BA criticised over cancellations

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The airline has scrapped one in 50 of its flights to and from its hub airport (Heathrow) this year, worse than its biggest rivals KLM, Air France and Lufthansa, according to tomorrow night's Dispatches programme on Channel 4.

BA said rivals had much greater spare runway capacity at their home airports and also defended its record over other claims in the programme.

Dispatches received information from Dutch-based Hendrik Noorderhaven, who monitors aircraft movements and helps people claim compensation. He said: "From the legacy airlines (national carriers) we've been monitoring in Europe they're the worst at the moment."

He said the 6.35pm flight to Frankfurt has been cancelled 27 times this year.

When passengers seek compensation they are often refused on the grounds that there have been "extraordinary circumstances", under which airlines do not have to pay out, the programme said.

A BA spokesman said: "We operate more than 250,000 flights a year, looking after more than 30 million customers.

"Despite having one of the most congested airports in the world as our home base, we achieved a 10% operating margin last year - a record for the airline and well ahead of comparable network carriers."

On cancellations, he said: "It is not surprising that Lufthansa, Air France and KLM had a slightly lower percentage of cancellations than British Airways in 2007 and the early part of 2008 as they enjoy much greater spare runway capacity at their home airports.

"Frankfurt, Paris Charles de Gaulle, and Amsterdam operate at 75 to 80% of capacity and have four or five runways. Heathrow has only two and operates at 99% capacity."