2 Adults 2 Children No seat reservation

[weg831]

We’ve never paid and always been seated together (family of 5) with BA. The seats have been allocated during the week before travel. I also would definitely help if a young child was separated from their parent. I know it’s an emotive subject on here, but just giving my experience and thoughts!

[Mexy02]

I have kids and We paid £300 for our seats so if someone asked me to move then I’m afraid the answer would be no. It’s a risk you take but I didnt want to stress so saved up and prebooked. You know your kids best so only you can really decide .

[MarkUK]

Originally Posted by sparkles18

If flying with BA with children 11 and under they will do their very best to seat you together and your seats are assigned 5-6 days before your flight.

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I wasn’t aware of this. Do they show on-line at this time or do you still have to wait until check in to see your seats?

[weg831]

Originally Posted by MarkUK

I wasn’t aware of this. Do they show on-line at this time or do you still have to wait until check in to see your seats?

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It shows online.

[weeleighluigi]

Originally Posted by Guest

Don't get me wrong weeleighluigi like you we've never paid to sit together and have never been split up (not even on ryanair) and we do at least one return flight every two months as a family.

My point was more that if it is going to be a stress creating situation then even at 200 pounds it would be worth it to not tarnish the enjoyment of the rest of the holiday

As I've said before our kids where doing unaccompanied flights from about the age of 7 so they really couldn't care less if we sat by them or not, in fact I think they'd prefer we didn't

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Absolutely, if it is something that would ruin your holiday then save longer and book them.
My youngest would struggle on her own, she is 6, but hubby and other daughter wouldn't really bother. To be honest though... the plane is taking us to Florida, I'd happily sit on the tail!

[nampam]

Yes you could be separated but I think most airlines will always try to sit you together. We recently flew with BA and we were a group of 8, only 1 being younger than 12 but we still got placed together both ways, last year we flew easyJet that was 10 of us and again all seated together. I know some have been unlucky in the past but it’s a risk only you can decide whether to take or not

[Scotscraig]

Originally Posted by weg831

It shows online.

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We weren't able to see last year 5-6 days before but we were the year before.

[Thecornflake]

When we went a couple of years ago I think it was only around 35 each to choose seats, and then also paid 15 each to have priority which was well worth doing. We were off the plane first, through immigration in about 30 mins and then our bags were the first off the plane. Think landing to getting into the car was less than an hour.

Personally I’m happy to pay the extra especially with a 9 year old who would freak not being able to sit with us and also I’m fairly averse to being close up to strangers for 9 hours straight. Plus on the way back as a night flight I chose the seats with leg room in front of them.

[dx4100]

Do you want your 7 year old sat away from you ? Do you really want your kids potentially misbehaving out of your reach and causing issue for other passengers...

Remove the stress and pay the fee... They should rename it the family tax to be honest as we have little option but to pay I feel.

Once saw a women kicking off because she choose not to pre-book and no one would move so her and her 8 year old could sit together. Its was a flight full of families who had all prebooked! Alway said I would never be that person losing their mind at the start of a family holiday! For us its a cost factored into any holiday we book.

[fredflintstone]

This one of those topics that generally has strong views.
Paying for seats gives you a high chance of being sat together. No guarantess just with not paying. How many threads have we seen over the years with people being taken out of the Virgin bubble and being split or of a plane change tht upsets the allocation. Usually fixed with a call but paying is not a guarantee but it helps.

But I understand those who find the cost very high and want to avoid it. There is another price to pay though and that is the stress worrying.

This is one of the reasons if I respond to "Is my flight full" I add the seat allocation so people can see the planes are not full of seats that have been reserved. Doesn't mean much months out but when the flights get nearer it helps.

Although I have only started doing this recently I also monitored Virgin and BA to FLorida last year and until a few days out (when the airline starts allocating seats) they are always lots of seats available so I would not have forseen issues. Obviously make sure you do on-line checkin as soon as possible helps although your seats has probably been preassigned already.

It then depends on how the airline wants to treat you. Ryanair for instance seems to do its best to split you.
BA is very good. It tries to keep parties together even if they have no kids. And for infants they allow everyone on the booking to allocate a seat on booking for free. Virgin are not quite as good with only 1 free per infant but they also do not try and split parties.