Booked 2 business class seats on JQ37 SYD-DPS 6 months ago. We assigned oursleves 2 seats, 1A/1C in order to be first off the aircraft at DPS and to have noone reclining into us.

Seats confirmed.

Checked the booking throughout the past few months, watched the cabin fill up.

Did online check-in, and seats 1A/1C were confirmed, with a note to collect BPs at the check-in desk as these were designated emergency exit seats.

Went to check-in, and we were handed BPs for row 3 in the middle section. The explanation was that row 1 seats are bassinet seats and someone checked in with an infant, requiring these seats.

I know seats aren't guaranteed blah blah, but this is just ridiculous when you have paid a premium to travel in "business class". BTW the seats are hideous, very narrow, very uncomfortable, no legroom and in rows 2/3 if the person in front of you reclines the seat back, they are right in your space. While the meal was good, the crew weren't - only one appeared to be Australian, the rest were at entry level English and had difficulty understanding English.

My main complaint is about being booted out of our seats at the airport:

1. I don't recall any warning when selecting 1A/1C that these are bassinret seats and priority will be given to passengers with infants.
2. There was similarly no warning at OLCI that we may lose these seats.
3. The flight was sold out weeks in advance, so the passengers with the infant must have booked weeks before and there was plenty of time to reallocate seats and give us something comparable.
4. We booked first, it would have been fairer to re-seat the last passengers to have selected bassinet seats.

As it happened, 2 men were sitting in 1A/1C without the infant, with the 2 wives in 2A/2C who had the infant on their laps. This made it all the more annoying.

This was handled exceptionally badly. Be warned.