cauchy

I think you've missed the point. Having paid for seats, the OP is expecting BA to try its best to keep the couple together in the agreed seats. Something's gone wrong, which isn't good, and one can see how someone would conclude that BA is shirking its responsibility by not answering the phone when the passengers try to fix this.

It's not a general rant about seat selection fees.

golfmad

Could be any number of operational reasons and I doubt we will ever know unless someone with inside working knowledge chooses to share that with us. As stated above, this is most likely to be welcomed as an upgrade by passengers on this route.

corporate-wage-slave

The usual reason is shortage of aircraft in the original 777-200ER 3 class. Swaps around 777 series aircraft are very common and will become more so given the sheer number of versions now operated by BA. I used to be able to memorise them all and their set-up, now it's too difficult.

However CW is now full, WTP nearly so, so it could be to get a few more passengers on to the service. I think there's a good chance Flub will be used too.

Jagboi

In summary:
Passenger wants a service.
Airline takes payment for said service.
Airline fails to deliver service it was paid to deliver.

It's a text book definition of fraud.

GetSetJetSet

charging for J seat selection is distasteful but not a scam. The “scam” was clearly charging for seat selection, not providing the seat and not refunding the $. In the end, I was able to sort the seats, but my initial contact with BA only involved them saying the seat wasn’t guaranteed. They didn’t mention that the $ could be refunded until their second reply. Also, if sitting in a particular seat or in this case next to a particular person is your top priority then getting a refund still doesn’t fix your issue. In any case, charging for a service, not providing the service and keeping the payment anyway sure sounds like a scam in my book.

you don’t see a difference between trying to enter a country without the proper documents and paying for a service, not receiving it and not receiving a refund?

Wow, hot take there take there champ. Maybe if you pay Delta specifically for lounge access and a meal on your 1.5h flight and they close the lounge and forget to cater the flight then these might be similar situations. In my case they are paying for a service specifically and not receiving it. In yours it’s complaining about something you were never entitled to...*drops mic, walks off*

if you’d read carefully, you might have seen that I am not in fact the one flying BA, so i’m not sure how this portion of your rant is at all relevant.

Dave Noble

No it isn't - BA didn't take the money with the intent to not provide the service - it did provide the selection however the aeroplane type changed - if it intended to take payment and not provide it , then indeed it would be fraudulent

It is, imo, very poor that it doesn't automatically refund the seat fee as soon as such a situtation arises.

The passenger should not have to be trying to phone the airline to get it resolved

GetSetJetSet

agreed. If BA could handle something like “keeping passengers who paid for assigned seats together, together” in the event of a swap, automatically issuing a refund if you pay for a seat and lose your assignment or at the very least making it less impossible to get a human on the phone, we wouldn’t be here.

TTmex

Hi. Did BA say they wouldn't refund this? Afaik you can use an online form to claim back seat fees from a changed seat? I'd be upset too if they refused, but I'm sure you should get it back

Cap'n Benj

While the OP has gone well OTT with his reaction on here (hence the snarky replies) it’s clear that BA is not well set up to manage the situation, there is obviously the cause for grievance that needs to be addressed.

Hopefully they’ll have something in place at some point that will automatically assign pax to equivalent seats when available, while also alerting them to the change and inviting them to re-select.

and that is the weird thing here. Considering how open the cabin looked, why couldn’t the pax simply select new seats?

Steve in Olympia

It is a reasonably good bet that BA resolved the “scam” to the OP’s satisfaction, but the OP doesn’t want to reveal that. He wants to stay angry.

GetSetJetSet

does no one read the thread before replying? I got their booking locator and was able to sort it out for them, no help from BA, situation resolved as noted hours ago.

Jagboi

The passengers don't have status, and I've found with theoretical seating if you don't have status there is only one seat available - the one the computer puts you in. Even in a wide open cabin I have been unable to change seats for a non status passenger.

Steve in Olympia

You still won’t tell us what the resolution was. Very strange. Or maybe not.....

DYKWIA

So, you just went on to the BA website and changed their seats, and I assume claimed back their seat reservation cost?

In which case, much ado about nothing.

golfmad

I am quite up to speed with your original post. I was merely adding some hyperbole of my own which is what I thought this thread was all about from the start

From your later posts it sounds like you resolved the problem online to your satisfaction. No one lost out, there was no scam, nothing to see here.