The following advice to the travel trade offers some guidance as to what is possible and what is not.

Before any ticket is issued you my change up to 3 digits of a name yourself, more extensive corrections may be requested through Trade Support at no additional charge.

Once the ticket has been issued BA tickets are non-transferable. To eliminate any difficulties, you must take care to spell the customer's name correctly, ensuring that the name in the PNR is as the name on the passport. We would also recommend you add the full first name rather than an initial.

In instances where a name correction is required and documents can be provided to prove that there is no change of passenger, authority may be given to amend paper tickets, or BA will make the amendment in the case of e-tickets. An example of this would be where a customer has made a reservation in their married name, but the passport still shows the maiden name.

When the itinerary contains segments on other carriers, the applicable carriers name change policy will also apply, this includes codeshare flights. Generally this means no name change can be actioned by BA, under any circumstances.

Once travel has commenced, name changes are not permitted under any circumstances.

W.E.F. Monday 01 Dec 2008 Trade Support will introduce a £30 service fee to cover the additional cost when reissuing tickets due to the correction of a name.

This is the same cost charged to customers using direct channels to reissue a ticket due to a name correction.