Hi all,

My family and I (2 Adults, 10yo, 6yo) have a flight in CW booked for tomorrow. We have 2 separate booking as we used 2 BA companion vouchers to book, one from my wife's BAEC account and one from mine.

A few months ago, I was considering paying for seat selection so that we could all sit together but the only available middle row had a bassinet seat (4E) which was blocked. I contacted BA and they told me that the seat should become available for anyone to book some time between T-72 and T-24 (I think I also read some similar advice on FT), so I decided to wait until online check-in to try to bag the seats.

As it happens, at T-5 days my wife and daughter were automatically assigned seats 4F and 4G in the row we wanted, and a few hours before check in 4E (bassinet seat) was unblocked and showing as available. 4D was also empty so I thought it should be simple to move myself and my son to 4D/4E at check-in, However, when I tried to move seats I received the error "Sorry, we can't place 'NAME' in a carrycot seat as they are protected for customers travelling with an infant under 2. This seat is available to because they are associated with the infant in your booking". I'm not quite sure what the second sentence means as it doesn't make sense.

I called BA, explained the situation, and was transferred to the executive club team "because I booked with Avios". A lady from the call centre (India) told me that no-one could ever book a bassinet seat at any time unless they had an infant. I explained that I was previously told otherwise and she became very rude and unhelpful. (I will be making a complaint at a later time - which will be difficult as she refused to tell me her name).

Can someone please clarify what the correct policy is with regards to bassinet seat availability?

TIA