Hi guys, long time lurker first time poster - go easy!

I booked myself on a MAN > LHR > MSY flight back in August. The flight departs on 22nd Jan.

I booked via TravelUp and it’s an Iberia codeshare operated by BA (for some reason the Iberia flight numbers were nearly a grand cheaper than the BA ones).

I am booked in J. I can reserve seats on the MAN to LHR sector but for LHR to MSY it throws an error, saying “Seat choices are only available at check-in.”

I have called BA upwards of five times to find out what the issue is. I’ve had various excuses, the latest one being they haven’t allocated a plane to the route yet so can’t take bookings - before the operator hung up on me. I’ve also called Iberia upwards of five times and had loads of bluster from them as well.

I don’t want to be in a seat where I have to climb over someone’s legs to go for a squirt. Likewise, I don’t want someone climbing over my legs while I’m having a kip.

I have booked with TravelUp on lots of occasions and never had an issue with reserving seats on BA flights before (most recently in November to Vegas).

Just wondering what advice anyone can give? I have no problem paying to reserve them, I just don’t want to be given a crap seat at check in.

There are often problems with codeshares it seems, but perhaps a grand is adequate compensation for a crap seat.

There are only going to be a handfull of seats where you don’t have to climb over/be climbed over so the chances are you’ll have a crap seat I’m afraid.

IT systems don’t seem to be BA’s forte. But it happens elsewhere. I was travelling in J to SYD on Qantas on a Finnair codeshare and computer just said no when it came to seat reservation. Just had to take what was left at check in.

Have you tried using the Finnair/Qatar sites to reserve a seat? That sometimes works.

Thanks for the reply, I will try those sites now to see if I can book via them instead.

Thanks for your reply! I had a quick look and all sectors are fully ticketed, with the LHR to MSY sector starting 075- as you said.

I tried to manage my booking on the Finnair and Qatar sites, but they both send me back to BA’s site :/

Quite annoying really, especially if the cabin is starting to fill up like you say.

I will do both, have just pinged them a message on Facebook and will call back tomorrow.

If you want aisle access without being stepped over 1Dand 1F are currently free.

Do you have status? If not, as it is a TA booking, does the OP need to go through their TA to reserve and pay for seat selection?

I quite like being tucked away by the window, so 3A or 3E will be grand.

I am bronze and will hit silver after this trip. I have booked with various TA’s before (usually whoever’s cheapest on Skyscanner).

I have never, ever had an issue reserving seats when booking via a TA. I always just add the booking ref to the BA app and then reserve/pay for my chosen seats in there. I did this as recently as November on another TravelUp booking on BA in J, to Vegas.

Hopefully I will get some sense out of BA/Iberia tomorrow.

Usually if a BA flight is booked via another carrier like Iberia in that carriers PNR the BA flight will appear under the codeshare flight number.

If you give this to BA typically the system will give an error and the agent will be unable to book seats as you describe.

**However if the agent searches against the flight and your surname there is usually another PNR where the flight is under the BA flight number and seats can be booked.

Thanks for all of the replies! Much appreciated. I used a hybrid of the various pieces of advice here and got it sorted in under 10 minutes.

I tried the Royal Jordanian website to manage my booking, but this didn't work for me unfortunately.

I called BA and played dumb. I told them I'd forgotten my booking reference code. They took my details and located my booking on their system, after 5 minutes of huffing and puffing the bloke on the phone read the booking reference back to me... as expected it was different to the one given to me by TravelUp.

I punched the new booking ref into the BA website while still on the phone to him, and sure enough I was able to reserve and pay for seats (got 3A and 3K, so pretty happy with that).

I think this is probably the quickest and easiest way for anyone in a similar position to deal with it in the future. A quick call to BA to ascertain the “other” booking reference and then once you have it, you'll have the full range of options available to you via BA.com - including reserving seats.

(Tried to post this morning to wrap the thread up, but I had some 5 post/24 hour limit for being a new user!)

Good result, thanks for posting back ^

Glad it got sorted just didnt see the need for you to play dumb. Would have been quick enough to say this was booked under iberia PNR but cant do seats can you check if there is another PNR for BA.