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Why won’t British Airways refund your seat reservation fees when you cancel a flight?

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I thought it was worth taking another look today at one of the most egregious money-making schemes pursued by British Airways – the refusal to refund seat reservation fees if you cancel your booking.

This was a hot topic before the pandemic, but went away for two years because – under the ‘Book With Confidence’ covid guarantee – BA was fully refunding what you paid, including seat selection fees. (The money was ring-fenced for paying future seat selection fees, but at least you got it back).

‘Book With Confidence’ is no longer offered, of course, so your seat reservation fees are back at risk.

BA seat reservation fees refund

What originally kicked off our campaign on this was a reader who cancelled two Avios seats in Club World to the US.  All of his Avios and other charges were refunded, less the administration fee, as usual.

However, British Airways refused to refund £500 of seat reservation fees.

Can you really spend £500 on seat reservation fees for a couple?

Unfortunately, yes.

I just did a dummy booking for Heathrow to San Francisco for March.   As you can see, for someone without British Airways Gold or Silver status or the oneworld equivalent, if you want to sit on the top deck of the Airbus A380 by the windows it will cost you £122 per person each-way – a total of £488 return for two.  Bargain.

BA seat reservation fees refund

There are two issues here, I think: is it made clear that your reservation is non-refundable? and is this ‘fair’?

Is it made clear that seat reservations are non-refundable?

British Airways has made some improvements to its wording since we first started highlighting this issue. When you go into ba.com to select seats, this is what you see (click to enlarge):

BA seat reservation fees refund

The terms and conditions are not shown, but require you to click a hyperlink.  This is not ideal, but probably acceptable. 

Under the old version of ba.com, you were shown a summary of the T&C with a further click required to see the full version. Unsurprisingly, this ‘summary’ did not include the key point – that your fee was non-refundable in virtually all circumstances.

Things have now improved in terms of clarity. When you click the ‘Terms & Conditions’ hyperlink, you are taken immediately to the full T&C document. The bit on ‘no refunds’ isn’t at the top, but it is there if you scroll down.

Regardless of the T&Cs, is this ‘fair’?

You might say ‘it doesn’t matter if it’s fair’.

Except, under UK contract law, it does.

There are lots of pieces of regulation which could come into play here such as the Consumer Rights Act 2015, the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977, the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999, the Sale of Goods Act 1979 and the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982.

Here is a very concise summary from the Government’s own website:

Businesses can keep your deposit or advance payments, or ask you to pay a cancellation charge, only in certain circumstances:

If you cancel the contract, the business is generally only entitled to keep or receive an amount sufficient to cover their actual losses that directly result from your cancellation (eg costs already incurred or loss of profit).

Businesses must take reasonable steps to reduce their losses (eg by re-selling the goods or services).

Non-refundable deposits should only be a small percentage of the total price.

Cancellation charges must be a genuine estimate of the business’ direct loss.

A good base line is that a consumer contract can only be imposed if it is ‘fair’.

It is difficult to see how retaining a payment of £488 for seat selection is ‘fair’ when the airline can cancel the underlying seat reservation without penalty and suffers no loss when you cancel, especially if the seat is cancelled well before departure.

Seat selection fees also appear ‘unfair’ in terms of the ‘power’ given to each party.  British Airways, according to the small print, is free to throw you out of your allocated seats for any reason it wants.

Intriguingly, if British Airways upgrades you, you don’t get a seat refund:

For the avoidance of doubt, paid seating will not be refunded if you are involuntarily upgraded;

It is difficult to imagine a court agreeing with that, especially if you paid for seats purely in order to be together but – due to the upgrade – you were separated. You do get a refund if you choose to pay to upgrade and do not want to pay for selection in the higher cabin.

In the case of an Avios redemption – or a fully flexible cash ticket – the airline is willing to refund the flight.  It is therefore difficult, in my mind, to put together a ‘reasonable’ justification for keeping the seat selection fees.

BA seat reservation fees refund

Is it worth fighting this if it applies to you?

If you are impacted by this, your options are to take British Airways to CEDR arbitration (here is our guide on how to do it) or, failing that, to MCOL / Small Claims (here is our guide on how to do that).

The bad news is that I know that some readers have lost their case at CEDR when trying to do this. This is because the arbitrator is not empowered to look at whether BA’s actions break consumer laws. They only look at whether British Airways has broken its own terms and conditions – which it hasn’t.

Here is a quote from a failed arbitration claim

Here is a quote from a CEDR arbitration decision refusing to order BA to refund seat selection fees:

“Whist I recognise the passenger deems this provision unfair, I am unable to make a determination as to whether the same is unfair, binding, acceptable, balanced or not to the detriment of the consumer. Should the passenger be unsatisfied with my ruling, he is free to reject the decision and and to negotiate a settlement with the airline or to pursue the matter elsewhere should he wish to do so, including to dispute the validity of the abovementioned provision (or the airline’s terms and conditions as a whole) before a competent body or court.“

Even if you win at CEDR or MCOL, these cases do not set legal precedent.  Settlement usually comes with the requirement to sign a confidentiality agreement, so it cannot even be publicised.

