speedbird66

If I were you I'd save the money for advance seat selection but make sure you check in online exactly 24 hours before the flight. Of course there is technically a finite risk that there won't be any pairs of seats left on the aircraft, but in my experience the chances of that are vanishingly small.

Homer15

I find this annoying (piggish?). If the flight is fairly empty, chances are you will get room to spread out anyway, and if the flight is fairly full, then it makes more sense for you to just sit next to your companion to start.

EricP0418

Well thank you to everyone for all the help, I just ordered the tickets and they are indeed with BA. I am trying to figure out how to pay to reserve the seats though, I'm okay with paying an additional fee, but do not see the option unless I am missing something. The site that I booked through has not sent me a full Ticket Confirmation/Receipt, but I am able to go onto BA.com and see my itinerary (flight #, time, etc.).


Am I just missing the seating reservation option? or is that not available right away sometimes?

windowontheAside

I may have missed something, but if both passengers are on the same booking, why would they end up split up, unless they were very late checking in?

Fairly prompt OLCI (and although 'to the minute' is good, I don't think it's necessary to secure two adjacent seats) would do it surely?

BingBongBoy

It may be that, if your flight has not been ticketed from the agent/site you have booked it through, you may not be able to pre-select the seats till it has been ticketed, an automated process which usually takes anything from a few minutes to a couple of hours.

Once it has been, go into "Manage My Booking" on www.ba.com using your booking reference and last name, and towards the bottom of the screen, will be a section, something like "Service Requests" or something, and you will see a link to seat selection. That is what you need to look for.

Hope you enjoy your flight, you never know... It may be me flying you over!

EricP0418

Alright, Thanks! I will check back in on them later in the evening. I have traveled with BA frequently throughout my life (father lives in England, along with most of his family) and can't say I've ever had a bad experience with the airline other than a defective tv screen that was just a chance circumstance!

Thanks to everyone that gave feed back, I will post back here if I have any difficulty securing reserved seats through BA.com, thank you all for being so courteous and helpful!

dunk

You can see the BA seating policy and costs here: http://www.britishairways.com/travel...y/public/en_gb (UK site).

Basically, if you don't want to pay, you can select seats when you check-in online at 24 hours before your first flight.

As BBB says above, the link to book seats is in Manage My Booking (MMB), for which you'll need your booking ref. You can go through the selection process to see what is available without having to finish and pay. It may be worth checking this occasionally and only deciding to pay if things are looking tight. Otherwise, be online at T-24 to check-in and choose.

hth

BingBongBoy

No worries...

EricP0418

Alright it turns out that I can actually get to that screen, but it brings up a list of the different flights (Boston --> London, London --> Stavanger, etc.) and next to the Boston --> London flights it says "Seat choice will be available at check-in" with a link saying "How to get the best available seats", which when I click it just says it will be available at check in 24 hours prior to departure.

Does that mean that I am unable to pick my seat until 24 hours prior to departure even if I want to pay the fee? or am I missing something.

(Edit: Upon further investigation, it looks like my flight to London from Boston is Operated by American Airlines, would that effect how I am able to pick my seats? despite it still showing up on my BA itinerary?)

BingBongBoy

I think it probably means you flight is not ticketed yet. Have you had an e-Ticket e-mail yet, with your e-Ticket number starting in 125- ?

Also, who have you booked your flight through? Which site/agent?

EricP0418

I have only gotten an e-mail confirmation of booking through the site that I used (Vayama.com) with what I'm going to be charged with, my BA Reservation Number, and a notice saying that they will email me a Ticket Confirmation / Receipt once my credit card is authorized. So no sign of an e-Ticket e-mail yet.

colmc

It would. There are some convoluted ways, but the easiest (and this is saying something) are to register an AAdvantage account on aa.com which will allow you to pull up the flight using the flight number, surname etc and look at the seat map.

BingBongBoy

Ah... There we have it.

As colmc says, register with AA and do it through them, or, try and get hold of the AA record locator through using a website like www.checkmytrip.com and log into the AA website if you can do it that way.

Littlegirl

I think you are worrying too much. Most passengers get to sit together.

If you checkin -24 you should already be showing together but you will be able move the seats around to select any seats showing as empty and move yourself around on both your flights.

People usually only end up not sitting together if they leave it until the airport and are one of the last to check in.

When your flight is properly in the system, if you follow the links, you will be able to pay to sit together but I really don't think you need to do this but if it gives you peace of mind.

As I said earlier if you check in at -24, you will find you are already together.

Edit I did not notice you were flying AA, in that case follow the advice given by colmc and Jrussell.

Have a nice trip.

jrussell

AA is the answer.

Call BA and ask for your AA record locator (6 letters)
Go to aa.com and click on "My reservations"
Click on "continue without logging in"
Enter your name and record locator
Your reservation details will appear
Click on "select seat"
A seat map will appear then select the seats you want
There should be no charge