pre-reserving seats on BA flights to South Africa?

pigeonpie

We are flying in June to South Africa with BA. The seats are already a horrendous price but see BA have a £40 add-on for pre-reserving seats, unless we wait until check in which is 24 hours before departure.
The flights are long (12 hours+) and I don't sleep on planes so like an aisle seat. We also obviously would like to sit together.

Online travel agents tell me there is no longer any way for them to check how many seats are left, nor if they are reserved.
BA won't let us use OH's large no of airmiles to pre-reserve either, which is deeply annoying.

Can anyone advise on whether it's a good idea to spend an extra £80+ on seat reservation for a June flight? (I'd def do it for flights out there in SA summer).
Feeling ripped off but don't want to cut off my nose to spite my face etc.
thanks for any tips from recent travellers or regular June travellers.
Flights are economy to JHB and premium economy back from C.T

kazwookie

I'd save your money, and just speak nicely to the check in staff, and ask for the seats you want and see what they come up with.

[Deleted User]

I usually schedule myself to check in online as soon as it opens. Most people probably won't want to pre-reserve and my wife & I have rarely had a problem. If people are transferring to your flight from a connecting flight, they will have seats pre-reserved by BA already.

becominganobsessivesaver

If you log on to manage my booking on ba.com and go to select your seat you) should be able to see your seatmap and what is available to pre-reserve. Keep checking and if it looks like all seats which meet your requirements are nearly prebooked then bite the bullet, if not check in 24 hours before. Key points are bronze status passengers can select seats 7 days before and families with children 3 days before (they do not select seats but are assigned seats together). Around this point (or 24 hours before) the seats held back for high status passengers and bassinet seats will become available if not pre-reserved.

luci

It's easy to check which seats are already booked. Go into Manage My Booking on https://www.ba.com and go through the process to pre-book seats. That will show you what is currently available. You can keep checking and pre-book if you think they are all going to be booked, which I doubt.

becominganobsessivesaver

Just read that you are premium economy on your return, this is a small cabin which is usually full, so may be worth paying on this leg. There is a higher risk that you could end up with two middle seats

malkie76

Do a dummy booking on expedia.com they show you seat maps and seats taken. Alternatively sign up for a free account with expertflyer for flight seat information

pigeonpie

thanks everyone. We'd assumed BA would let us us OH's airmiles to reserve seats (he has loads as went business class to Japan for work) but nope.

Voyager2002

Do you mean that your OH has Avios points? I thought that Airmiles no longer existed.

Anyway, get her/him to telephone Executive Club (the BA frequent flyer scheme) and find out if he has any status with them, or can get status before this trip to South Africa). People with status can reserve seats well before check-in opens.

Otherwise: personally I would not mind being separated just for the flight (you will be together for the holiday and probably just reading or watching films during the flight) and it should certainly be possible to find two separate good seats when on-line reservation opens.

pigeonpie

becominganobsessivesaver wrote: »

Just read that you are premium economy on your return, this is a small cabin which is usually full, so may be worth paying on this leg. There is a higher risk that you could end up with two middle seats

thanks again for the heads up. There were only 2 together left so have paid for them. Right next to the loo of course!

mynameistallulah

pigeonpie wrote: »

thanks again for the heads up. There were only 2 together left so have paid for them. Right next to the loo of course!

It's a shame that you did not follow malkie76's advice and checked expertflyer first - MMB does not show all available seats, so there may well have been more available. Last time I flew in WT+ MMB only showed a few single seats, but in fact the cabin was nearly empty.