Correct baggage charges??
 

Iberia appear to offer status passengers one extra bag over the ticketed allowance, so basic ticket 0 baggage = Iberia allow 1
status passengers travelling on BA HBO get 0 bags always
(for future you will likely find purchasing the ticket that includes baggage is cheaper than HBO plus bags)

you cant check in at IB counter for BA operated flight...

If its a BA flight, you wont get free luggage with status.

You purchased hand luggage only. If you wanted to check in luggage you should have paid a normal economy fair. Doing this takes one of these fares away from people that actually want to use it as just that.

That last sentence seems somewhat condescending.

That's not how it works on BA.

I'm sure that wasn't the intent, but nevertheless welcome to Flyertalk and welcome to the BA forum MoggieMae. I actually don't think the availability of HBO fares isn't straightforward, it's more based on overall demand, so someone booking a ticket is in the overall pool rather than a particular HBO pool. What is certainly true that when it comes to BA's metal, it's extremely straightforward: don't buy HBO if you are not HBO! The economics are almost certainly going to run against you. With other airlines it's a more complex story, but with BA it is simply HBO = HBO.

Added to cws comment, it is even worse if you have an HBO ticket but don't realise and then have to pay for bags at check in. Paying for bags in advance in MMB on an HBO is significantly cheaper

For example, for the OP paying in advance would have been €40 for the first bag and €70 for each bag after, whereas at the airport it is €75 per bag.

https://www.britishairways.com/en-gb...weight-baggage

Unfortunately, BA doesn't communicate this very simple message particularly clearly, and it's easy to see why some infrequent passengers with status might get the impression that they get a checked luggage allowance on an HBO fare.

Im sort of confused so please bear with me.. i would have thought that BA had x amount of cheapest fares (ie the hand luggage only) then x amount of O fares etc.

Is that not how it works? So if someone who has status buys a hand luggage fare thinking that can check in bags, and they are the last to buy the hand luggage only fare in that price bracket, are they not taking it away from someone who truly wanted that fare as HBO?

In isolation, this is plausibly what could happen, but overall it is much more likely that the system is balancing two things here on a macro level: overall demand management ("let's fill our aircraft") and fares ("how much can we get away with? And what are Norwegian charging?"). So a classic supply / demand ratio. They also know that particularly at the lower fares a chunk of people will buy a ticket and then simply won't show up for the flight. I think the use of fare buckets (fare classes) such as O9, Q9, G9 is a bit misleading since it kind of suggests someone is ticking sales off one by one, but there is so much more going on in the background it is almost the Chaos Theory, where the wings of a butterfly in the Amazon jungle impacts, theoretically, global weather patterns.