I applied online after being referred by a friend who works for BA.
The online forms are fairly straight forward and not terribly difficult. A week after sending my application for review I received a phone call from BA confirming that I had tattoos and their placement. Their position does not contradict BA's uniform policy. The women on the phone call sounded very keen and relieved that there was no conflict and concluded with hoping to see me soon. Another week later I received an offer to attended an assessment day at BA's HQ in London.
Due to traveling from Scotland for the interview I had to pick an interview date that was later in the month to allow me time to book travel and accommodation.
I arrived at the assessment day half an hour early and there was no person on the reception desk to greet any of the 40+ candidates. First impressions mean everything.
Once taken through to the assessment area, all documents and identification where checked and each candidate given a name badge. Once everyone had completed their sign in, we were given forms to fill in regarding tattoos and piercings etc, information that had been covered 3 times already during the application process. Each candidate was then measured, and conducted a 'reach test', I passed both.
After waiting about 40 minutes for this process to be completed everyone was taken through and shown a presentation on BA, selling the job to you as a potential employee. Salary isn't mentioned or minimum contractual hours.
We were then told the morning would be split into to halves. 1 to 1 scenario role-play and group scenarios. I had my group first. 6 of us were taken into a room with 4 members of the recruitment team. We were given the scenario that our flight had no supplies due to a snow storm and were given a budget and each candidate a particular inventory of items and cost... after 10 minutes once we had discussed our budget we were given information that would change the budget we had agreed on. My group was a good mix and no one person overshadowed another.
We were then taken back through to the main waiting area and told we would eventually be called for our 1 to 1 role-play. I waited about 30 minutes. The member of staff who conducted the role play was the most professional and welcoming member of the BA team I had encountered throughout the entire day. The role play was a customer who had missed a connecting flight and your job is to work out a solution to their situation but empathise with their concerns and feelings. After my 1 to 1 the member of staff asked if I had aviation experience, I don't, but I have 10 years of Managerial Customer Service experience, including interviews and assessment days. The member of staff told me my role-play was 'excellent' and said she looked forward to seeing me in the afternoon for the face to face interview.
After the candidates had all been seen we were told that names would be called and we would find out if we had been successful in progressing towards the interview section. My name was called and myself and 30 of the other candidates were made to stand in front of the other 10 or so before being taken through to a small room and told we hadn't been successful.
From the mixed experience I had already had so far this is where my opinion of BA completely turned sour. I was disappointed obviously that I hadn't progressed further but after being told that BA's policy is to not provide any feedback but advise you to just reapply in 6 months. I found this very poor.
I spent nearly £500 on flights and BA recommended accommodation for the interview, I took 3 days off of work and traveled the length of the country to be told thanks but no thanks with no feedback.
BA will tell you they are the largest Airline in the UK, this is true and yet they can't offer you feedback.
From someone with experience who looked around the room at the 10 or so people given an interview. Not a single candidate was over 25, every female was tall and slim with long hair. Every male was about 6 foot, muscular and well groomed. 2 of the candidates I had spoken to that were selected had no work experience or qualifications exceeding secondary education. BA tell you they're hiring over 2000 staff in the next 12 months, their current recruitment drive only attracted 1200 applicants, that suggests to me they don't get a lot of repeat applicants. I personally wouldn't reapply after my experience and lack of professionalism from a company such as BA.