12-year-old Alice Saunders wasn't drunk or disorderly, yet British Airways refused to sell her an airline ticket from London to Scotland to visit her aunt. Heck, she didn't even threaten to blow up the plane.
But she does have Down Syndrome.
Alice, who lives in Littlehampton, England, attends a regular school, reads at grade level and is a frequent flyer.
“This is 2011. Most of the world has moved on in terms of their treatment of people with learning disabilities,” said her mom. “People with Down syndrome go to mainstream school, college, they live independently, they hold down jobs, but, it would seem, cannot travel independently with British Airways.”
Of course, once the media got wind, a British Airways spokesperson quickly apologized "for the upset caused to Mrs. Saunders and her daughter". They were adamant that it is not company policy to deny such travel, and announced a company wide disability awareness program with plans for additional training for all customer service agents.
By way of apology, British Airways offered Alice two roundtrip tickets.
I hope she politely told them what they could do with them.
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