There’s a fine line between fraud protection and annoyance. The pendulum for British Airways Executive Club awards bookings has swung into the annoying direction.
Yesterday I tried to book a JAL business class award for a friend from Los Angeles (LAX) to Tokyo (HND) using British Airways Avios. While BA charges 75K and AA charges 60K, my friend’s husband had a lot of American Express points and no American Airlines miles.
Anyway, this wasn’t a case of blocking, as we have seen of late on Cathay Pacific. No, the space showed up just fine on the British Airways Avios redemption website.
But when I clicked through to book, I noticed that the account holder’s name was pre-populated and I could not modify it. When I tried, I received the following pop-up window:
I suspect that I could have circumvented this by setting up a Household Account, but there was only one seat left and the process of adding family members is arduous. Anyway, I called British Airways, waited for 30 minutes to speak to an agent, and was finally able to book the ticket (rather easily) over the phone.
Here’s the odd thing. I tried to replicate the problem with other accounts and other routings…to no avail. I’m not sure if this was a random test or what, but it seems it has happened to a few others as well. The account holder had a zero point balance and transferred in points from American Express, but it was not a newly-created account.
CONCLUSION
Anyway, I just wanted to put out this data point for discussion. Have any of you run into a similar restriction? If you do run into it, don’t worry — just pick up the phone and call. BA will even waive the telephone booking fee for you.
Annoying to be “frozen” out of your own acct but perfectly understandable. Heck, even banks occasionally lock you out for adding money! Btw have you noticed UA now asks for your birthday on the phone?
I have. All agents, not just the Manila call center.
Have had the same problem. Tried to help my MIL book a trip for my FIL. MIL has had a BA account for 5 years and rarely uses her points. We had to call in to get them to book it. The agent made a wild speculation that seemed unrealistic. She said that they suspected credit card fraud even though we hadn’t put in a credit card yet. Her credit card on file is in good standing and hasn’t had any issues. I wish I knew what is causing the problem because she can’t book flights for anyone else without calling.
I ran into the exact same problem trying to book a coach seat on an AA flight from LAX to PHX with a Household Account that had roughly 15K balance. I am the Head of the Household and could not book an award for my daughter who’s a member of my household account online. Ridiculous!
I’ve seen this on my account since the summer. Happens for every route. I booked maybe a half dozen tickets for family and friends in the past. I figured it was a way to discourage selling award tickets. As mentioned, I set up a household account as a partial work around.
I am a gold member with the BA executive club. I have never been able to use my avois to buy a ticket. Other than on random dates 9 months in the future. I find that other than getting the marginal comfort of using soulless first class lounges there is absolutely no use it signing up for the executive club frequent flier membership.