British Airways blames IT failure for flight outrage, union says tech jobs outsourced to India

British Airways said it had cancelled all flights from London's Heathrow and Gatwick airports scheduled before 1700 GMT on Saturday due to a global computer outage.

"We have experienced a major IT system failure that is causing very severe disruption to our flight operations worldwide," the airline said in a statement. Passengers have been reporting massive hold-ups at airports and planes being held on runways.

As per reports a union official accused British Airways of cutting costs, firing IT staff in 2016 and outsourcing the work to India.

Mick Rix, national officer for aviation at the GMB union said, “This could have all been avoided, we can only feel genuinely sorry for the tens of thousands of passengers who are stranded at airports and face having their travel plans and holidays ruined.”

The problems, which passengers said were affecting flights across the country, came on a particularly busy weekend in Britain with a public holiday on Monday and many children starting their school half-term breaks.

"We apologise to customers who are facing some delays following an IT outage this morning," a BA spokeswoman said. "We are working to resolve the problem as quickly as possible."
She gave no further details. Passengers on social media reported long delays at check-in desks and flights being held on runways.

"We've tried all of the self-check-in machines. None were working, apart from one," said Terry Page, booked on a flight to Texas. "There was a huge queue for it and it later transpired that it didn't actually work, but you didn't discover that until you got to the front." 

"Still on the tarmac at Leeds. #britishairways reckon Heathrow is so backed up we can't set off. No way we'll make our Vegas flight," one passenger David Raine wrote on Twitter.
Another, journalist Martyn Kent, wrote: "Sat on plane at Heathrow for hour and a half now. @British_Airways Captain describes IT problem as 'catastrophic'."

London's Heathrow Airport, one of the world's busiest, said it was working with BA and advised passengers to check their flight status before travelling.
Passenger Roshni Burt, who was flying from Heathrow to Bahrain with her young son, said there was no news about when her flight would depart.

"When we left the check-in area there were angry people, people getting frustrated that their flights were coming up or near to departure, people getting turned away ... with BA staff basically saying 'if you've not checked in online, you've missed your flight'," she told Sky News.

Agitated passengers took to Twitter:

BA stopping people coming in to Terminal 5 because of queues #bbcnews pic.twitter.com/S4gw7ZOgzr

— Jack Baine (@JB72) May 27, 2017

@British_Airways Tried your app and online from a phone, laptop. please help pic.twitter.com/fkwy8QU6Aa

— Dharmesh Karmokar (@Dhaams) May 27, 2017

The captain of @British_Airways flight BA553 from Rome to London addresses passengers about IT problems."All aircraft around world affected" pic.twitter.com/8oFcqaucc7

— Phillip Norton (@phillipnorton) May 27, 2017

Danish football commentator, Peter Piil who was meant to be at the FA finale, was also stranded on a BA flight he tweeted: 

Kaos på British Airways, så vi laver optakt til FA finale fra flyet. #EurosportDK #FACupFinal #ARSvCHE @6erendk pic.twitter.com/Q0zZk9Ta2F

— Peter Piil (@PiilEurosport) May 27, 2017

Which roughly translates "chaos on British Airways" and they've been "waiting for a while."

BA is the latest airline to be hit by computer problems. Last month Lufthansa and Air France suffered a global system outage which prevented them from boarding passengers.