Can't select/purchase seats on BA website..? HELP
Apr 4, 2015, 8:14 pm
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Apr 2015
Posts: 3
Can't select/purchase seats on BA website..? HELP
Hi,
I am having trouble when trying to pay to select seats early on the British Airways website. This flight is not operated by AA. It's a BA flight from Los Angeles to Heathrow. I purchased my tickets a couple of days ago, and since then have tried everyday to select and purchase the seats. When I go to pay, it says to contact a British Airways representative and the error message says something about being unable to process the request. It doesn't seem to be an issue with my credit card. I've also tried different cards and even Paypal to no avail.
When I call, they don't have any reason as to why this is happening.
Anyone else ever encounter this? My flight isn't for 2 more weeks but my husband has terrible anxiety and I'm getting worried we won't be seated together if I don't pre-purchase my seats.
Any workarounds or advice on how long this delay may take to clear? One of the BA representatives said it was a 'glitch' that could 'take days' to resolve but no one could ever give me a clear reason.
A little frustrating!
Thanks in advance for the feedback!
I am having trouble when trying to pay to select seats early on the British Airways website. This flight is not operated by AA. It's a BA flight from Los Angeles to Heathrow. I purchased my tickets a couple of days ago, and since then have tried everyday to select and purchase the seats. When I go to pay, it says to contact a British Airways representative and the error message says something about being unable to process the request. It doesn't seem to be an issue with my credit card. I've also tried different cards and even Paypal to no avail.
When I call, they don't have any reason as to why this is happening.
Anyone else ever encounter this? My flight isn't for 2 more weeks but my husband has terrible anxiety and I'm getting worried we won't be seated together if I don't pre-purchase my seats.
Any workarounds or advice on how long this delay may take to clear? One of the BA representatives said it was a 'glitch' that could 'take days' to resolve but no one could ever give me a clear reason.
A little frustrating!
Thanks in advance for the feedback!
Apr 5, 2015, 1:32 am
#3
Moderator, Iberia Airlines, Airport Lounges, and Ambassador, British Airways Executive Club
Join Date: Feb 2010
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold; Flying Blue Life Platinum; LH Sen.; Hilton Diamond; Kemal Kebabs Prized Customer
Posts: 63,854
Welcome to Flyertalk porvidajb, welcome in particular to the British Airways Board, it's good to see you here, and I hope that you will continue to play an active part.
MysoreBound is right that there has been quite a few IT issues of late, and she is also correct in her implication that BA's IT is not its strongest card. There is a fair chance that this will just sort itself out anyway in a few days.
There are a few things to bear in mind. If this is the A380 or B747 and you are in World Traveller, if you simply wish to sit together then I really wouldn't worry. If you didn't pre-purchase seats the overwhelming likelihood is that by the time you set off to fly you will be side by side. There would be multiple occasions between now and then to fix that. We read relatively few reports of couples being split up in this forum, compared to thousands of cases where everything goes ok, and where it happens it tends to be in First or CW on smaller aircraft than A380 or B747, partly due to the seat arrangements, partly due to the low number of seats involved. So I wouldn't get anxious about this.
Secondly, if your ticket has been issued you typically can only select seats if you have status with oneworld, otherwise you have to wait until ticket issue is complete. So if you have an email with a number beginning 125- or 001- then you can rule this out.
Thirdly something to try, if you join BA Executive Club - if just for the purposes of this transaction - you then allocate your Executive Club number to the booking. You then add a registered card into your profile, against your BAEC number. Then see if it is happier with using the registered card as a payment method. Once you have sorted out your seats you can remove the BAEC number and the payment card.
Fourthly, if you have a smartphone (and quite a bit of patience!) you can try to see if you get any further forward with the BA App, it sometimes works better than the PC version of BA.com
Number five: if the anxiety is a genuine medical issue (or potentially so) then you shouldn't hesitate to contact BA on the basis of Disability Assistance requirements. I guess you need to be think this through carefully, since it may engender a requirement to present documents at check-in, but maybe you have that already.
Finally, it's not clear from your post, but surely if you rang BA you can simply say I want seats numbers X and Y and they will take your credit card numbers over the telephone surely? I presume there is an extra fee for doing that, but usually the fee gets waived if BA.com is misbehaving.
But to finish on my earlier point, I wouldn't get too worried, it will probably work out, and I hope you have a good flight.
MysoreBound is right that there has been quite a few IT issues of late, and she is also correct in her implication that BA's IT is not its strongest card. There is a fair chance that this will just sort itself out anyway in a few days.
There are a few things to bear in mind. If this is the A380 or B747 and you are in World Traveller, if you simply wish to sit together then I really wouldn't worry. If you didn't pre-purchase seats the overwhelming likelihood is that by the time you set off to fly you will be side by side. There would be multiple occasions between now and then to fix that. We read relatively few reports of couples being split up in this forum, compared to thousands of cases where everything goes ok, and where it happens it tends to be in First or CW on smaller aircraft than A380 or B747, partly due to the seat arrangements, partly due to the low number of seats involved. So I wouldn't get anxious about this.
Secondly, if your ticket has been issued you typically can only select seats if you have status with oneworld, otherwise you have to wait until ticket issue is complete. So if you have an email with a number beginning 125- or 001- then you can rule this out.
Thirdly something to try, if you join BA Executive Club - if just for the purposes of this transaction - you then allocate your Executive Club number to the booking. You then add a registered card into your profile, against your BAEC number. Then see if it is happier with using the registered card as a payment method. Once you have sorted out your seats you can remove the BAEC number and the payment card.
Fourthly, if you have a smartphone (and quite a bit of patience!) you can try to see if you get any further forward with the BA App, it sometimes works better than the PC version of BA.com
Number five: if the anxiety is a genuine medical issue (or potentially so) then you shouldn't hesitate to contact BA on the basis of Disability Assistance requirements. I guess you need to be think this through carefully, since it may engender a requirement to present documents at check-in, but maybe you have that already.
Finally, it's not clear from your post, but surely if you rang BA you can simply say I want seats numbers X and Y and they will take your credit card numbers over the telephone surely? I presume there is an extra fee for doing that, but usually the fee gets waived if BA.com is misbehaving.
But to finish on my earlier point, I wouldn't get too worried, it will probably work out, and I hope you have a good flight.
Last edited by corporate-wage-slave; Apr 5, 2015 at 1:38 am
Apr 6, 2015, 4:52 pm
#5
Original Poster
Join Date: Apr 2015
Posts: 3
Thank you so so very much for your response, it has alleviated some of my anxiety greatly. I will consider all of your advice. I did place a call to BA and they did try to process my seat selection and payment but were unable to. I will wait until tomorrow to try again. Again, thank you so very much. We have been considering having my husband make an appointment to his drs to get some type of proof of his anxiety for traveling since this is the first time he's leaving the country and going on such a long flight. Might be good to have just as a precaution in general. 