njm42

Hello everyone,

I am booked onto a flight Heathrow-Belfast mid-August, and am a little concerned by the seating options...

We have 3 different bookings which should be linked, and are all on the same flight:

1) Myself - booked with Avios
2) Wife + Daughter 1 - booked with cash
3) Newborn - booked with cash (own seat rather than on our lap)

When I tried logging in to choose seats, each booking has different options:
1) I get an error message and am told it isn't possible to choose seats at the moment
2) My wife and daughter can choose seats but need to pay Ł7-15 per seat each
3) My newborn can choose any seat she likes for free

Does anybody know why this may be the case?

KARFA

How do you mean your bookings are linked? You can TCP (To Complete Party) which means adding a note on one booking referencing the other. It is just a note on the booking though so not really a formal link as such.

I am really not sure how you managed to book your newborn a separate ticket - did you book this in your own name instead?

The ability to choose seating will depend on the BAEC/OW status of the passengers in each booking. For example, if your wife were silver then you would be able to select seats for free for everyone on booking 2. However, that seat selection ability would not transfer across to bookings 1 or 3. Do you, your wife, or your daughter have any BAEC/OW status?

A gold/owe benefit is free seat selection on another separate booking for non-gold/silver booking passenger . If you are a GCH/owe and there is someone travelling on the same flight and in the same cabin on a separate booking, you can request free seat selection for the other person so that you can sit together. If you are a gold/owe you can phone and do the request that those in bookings 2 and 3 get seated next to you. This request is usually sent off to the infamous back office to process and takes a few days to do.

corporate-wage-slave

Three different bookings will be a challenge, and linking is just a note reference, it doesn't do much in terms of seating. If you are Gold then more can be done but requires a conversation with the Gold Line. Moreover when Theoretical Seating kicks in you could be all over the shop. If sitting together is important then you really need to be on one PNR.

However you can insist - between 72 and 48 hours before departure - that each child will have at least 1 adult next to them, so I wouldn't do much now, I'd just check nearer the time whether the outcome is OK, and call in if necessary. But there is a risk you'll be in two separate blocks of seating unless you pay for the seating.

If you booked by telephone or altered your booking, seat selection may not show up online until fully ticketed. You can ring up to book seats however.

Nuster

Just be sure that all parties are available with their booking references in hand so that they can identify themselves to the subjective satisfaction of the agent's interpretation of the U.K. Data Protection laws. Some posters have suggested your newborn ought to be able to recite its PNR without hesitation 😜

njm42

Thanks all - is it possible to combine them into one PNR post-booking?

I knew that the Avios booking would be separate, and was told that I needed to book wife+daughter online before calling to add our newborn and that otherwise they'd need to charge the telephone booking fee for all 3 of them...

As long as we can get 3 seats together then that should be fine - we basically just didn't want my wife with the newborn on her knee to be sharing a row with our toddler and a random stranger; if we can get the 4th seat across the aisle that will be ideal and give us a bit more space to spread out

We don't have any status with BA, so free seat selection is only from 24hrs before... is it still worth calling 48-72 hours in advance to see what can be done?

KARFA

No, not at all.

AC*SE

You can't--so far as I am aware--combine bookings that involve different fare bases into the same PNR. Even if the three cash tickets could be combined, the avios booking will always be on a separate PNR.

paul78

If an infant (under 2 yo) is in a booking then free seat selection is available to all passengers on that PNR from time of booking. As your wife is on a different booking, I'd invest in the time to phone up now and ask for your wife, daughter and infant to be allocated seats now.

You could mention about your own booking but I'd think you will have to wait until T-24 to select your seat.

corporate-wage-slave

Yes, since if Theoretical Seating has not moved you the children next to an adult, then this is the window to call in and resolve it. Nothing to do with status, just the requirement to keep at least one adult with every child. It may be the agent will then move you to 3+1 on the same row, but the start point could well be 2+2, hopefully in contiguous rows. At 24 hours the agents can't do anything since the booking passes to airport control.

njm42

Brilliant, thanks for your help