Boarding Passes

Usually you will be able to print both boarding passes at the same time, but occasionally it doesn't happen for a variety of reasons. If not simply head to one of the transfer desks at Heathrow for the second boarding pass. 2.5 hours is plenty of time to make the connection.

Mary, we have done this BA flight several times. It is not a problem. If you bought these as a single roundtrip, the flights will be on a single ticket and you should be able to check in for both 24 hours in advance of the first flight to LHR. That is what we have done. If for some reason the website will not let you do this, you can still check in for the second flight 24 hours in advance of it, which will be 6:25 am on the day you will depart for LHR. Either way you will have both boarding passes in hand when you go to the airport in Seattle. Stop at the BA check-in desk to show your passports and make sure all is in order before you go through security. Have a great trip!

We flew BA PHL-LHR-PRG, last year, return AMS-LHR-PHL.
If I recall correctly, at 6:10 PM the day before the outbound, I was able to our seats and print the boarding passes for both legs of the Outbound. I believe that is because it is flying from the states. On the return, at 24 hoyrs before on the prior morning, although we could all seats, we could only print the boarding pas for AMS-LHR. Later that evening we could print LHR-PHL, and I believe if we had waited for 24 hours before that take-off we could have done it that morning, but as a separate transaction. This appears to be a Europeean ting. luckily , we were staying where we could easily print at any time (Boogaard's), however, since this is BA, using the kiosks at LHR should save any lines.

Mary, I just noticed your plan to try to check-in and print at 17:00 the day before your flight. They are absolutely precise about that 24 hours, calculated in local time at the departure point, so you will not be able to check in and print until 18:45. Since that is the first opportunity to choose seats (unless you have paid in advance), you will want to do it as close to that time as possible. Also, note what terminal your ongoing flight will depart from. You will arrive at T5 and may depart from either T5 or T3 (since this is a BA flight). Heathrow is huge but well-signed. Just keep following the purple signs for "flight connections" and at some point you will have the choice of staying in T5 or transferring (by internal bus) to T3. You will go through security again at some point. However, the whole thing need not take all that long. I timed our transfer when we flew to Spain last april, and from the time we got off the plan until we were in T3 in the departures area, it was all of 30 minutes. Be aware that they may not post your gate for the departing flight until 15-30 minutes ahead; at that time you should head directly to the gate. Before that they want you to stay in the central area and shop (didn't work for us, we just found seats and read the newspapers.) If you have additional questions and you aren't leaving this weekend, you could stop by our RS group meeting in downtown Seattle on Saturday morning.

And just a crazy side comment, but BE SURE both flights are at LHR and one isn't at LGW...it's happened, even when not booked that way :-(

Re Lola's advice about the 24 hours.Last year there was a count-down timer on the BA site for something, so you could easily be certain when the 24 hours started exactly on their time.

And they send you an email when it is time (although I don't know if it arrives precisely at "the" second you can check in. The email has a link to your rezzie so it is easy. Eileen, I sure hope their onward flight doesn't depart from Gatwick. That would have a heck of a time making that connection in 2.5 hours. I wish they would stop having the afternoon Venice flights depart from Gatwick. As much as I loved flying into Venice and seeing the magical city out my window, I never want to do that transfer again!!!!!