It would require a full court hearing to take place before legal precedent was set, as happened in – for example – Jet2 vs Huzar, the case which set the precedent that mechanical failure was not an excuse for not paying EC261 compensation.

Until someone does that, however, British Airways will carry on attempting to extract large sums for seat selection fees on cancelled flights.

The only good news is that, with the new Club Suite, the seats are created more or less equal and there is very little justification for spending money on a reservation.  Even if you end up not being able to sit together, other passengers should be more willing to move onboard to accommodate you as they would not be worse off.

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Comments (125)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Bluekjp says:
    2 Jan2 January 07:06

    This article is heavily weighted against BA as if they are unique in this respect which is very unfair towards them. Nigh on every airline charges for seats nowadays, with more coming onboard all the time and I know of none that will refund seat fees. This should be an article directed at ‘Airlines and non-refunadable seat fees in general’

    • BJ says:
      2 Jan2 January 07:29

      Agree, the number of airlines charging seat selection fees in lremium cabins is increasing. I’m unsure if they all have harsh refund policies lije BA but would be unsurprised if they did. If this is a HfP campaign then I think it would be better addressing seat selection fees across all airlines full-stop. First come first serve sounds fine to me, i fon’t buy into this culture whereby if you have the cash why not. Same with paying to pre-book lounge access. It encourages profiteering to the benefit of those who can and are also willing to pay at the expense if those who are unwilling to pay or cannot do so. Free seat selection worked fine for decades, there was no need to monetise it.

    • Travel Strong says:
      2 Jan2 January 08:32

      It seems reasonable that the BA problem is a focus for HfP given that the use of BA Avios points is a primary focus of the site. Readership will undoubtedly be heavily Avios focussed, and deserves to be made aware of this risk (in a more prominent way than BA does within the booking T&C’s on an otherwise flexible booking).

      irectly relevant to those who book with Avios

      • BJ says:
        2 Jan2 January 09:23

        I het that but personally I think the bigger issue is seat selection fees across airlines generally not so much the BA refund issue despite how awful that itself is.

        • Lady London says:
          2 Jan2 January 23:54

          Personally I think the issue is refund of reservation fees for 4 seats for a family to Dubai 🙂

      • ianM says:
        2 Jan2 January 09:31

        I’m thinking most HFP readers will be Silver at least so not really an issue

    • Rob says:
      2 Jan2 January 08:35

      I am struggling to think of another carrier which charges in Business, except for ‘premium’ seats like thrones.

      • BJ says:
        2 Jan2 January 09:15

        I’ve not paid enough attention but that seems to be the case with AY. On out summer flights we can vhoose any seats intraEurope but on longhaul central pairs can be selected but we cannot choose winfow solo seats. They seen to be available for a fee but I cannot even do that. I’ll call AY on return from current trip. In past year seat selection was free on AY, CX, JL and QR. I think I read that fees niw apply on AF/KLM or they will soon.

      • Nick says:
        2 Jan2 January 09:18

        … which also suits BA. What’s often forgotten is that this is one of the biggest benefits there is for both Golds and high-yield last minute customers. Spending £15k in J/C class to fly next week? BA: great, have the best seat there is. VS: sorry, all the best seats went to those paying £2k six months ago, here’s one by the toilet. Where would you spend your money then?

        Their corporate and CSAT surveys reinforce this, the right customers see huge benefit in this policy and direct spend accordingly. And of course there’s millions of extra revenue from those willing to pay for the same benefit in advance. The price is set to ensure a good balance of the two.

        • Rob says:
          2 Jan2 January 11:30

          I am in favour of some sort of seating controls, but BA ALREADY does this well by holding back seats for late bookers who are on full fare or elite. Being able to book an Avios ticket 3-4 days before departure and still getting Row 1 as a Gold is impressive.

          Compare this to Eurostar where I booked a Standard Premier ticket relatively late in the day in December and, despite being Carte Blanche and paying more than 90% of passengers, could only select ‘poor’ seats (ie sharing a table with 3 strangers). As it happened I got lucky and with regular checking could move after others cancelled.

          • RussellH says:
            2 Jan2 January 12:18

            I would regard ANY seat with a table as better than the awful “airline” seats.

          • Rob says:
            2 Jan2 January 13:27

            I think they are OK – I can get a 13 inch laptop on with no issues plus a drink. Key is to take one parallel to an empty table so you can easily slide across if the table block remains empty.

          • SamG says:
            2 Jan2 January 12:29

            BA doesn’t hold back any seats (except row 1 for GCH on short haul and F) . The holding is achieved by charging. Which is a system that works pretty well I think. Other airlines that I use (e.g. Thai, Singapore Airlines) do not charge and as a relatively late booker I often end up in your Eurostar situation picking a poor seat, though I’d guess I’m paying more than most for my ticket.

            Luckily with Expertflyer alerts I’ve always managed to snag something better

            I do agree though that BA should refund if you cancel. They’re at least better than Turkish Airlines – you have to pay again if you change flights!

