Seat Assignment on SA
Jun 18, 2016, 4:44 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Nov 2015
Location: YYZ
Programs: Aeroplan
Posts: 35
Seat Assignment on SA
I booked flights on Air Canada - Toronto to London to Johannesburg (and return). The flights are two months in advance. I am Star Alliance Gold. London to Johannesburg is operated by SAA. Air Canada tried to do seat assignment on SA Flight with no luck. I called SAA and provided SA Booking Reference. I was told I can only select seats 24 hours before departure because I booked the flight with Air Canada. Is this now SAA policy - it wasn't last year. If this is the policy, I will cancel flights and use a different Star Alliance carrier. This just makes a mockery of "Star Alliance"
Jun 18, 2016, 8:47 am
#2
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: BGI (ex-YYC, YYZ)
Programs: AC*G-E100K (once again)
Posts: 1,701
I booked flights on Air Canada - Toronto to London to Johannesburg (and return). The flights are two months in advance. I am Star Alliance Gold. London to Johannesburg is operated by SAA. Air Canada tried to do seat assignment on SA Flight with no luck. I called SAA and provided SA Booking Reference. I was told I can only select seats 24 hours before departure because I booked the flight with Air Canada. Is this now SAA policy - it wasn't last year. If this is the policy, I will cancel flights and use a different Star Alliance carrier. This just makes a mockery of "Star Alliance"
Did you call the USA call centre? Maybe HUCA if you believe your fare class gives you free seat selection?
Star alliance gold never gets you guaranteed free seat selection on low economy fares on all airlines. Please visit http://www.staralliance.com/en/gold-status for a list of benefits that comes with star alliance gold.
Jun 18, 2016, 8:51 am
#3
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: BGI (ex-YYC, YYZ)
Programs: AC*G-E100K (once again)
Posts: 1,701
Your other option is Lufthansa but they have a similar additional charge requirement. http://www.lufthansa.com/ca/en/Seat-reservation No perks for being gold.
Jun 18, 2016, 10:41 am
#4
Original Poster
Join Date: Nov 2015
Location: YYZ
Programs: Aeroplan
Posts: 35
Air Canada Fare Class is H which I am assuming is no good for advanced seat selection on SAA. I have looked at Lufthansa and still looking - their flights to JNB are operated by SAA so probably no luck there either.
Jun 18, 2016, 4:05 pm
#5
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: near Heathrow
Programs: BA GGL/CCR, GfL (OWE), SA LifePlat (*G), BD Gold to the end, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 2,911
Jun 19, 2016, 5:07 pm
#7
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: BGI (ex-YYC, YYZ)
Programs: AC*G-E100K (once again)
Posts: 1,701
Nov 11, 2019, 11:42 am
#8
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: ATL
Programs: Shamelessly Gold at Flying Burrito and AirTrain A+ Elite. Turkish Star Gold, 100k at Flying Eskimo
Posts: 740
The issue is not so much that it is not free but that you are unable to select seats even if you are willing to pay for it which i find ludicrous!
Nov 13, 2019, 11:23 am
#9
Join Date: Jul 2005
Posts: 1,077
Are you talking about booking via SAA (US Call Centre)? When I booked my and family's most recent jaunt down for August-Sept 2019 by calling the US Call Centre, SAA charged us for seat selection and did the selections with me over the phone. We paid for and made selections on IAD-JNB and for the return INB-IAD. For our internal flights between JNB-CPT we just rolled with it and relied on at-airport seat selection (or perhaps even auto-assigned, I don't recall).
Last edited by jsnydcsa; Nov 20, 2019 at 1:28 pm
Nov 17, 2019, 9:47 am
#10
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: BGI (ex-YYC, YYZ)
Programs: AC*G-E100K (once again)
Posts: 1,701