Sadly I am going to stick the knife into our great flag carrier. Not so much the airline service, which does a competent job, but more its lousy Frequent Flyer scheme. Ugh!

First a quick history lesson. You should be aware of what BA is and where it's come from. It is not really a commercial entity as such. Whilst Howard Hughes was busy wheeling and dealing to build TWA, and Juan Trippe moulding Pan Am into the world's first global carrier, BOAC (as it was) was little more than an elitist airborne smoking lounge for Britain's ruling classes bankrolled by the State.

BOAC grew into a fat happy monopoly. It had no democratic remit, and would rather carry 20 pax in style than 200 cost-effectively. Post-war, believe it or not, the UK still designed airliners to carry 12 people across the Atlantic. Ministers routinely hopped on for free. Even as the Comet put us ahead, just 36 lucky toffs sipped Drambuie while the 707 was preparing for 180. And things got even worse in the 60's, when undue pressure from BEA killed the brilliant Trident (a 727 before its time) by insisting its fuel range be cut, and wiping out the world market.

Eventually it had to stop, and BA became a private company, forced to compete, meet challengers and make profits for its shareholders. Hallelujah! Except one thing. The high handedness still remains.

BA MILES - FREQUENT FLYER PROGRAMME FROM HELL

BA has two loyalty mechanisms. The first is the "Executive Club". This is a member privilege scheme where frequent fliers rack up points. For most people it's a bit of a mystery. My Dad flew to Germany twice a month for 10 years, business, full-fare, and even he never got off first base. In fact I have never met anyone who has made it to "Silver" status, but no matter. Somebody somewhere must qualify. In the meantime, 56 million UK residents are "Blue" members, meaningless but rich in work for bureaucrats.

The second is, or was, a thing called "Air Miles". These were great - you could collect in lots of interesting ways - filling your car with petrol, buying groceries, all sorts. You could then spend them on flights. It actually worked! Well done BA.

Late 2000 BA sold the Air Miles scheme and replaced it with a thing called "BA Miles". This is where it got clever. All participants were informed that Air Miles would still technically exist. If you wanted to keep them you could. However, it would no longer be a part of BA. The implication (beautifully worded) was that if you kept your Air Miles they'd be henceforth worthless on BA flights. Like fools we all rushed to transfer our balance to the new BA Miles.

And then redemption rates doubled. Suddenly you needed twice as many miles as before to fly anywhere. We were had! The real irony was this - not only was the old Air Miles still up and running like nothing had happened, but yes you could still book BA flights with them - at an unchanged rate! I checked this out with BA, and they said, yeah you can buy our flights with Air Miles. Why did you think you couldn't?

Once again like fools we all scrambled to change our miles back into Air Miles before it was too late. I did mine last May. Except by August they hadn't appeared. I chased them, and said sorry technical error etc. October, still not appeared. Are you with me yet? Trying to book a Christmas flight and still no transfer - after 6 months!

Seven separate times BA have "processed" my request to convert back to Air Miles. On the last attempt I actually pinned a Manager on the spot, who promised to me on his mother's life that "they have definitely gone now - I am looking at my screen" etc. As soon as I get off the phone, they snigger, light up a cig and get back to the Times crossword. One more mug with his miles stuck in BA Miles.

This has now happened so many times, that I can only conclude we are not looking at any technical error, but an internal memo from BA's managers to lie, lie and keep on lying to anyone with the temerity to want out of BA's mileage scheme.

I like the airline. Cabin crew are a bit haughty. But it's always nice to see a BA plane prancing up to the gate at some far flung destination. It gives me no pleasure to stick the knife into my flag carrier.

BA does not have a good track record in integrity. It's a modern private company with the ethics of a state-run quango - and evidently still feels above the law. Did you know it was convicted of a dirty tricks campaign against Virgin in the early 90's? BA's managers (get this) actually hacked into the Virgin computer, rang Virgin first class passengers, posing as Virgin staff, and lied to them that their flight was cancelled, re-booking them with BA. Unbelievable but true. So I guess not much hope for my Miles!

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