Refunds

All refunds should be processed in your GDS. Refunds should only be sent to us to process if:

• tickets are over 12 months old(*). This will incur a standard administration fee of GBP30 (or local equivalent) charged to you by ADM.
• ticket has been closed off in the system (eg if the passenger checks in but does not travel or coupon status is 'F' but was not utilised)
• there are technical problems with the GDS which prevent ticket refunds, including where British Airways has re-issued or exchanged travel documents and therefore owns them. You should mention 'BA reissue/exchange' in the text field on the Refund Request form.
• there is incorrect sales reporting (eg a void transaction is reported with a value on the BSP or ARC report)
• other airline tickets are reported erroneously by BSP or ARC as BA Sales system errors (eg where an eticket booking cannot be retrieved at check-in)
• a ticket has been utilised but additional action is necessary to make an initial or further refund
• you have reissued tickets where the original 'form of payment' is not available on the ticket being refunded due to the original ticket FOP not being carried across during the reissue
• the passenger has been downgraded
• there has been a death of passenger or family member, in accordance with the conditions of carriage. Prior to travel, you should submit a Refund Request form and a copy of the death certificate should be emailed to us.

Please contact your GDS helpdesk if you have any queries.

(*)We have extended the validity of our tickets and EMDs. If you are able to display the document, the coupon status is ‘O’ or ‘A’ and a refund is eligible, your GDS will permit the refund to be processed and the below webform should not be completed.

If you are currently waiting for a refund to be processed by us, where the ticket is beyond 12 months validity, we recommend you process the refund in your GDS to avoid our standard administration fee.

Completing the webform, is confirmation that you cannot process the refund via your GDS, and the standard administration fee will be charged.

NDC agents should continue to complete this webform for tickets outside ticket validity and no administration fee is charged.

Duplicate and retrospective refunds

We will only accept retrospective refunds if:

• the customer has been downgraded - by either voluntary or involuntary changes
• the ticket is a genuine duplicate (the same in every respect but created on different dates) and ticket has not been used at all
• you have issued 2 tickets in error for the same customer in 1 booking and tickets have not been used at all

You should raise a Refund Request to apply for a refund. If you have issued 2 tickets in the same booking which aren't genuine duplicates, each will be refunded separately as per fare rules. 

Similarly, if a passenger uses the ticket coupons out of sequence, the ticket can only be refunded per fare rules.

We will not make changes to a coupon status in order to facilitate refunds in these scenarios. We will change status from Y (no-show) to O to enable a refund of taxes. For assistance, please contact Trade Support.

Failed transactions in your GDS

If you add incorrect or expired payment card details, you may see a failed transaction in your GDS. For these cases, you should submit the refund to us.

If applicable, you can submit a Refund Request form to us. Please ensure you fill in details accurately with as much information as possible.

Refunds will be credited to the original form of payment.

Please allow up to 8-9 weeks for us to process your request.

Raise a Refund Request

If you need to provide supporting documentation for the Refund Request, please email our Refunds Unit at supportingdocs.trade@ba.com. Supporting documents should only be sent for requests already raised on the Refund Request form. You should not use this email address to chase existing requests and emails sent to this mailbox will not be responded to.

We have issued a policy document for our refunds process and guidelines for you to refer to.

Find out more

You should calculate your own refunds both for those that are processed through the GDS and those that are requested through the Refund Request webform. Any uncalculated requests sent through the Refund Request webform will be returned to you to calculate and our agency support desks will be unable to assist with any refund calculations.

Cancellation fees due from refund transactions must be deducted from the refundable (residual amount) eg if the fare has a £100 cancellation fee and the refundable amount is £250, the refund value is £150 (ie £250 - £100)

We have announced some changes to our refund policy, enabling you to automate refunds, using the industry standard ATPCO Category 33. The automation will lead to a reduction in the time taken to process refunds for customers.

Find out more and see further examples

Where applicable, all EMDs for residual balance and group deposit should be processed via your GDS.

Please ensure refunds are made to the original Forms of Payment and made in the same currency that was used to pay for the ticket (ie cash payment should be refunded as cash and credit card payment should be refunded to credit card)

Where a different form of payment is used during the reissue, refunds should be made to both Forms of Payment, in accordance with IATA Resolution 890 (4.2) and/or in the ARC handbook (page 90) if you're based in USA. Failure to do this will result in an ADM being raised.

To accommodate a split Form of Payment refund, you should contact your GDS helpdesk for the GDS entries required to add the original form of payment manually within the refund mask.

Non-refundable tickets: only Government and/or Airport taxes will be refunded.

The following USA taxes are non-refundable when they relate to non-refundable fare components, even if unused:
US (International Transportation Tax)
US (Domestic Transportation Tax)
XF (Passenger Facilities Charge)
ZP (Flight Segment Tax)

Partially used tickets: not all taxes will be refunded as some would have been used. eg if a customer has already departed from the UK before applying for the refund, UK departure taxes will not be refunded.

A refund of the carrier imposed charge may be made on unused flights in your itinerary, if permitted, by the fare rules and conditions applicable to your booking.

Combination of fares: refer to the fare rule to check whether the most restrictive rule applies or if individual fare component rules apply to the refund.

Refundable tickets: carrier imposed charge and fuel surcharges will be refunded where applicable.

During disruption, we will update the Customer Guidelines on our batraveltrade.com homepage. If we haven't issued specific guidelines, standard customer guidelines apply.

You can refer to our archived customer guidelines if you need to refer to them at a later stage.

You should issue refunds during disruption yourself in your GDS to avoid receiving an ADM.

Extra baggage

If a customer pays for extra baggage online and wishes to cancel, they must do this through Manage My Booking on ba.com before checking-in.

We will accept extra baggage refunds for involuntary changes if:

• we cancel a flight due to operational reasons (eg weather, schedule changes)
• we no longer operate the route
• a customer is entitled to a refund of their ticket under the Standard Conditions of Carriage  

Seat requests

If a customer purchases a seat on ba.com, they will be unable to request a refund unless:

• we cancel a flight due to operational reasons (eg weather, schedule changes)
• we no longer operate the route
• there has been an aircraft change and we're unable to seat the customer in a suitable alternative seat
• there has been flight disruption so the customer has been moved to another flight and we're unable to seat them in a suitable alternative seat on the new flight
• the customer is entitled to a refund of their ticket under the Standard Conditions of Carriage