British Airways Staying at Heathrow???

Tobi Hughes·
Madeira News

There have been a fair few comments on my blog and social media, that British Airways have started letting it’s customers know that their flight has been cancelled from Gatwick, and moved to Heathrow.

For some of you, this is just happening now with not a lot of notice, as I believe BA had planned to restart flights from Gatwick very soon.

But thanks to some readers, they have been informed that their flights as far ahead as March 2022 are being changed to Heathrow still.

BA stopped flying from Gatwick when the pandemic started, and shifted to Heathrow, as Gatwick completely closed its South Terminal to cut down on running cost, and it seems the closure has been pushed back even more.

Some flights were transferred to Gatwick North, but the BA flights to Madeira transferred to Heathrow, and it looks like it could stay that way for a lot longer yet.

Have you had the notice about your flights being changed to Heathrow, and anyone have flights booked past March 2022 that have had the notice.

Photos of an empty Gatwick South from Sussex Live

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Tobi Hughes

18 Responses

  1. Yes indeed! Just received the email from BA. Now LHR not LGW. Good news! Same days as originally booked with timings the same LHR- FNC and only 5 mins earlier for the return. Now bracing ourselves for the LHR Terminal 5 experience!

  2. Yes we have received the notice today that our December 18 flight ✈️ will now be leaving from T5. We have been to Madeira twice this year from T5 and found it a smooth operation probably because there were so few passengers in the whole terminal but both our Madeira flights were at least 60% occupied.

  3. Hi Tobi
    Just got email with change to Heathrow from Gatwick. Our flights are 7 February 2022. To be fair half expecting it.
    Now changed departure hotel bookings!

  4. I’ve just booked our BA August 2022 flights and disappointingly they are scheduled from Gatwick South. I had really hoped that BA would have scheduled some summer 2022 FNC flights from Heathrow, not least as some weeks this year, they have run 8 or 9 services per week. It’s not been unusual, in the past, for BA to operate to some holiday destinations from both Heathrow and Gatwick – surely LHR could have retained a couple of those. That said, it’s all moot, I fully expect that we will eventually get the email telling us to turn up at LHR – hopefully! Gatwick is a pain to get to from the Midlands.

    As for T5 David, if you are on an early flight and can manage to get there the evening before – do the overnight bag drop, it saves so much time in the morning, and don’t believe the Daily Mail horror stories about 3 hour queues at immigration, on return – last weekend, it took us 7 minutes (we timed it!)

    Finally, for anyone travelling home with BA, you will be invited to upload your vaccine certificates, UK locator form and fit to fly lateral flow test results to the BA Verifly App. Do it! Check-in at FNC can be slow at the best of times, especially with people searching for their printed documents or looking for downloads on their phone. Once uploaded, Verifly presents the check-in agent with your photo and a green ‘fit to fly’ tick. Show it and you’re away. Do though print all your stuff as a back up, just in case you have mobile phone problems.

    1. Robert, were the e-gates at T5 open on the way back or did you have to be seen by an immigration officer?

      1. Yes, Maurice, about a third of the e-gates were open which we used. I guess the onus on checking documents has been placed on the airlines before travel to the UK – unless of course the systems have be built for the e-gates to recognise passport numbers and link them to the UK Passenger Locator Form (doubtful).

        As for uploading documents, on the way out, as I recall, BA invited travellers to upload documents – i.e. the vaccination certificate and the Madeira safe QR code, to the ‘Manage My booking’ site, around the time on-line check in opened (iirc it might have been the day or so before, I can’t be sure), once validated, that upload allowed check-in online. Without that, it was check-in, as normal, at the check-in desk.

        On the way back, we uploaded our documents to the Verifly App which BA are using along with American Airlines. We got an e-mail invitation from BA to download the App several days before we were due to return, uploaded our ‘certificates’ in line with the Verifly checklist and check in at FNC was painless.

    2. Robert, I have the BA app but I cannot see how you upload docs such as NHS vaccination certificates and the UK.gov passenger locator form details. I’ve also looked at our booking on the website but can’t see how you upload docs to it. Any tips appreciated.

        1. Being in our 80s we are not “mobile phone with it” and usually have little general use for mobile phones. We have printed documents and
          reasonable command of technique with our p.c. Any easily understood advice would be welcome regards getting all this Covid requirement onto a p.c. which can then be sent to B.A.for our flight to Madeira in October? Dont understand re “Madeira Safe coming and locator form going”!!! Please clarify.
          Really enjoy all your pictures of Madeira. We thought we knew it pretty well, but you give us a few surprises!
          Sheila Davis

    3. Much appreciated advice about T5.

      Now booked nighf before at Premier Inn T5

      Happy days are here again!

    4. “Do though print all your stuff as a back up, just in case you have mobile phone problems.” Now photograph all the the paper copies in case the little girl at the desk mislays or knocks one on the floor without noticing. I don’t often have murder in my heart but I did the morning it happened to me.

  5. I had thought I would book BA flights from Gatwick to Madeira for 2022 soon. Heathrow is a bit of a struggle to get to from South East London. Gatwick is so much easier to reach including a 20 minute maximum train journey from East Croydon.

  6. Yes, got email yesterday of change to Heathrow next March. A bit of a pain as longer to get to and increased taxi cost.

  7. We received our LGW to LHR emails yesterday for our November 2021 flights and the March 2022 flights. So far the July 2022 flights are still from LGW, but I guess it’s too far in advance to say whether next summer will be LGW or LHR. Still very much looking forward to returning to Madeira soon!

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