh, no... this happens all the time! We're used to it!"

James Coyle, London,

There is a great deal of mudslinging going on at the moment. This is an enormous project that was bound to suffer problems. Yes, things happened that could have been avoided, yet most of the critics seem content to be armchair experts. The British press simply love to give aviation a good kicking when ever the opportunity arises. When all the problems are over will the same press give the same attention to praising the new facility, I very much doubt it!

Robin Voice, New Malden,

Welcome to Britain - and you are welcome to it. This is the typical standard of British business today. Out of every 10 companies you deal with how many can you say "it was a pleasure doing business with them"? More likely all you get is incompetence and excuses.

Mark Sheppard, Retford, UK

Not so much Heathrow as Heathrobinson

Ida, Crawley, West Sussex

So the whizzy baggage system is too fast for BA's team of 'throwers' and the operators can't log in. Despite the opening week blues, T5 represents an achievement of which we should be proud, not critical. At the very least they have provided a more pleasing environment for grounded passengers!

Whilst I don't agree with BAA's monopolistic position over London's airports, both it and BA will solve these problems in the coming weeks and we will at last have a world-class terminal for our national flag-carrier.

I look forward to the Heathrow putting the woeful baggage performance of Amsterdam's Schippol airport truly to shame!

Andy, Leeds, UK

Staffing has always been a problem for BA at Heathrow. Even at the so-called premium zone check-in there were always immense queues as there weren't enough desks to accept the hold luggage of people who have already checked-in. Whilst other airlines go out of their way to retain and gain passengers, BA takes them for granted and thinks that sound bites will substitute efficiency. The experience passengers want is swift and efficient processing and not restrictions, photographing and expensive eateries. By the way, who came up with the idea that a non-governmental, private organisation could be forcing people to provide their fingerprints? That in it's self would have been reason enough to avoid T5. And let's face it, it didn't fail because the Home Office didn't allow it….

BA Gold Card-holder, London,

The Gateway to Britain - it's chaotic, the staff are surly and poorly trained, the management no where to be seen, and clueless as to how to cope. Nothing works; but at least it looks nice.

Some may regard this as embarrassment, but at least new arrivals at Heathrow get an accurate picture of the rest of Britain.

Daniel Smith, London, England

I cannot see why they did not phase in the new T5, slowly over a period , surely the other facilities are not shut down?. Jim

jim, donegal, ireland

I learnt years ago that if your want a good travelling experience, never use BA or Heathrow airport. They always lost my luggage, many delays, rude staff, and cancellations. They have never changed, and T5 shows they are just the same as ever. I travel alot and use other airlines, and I have never had a problem, and my travel experiences are much more enjoyable. People get sucked into BA's marketing, and think BA are a first class cut above the rest, but other airlines are much better, and more customer focused. Too many fat cat directors and managerial staff at BA are the real problem, and the inter political battles with the staff have ruined it. My other concern is a piece of UK flagship design is being made a laughing stock in the world. Some very senior people should consider their positions.

Antony Lewin, London, UK

Hands up those who are surprised. You can't travel in, out or within this country without a great deal of hassle. Due to global warming and saving the earth isn't it?

mike, Midlands, UK

It's a classic project management mistake to underestimate testing and training times. No doubt pressure was put on from management (they're generally ignorant clods) to minimise the testing and training costs. And this is the result. Most of the Heathrow staff are from the third-world so the testing and training should have had a language and culture multiple applied to it. Anyway, neither BA nor BAA care very much about passengers, so what's the point.

Andrew Reid, Camden, UK

With every huge project like this everyone would expect ever bigger problems to arise at one point or the other. Unfortunately this terminal experienced its problems from the very beginning. Hopefully BA and Heathrow's staff will be able to cope and deal with these difficulties promptly.

Andreas Andreou, Nottingham, UK

Why are the British press always so negative! There were bound to be problems with the opening of the new Terminal 5. Baggage is a small problem compared to what could happen. When the beautiful Chek Lap Kok here in Hong Kong opened we didn't have any food in the shops for 3 weeks as the new airport was unable to handle the cargo. This was unanticipated. There were many teething problems for many weeks and now this airport is one of the best in the world. Give T5 a chance.

JAF, Hong Kong,

End BAA's monopoly now!

Frank Upton, Solihull,