      • Hbommie says:
        2 Jan2 January 10:06

        AY charge even after check in. They wanted £129 last week HEL to HKG, asked at the airport and they switched for us to seats away from the bogs.

        • BJ says:
          2 Jan2 January 11:20

          Was that for all seats or just window solo sests? MMB will not let me pick window at all but it let’s me pick centre pairs. It displays price £0 for all seats.

          • Hbommie says:
            2 Jan2 January 12:38

            I think it was for all seats but there wasn’t 2 centre pairs available so we asked for 6&7 window.

      • ayearinmx says:
        2 Jan2 January 10:13

        Qatar do… £80 for MXP-DOH on the cheapest business flight class. Reminded me to change my booking to my BA account

        • BJ says:
          2 Jan2 January 11:38

          We were not charged EDI-BKK in March or December. Booked via QR, QR MMB. It’s possible my partner may have status from 2022 but I haven’t noticed.

          • Hbommie says:
            2 Jan2 January 12:40

            We have free seats available Sydney-Doha-LHR in Feb. Selected on avios booking at the time of booking last year.

      • dundj says:
        2 Jan2 January 11:25

        AF/KL do for at least non-status passengers now on long haul, think short haul remains inclusive of fare.

        • BJ says:
          2 Jan2 January 11:41

          So that’s already started. Their fares exEDI have jumped quite a bit too.

      • Jay says:
        2 Jan2 January 12:45

        QR on Business Lite?

        • Hbommie says:
          2 Jan2 January 12:55

          Not sure, it was an avios booking on BA.com so I assume fully flex?

        • Rob says:
          2 Jan2 January 13:26

          But you are then deliberately selecting a Lite fare with certain benefits stripped out ….

          • Doug M says:
            2 Jan2 January 13:33

            BA J fares include seat selection. So in effect it’s exactly the same with discounted business tickets not including seat choice benefit.

  • BJ says:
    2 Jan2 January 07:14

    Obviously it’s not fair but people know the rules when they pay to select these seats so if they lose their fee – tough. The problem here is not BA but weak consumer-unfriendly legislation and toothless regulators across a whole range of products and services from airlines to water.

  • Dave likes planes says:
    2 Jan2 January 07:26

    I was dissuaded from upgrading to First when the nice lady at the call centre informed me that I would not get refunded for the paid seat selection I had made in Club.

  • Mick S says:
    2 Jan2 January 07:33

    I’d prefer to be sat away from my family, so I wouldnt pay for a seat reservation even if it was 99p and refundable 🙂

    On a serious note, the kids dont want to sit near their parents anyway. Anyone paying for seats, knowing the conditions is a mug.

  • JohnTh says:
    2 Jan2 January 08:02

    Wouldn’t the higher status travellers feel devalued as free seat selection seems to be one of the key perks and keeps them “loyal”?

    • Alan says:
      2 Jan2 January 08:06

      I could see that argument if they removed seat selection fees altogether but don’t see how follows if BA simply did what would seem right and refund the fees if the pax cancels?

    • Matt says:
      2 Jan2 January 14:20

      Do loyal customers feel valued if something that once upon a time was free, is chargeable to customers without status? Perhaps a little, but they’re not really gaining anything, aside from a feeling of oneupmanship over fellow travellers.

  • Connie cole says:
    2 Jan2 January 08:20

    I got ripped of by b.a for £550 pounds for seat ref in march 2022 that was last timei use them I refuse to use there Airlines when I going on holiday never got my there will never get my money again

    • Travel Strong says:
      2 Jan2 January 08:37

      This is the main reason why BA should look again. It does nothing to encourage loyalty, and a surefire way to turn customers against you.

    • Mikeact says:
      2 Jan2 January 08:41

      That’s fine..nobody is forcing you to fly BA….go with another carrier.

      • Travel Strong says:
        2 Jan2 January 08:46

        I suspect BA would still actually like their money, though…

      • zapato1060 says:
        2 Jan2 January 13:01

        A restaurant that guarantees food poisoning cannot simply state “go eat somewhere else”.

  • Andrew. says:
    2 Jan2 January 08:33

    Seat charging is useful when people start whining and ask you to swap seats. Doesn’t matter if you’ve paid or not, can always claim you have and ask for cash to move.

    • Novice says:
      2 Jan2 January 18:53

      I still wouldn’t move unless the other seat is better. I absolutely hate entitled people especially parents who think they can expect anyone to move just for having kids.

      I’m not bothered the kid is going to be sat away from parents as it’s not my responsibility.

      • Lady London says:
        2 Jan2 January 23:59

        Yaaaay Novice. Are you in favour of child-free flights or cabins too ?

  • Travel Strong says:
    2 Jan2 January 08:35

    As others have said, this is one of several reasons why I will not pay BA seat fees – and I’m grateful to the site for highlighting it over the past few years. I’ve also met regular BA Avios bookers who were unaware of this risk and were quite shocked at the BA practices once I pointed them in the direction of past articles.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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