The airline said the suspension of sales to domestic and European destinations was designed to allow existing customers to rebook flights when needed. Airlines and airports across Britain and Europe have struggled to cope with the post-lockdown recovery in travel, with many failing to hire enough staff to handle check-ins and baggage. Heathrow, like Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, has told airlines to limit the number of tickets they sell in the summer after limiting the number of passengers flying from the hub to 100,000 a day to reduce queues, delays baggage and cancellations. Heathrow said last week that the cap had made significant improvements in punctuality and baggage handling. “As a result of Heathrow’s request to limit new bookings, we have decided to take responsible action and limit the fares available on some Heathrow services to help maximize rebooking options for existing customers, given the restrictions placed on us and the ongoing challenges facing the entire airline industry,” BA said in a statement. But an industry expert argued it was positive news for consumers because it would allow the airline to make sure people who had confirmed bookings would still be able to fly on schedule. Julia Lo Bue-Said – the chief executive of the Advantage Travel Partnership – told the BBC’s Today programme: “It’s positive news for consumers. In one sense it sounds quite understandable that an airline would reduce seats in a peak period, but absolutely everything is about building resilience, ensuring there is less disruption’ and less risk to those who have booked. The airline earlier responded to Heathrow’s passenger cap by announcing it would cancel 10,300 flights until October, with one million passengers affected. While the move stops BA’s access to the lucrative last-minute flight market during the peak season, Lo Bue-Said argued it was a short-term solution to meet consumer demand while minimizing disruption. “It gives them the ability to kind of scale,” Lo Bue-Said said. Responding to the news on Twitter, one user asked: “Shouldn’t short-haul flights be banned anyway for environmental reasons as well as reducing pressure on airports?” Emirates last month rejected Heathrow’s order to cancel flights to comply with the cap. The airline accused the airport of showing “blatant disregard for consumers” by trying to force it to “deny seats to tens of thousands of travellers”. A Heathrow spokesman said at the time that it would be “disappointing” if “any airline wants to put profits ahead of a safe and reliable passenger journey”. Virgin Atlantic also criticized the airport’s actions and claimed responsibility for failures that contributed to the chaos. On July 21 the airlines were accused of “harmful practices” in the treatment of passengers affected by the disruption. The Competition and Markets Authority and the Civil Aviation Authority issued a joint letter to air carriers, expressing concern that “consumers could suffer significant harm unless airlines meet their obligations”. Subscribe to First Edition, our free daily newsletter – every morning at 7am. BST The letter said: “We are concerned that some airlines may not be doing everything they can to avoid one or more harmful practices.” These include selling more tickets for flights “than they can reasonably expect to provide”, not always “fulfilling obligations” to offer flights on alternative airlines to passengers affected by cancellations and failing to provide consumers with “sufficiently clear and advance information about their rights”. Last month, BA check-in staff at Heathrow threatened to strike over pay. A package was later agreed to restore the 10% pay cut introduced during the pandemic.