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You can call the airline and get your seats but not sure how many days before you travel they allow you to do this so call BA
Find out which plane operates the routes and then get a seat plane either from http://www.seatguru.com/ or the BA site
You might get WT+ cheaper when you get to the airport £270 seems alot of money if you can land some of the WT seats with extra leg room for nothing

However with online check-in, you may have the possibility of nabbing bulkhead / emergency exit seats. I can confirm I've done this in the past.

From my experience as a 6ft 4 in man flying with BA - you're stuffed.

31" seat pitch is the worst around and our 'National' carrier offers it.

I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news but BA long haul for a big bloke is the absolute pits.


MTC

Fatboy_NSS

you are correct about getting a bulk head stopping you sliding your legs forward.

But, if you were lucky enough to get a bulkhead seat you could at least get a lot more lateral movement and you would feel a lot less jammed in.

I had the misfortune to travel cattle class with BA from Nairobi - Heathrow. I was incapable of moving my legs in any direction and once the man in front reclined his seat I had the pleasure of my in flight screen less than a hand span from my face for a 9 hour flight. And he had to be woken up to enable me to eat my meal (not enough space for tray to open)

Disgusted

MTC

p.s. i don't know how easy it would be to do but........ find a way to cancel your tickets with BA (mabye under the distance seeling regulations) and rebook your flight with Air New Zealand who would offer you an extra 3" of leg room as standard. It may cost a few quid more, but certainly not £270.00 per section, per person that BA are wanting to charge you. Weigh up the pros and cons. A few extra quid to travel in comfort against possibly losing a few days of your holiday through discomfort brought on by your bad back being restricted by BA's seating policy.

p.s. on a quick search i found Heathrow - Sydney for £753.20 incl tax on Opodo flying with Air Zealand in June.

"Seats with extra leg room such as bulkheads and emergency exit seats are only allocated on day of departure."

That is not strictly correct. Those frequent flyer members with 'elite' status can pre-book those seats at the time of booking.

Also those who have a connecting flight can get those seats allocated when they turn up for the first flight - often hours before the desk opens for the main flight. e.g if flight is from London, a passenger flying down from, say, Glasgow can get a emergency exit seat for the flight from London allocated at Glasgow.