Do not trust Travel Start

British Airways has got to have the absolute worst customer service and by the looks of it (judging by their lack of response to all the complaints raised on this platform). We were meant to fly to Spain via Heathrow, we asked BA to advise on whether or not a UK visa would be required as we would be in transit for about 2hours or so at Heathrow airport. BA advised us that because we weren’t going through passport control that no visa is required. We also confirmed via the website by entering our flight details to see what were the guidelines for our transit procedure – the website reaffirmed what was advised. Fast forward 2 months and it is time for us to go to Spain, we get to O.R Tambo and are turned away at the BA counter, as you can guess because we do not have UK transit visas!!!! Ensue panic, we tried to contact Travel Start as the tickets had been booked through them and they were difficult to get a hold – it took at least 10 attempts to get through to a consultant, at which point you would either stay on hold or end up speaking to one and the call would cut. They were not very helpful in terms of resolving the problem as we needed to change flights to other airlines (which we thought would be doable as we had also opted for the Flexi ticket option when we booked the tickets). Turns out, the Flexi option only applies to the airline and its affiliates – the former defeating the purpose the latter has no flights going directly to Spain. All in all we ended up having to cancel our trip, request for a refund, which is ultimately going to be 30% of what we paid for the tickets as a bulk of the money is being taken in airline penalties, to add insult to injury we may also need to pay fees to the accommodation people in Spain. All of this caused by BA and their inability to provide accurate guidance to customers. I must mention we did check the UK visa site and it was unclear what the rules were for people who were in transit for 2 hours hence us contacting BA as we had hoped they would be able to assist as that country’s airline and having operated in their country for years. Thank you, BA for ruining our holiday months before it even began and to Travelstart doing the most by being the least helpful besides just trying to force us into booking dates that would ultimately lead to us paying even more money so that we can recoup our ticket money. Thanks for that :(