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My company has just started using a corporate travel agent for business travel, and their agent has told me that the name on my BAEC account must exactly match my passport, including my middle name, or I may not get credited with Avios and tier points. I’ve not had this issue until now, and my online account with BAEC doesn’t even have a field for my middle name. The only way I can see to change my name is to complete their webform and send them a copy of my passport or birth certificate, but even that form doesn’t have a field for my middle name. Can anyone advise?
Middle names aren’t considered for travel purposes, even if they appear on your passport. BAEC accounts just use first name and surname, as you’ve spotted, and this won’t affect your ability to get avios and TPs in any way. You don’t even have to give BA your passport details unless it’s part of a booking. What matters is that your BAEC number is added to your bookings, but even if it isn’t you can claim missing avios and TPs, it’s just a bit of a faff.
I think the agent is getting confused with the general requirement for first name and surname to match on travel documents.
Problem is, they’ve just booked me a flight, and whilst it’s attached to my BAEC number, it won’t let me book seats now
I can’t imagine that being to do with the name, more likely because it’s been booked by a 3rd party? What message are you getting when you try to select a seat via MMB?
It says I can only book seats by paying a fee
It says I can only book seats by paying a fee
Departure date and status level might clear this one up
It says I can only book seats by paying a fee
What’s your BA status level?
Silver
Are you logging into your account? If you’re BA Silver presumably you’ve been travelling with them for a while and done this before? I am just wondering if corporate bookings require you to call or go via the agent to make amendments? It might help to change the thread title if possible (or start a new one) to see if you can get answers from readers who also use corporate travel.
Also, when was the booking made? I think that if it hasn’t been ticketed yet, you won’t be able to select a seat.
The booking was made today.
The agent claims they cannot book a seat reservation as my BAEC account does not include my middle name, so it does not match my ticket and passport. I have booked lots of flights directly with BA before and never had this issue.
I think it has been ticketed as the agent has sent me the 125 – number as well as the booking reference.
Honestly, that sounds like complete nonsense from the agent. As I understand it, though, sometimes they have contracts with BA which have different terms to direct bookings so maybe it’s to do with that? Painful as it can be, you’re probably best calling BA and seeing if you can get to the bottom of it. You can call the Silver line so should get through a bit quicker.
Yeah, I may have to. The agent claims this will happen every time they book me a flight until BA fix it, and since I have to use the agency now for all my work travel, this is going to be a right royal pain if they can’t sort it out. I managed to somehow force the website to book me seats on one such flight, but the other won’t budge and still says I have to pay for seat reservations. I’ll try and call them when I’m back in the UK.
I’ll update this thread if and when I have more news, as if this is a BA change of policy then it could affect other folks too.
Passport name is completely irrelevant here.
The name on the ticket should match the name on the BAEC account. Neither of these need to exactly match the passport name, and the consequence of not matching the passport name would only be denial of boarding the actual flight (and possibly inability to check in, to a destination which requires live matching with visa systems like Australia / USA).
“Middle name” is just an extension of your first name, there doesn’t need to be a field for middle name. There is probably a threshold for matching ticket name to BAEC name.
For example with BAEC account having surname “Johnson” and first name “Alexander Boris”, tickets issued under Alexander JOHNSON and Boris JOHNSON have matched successfully for me and my family members, but Alex JOHNSON did not work and had to be reissued by the travel agent as it was their mistake.
By matching I mean that once the ticket is issued, with the BAEC number entered on the ticket, it shows up in the BAEC app when logged in to the account. Thus the status is “verified” and seats can be selected free as a status benefit.
Also for travel agent bookings, sometimes waiting up to 24 hours helps.
Never tell a travel agent your middle names.
Never mind travel agents – the only time I let my OH book any flights he managed to spell my middle name wrong on the booking! Delta Airlines wanted £65 or something ridiculous to change it so we just took the chance and nothing happened! So I know from experience that middle names probably don’t have any bearing on travel arrangements.
Well none of that explains why the flights didn’t connect to my account. BA have now added my middle name to my BAEC account but I still can’t book seats without paying. Getting really fed up with BA
Did you ask if they could allocate you a seat over the phone?
Not yet – I’m currently abroad on business. I’ll have to brave ringing the helpline when I get back. Been trying to avoid doing that, but I think I will have no choice.
Success! The change of name on my BAEC account means new BA bookings via the travel agent work, and my agent took on the job of phoning BA to sort out the previous booking. Result!
Glad you got it sorted, but a bit of a strange one. My work bookings always have middle name and my personal ones never do and I’ve never a problem with seat selection once the flight is actually ticketed (I’m BAEC Gold but that shouldn’t matter).
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