Virgin Holidays - am I expecting too much?

[newswatcher]

I have made a booking with Virgin Holidays, for a fortnight in Jamaica next year. Since Mrs NW works at a school, we can only go away during their holiday times. Difficult to believe, but Easter is already filling up. In our case, we have had to take the outbound flight from Manchester(Air Jamaica) and back to Heathrow, since Virgin say that they have already sold their o/b allocation from Heathrow.

In answer to the possibility of our eventually getting seats on the o/b Heathrow flight, they told me that

We have no way of knowing if any seats will be cancelled, please check with us periodically to check availability

I would have thought that they would have some way of checking their seat allocation, and advising me if any come free or, better still, switching me automatically, since they know I have requested this. If they want more, Air Jamaica say that there is plenty of availability, and Virgin only have to ask them for a further allocation!

I then asked if I could get an internal flight from Heathrow to Manchester through them. Having contacted BMI, they(BMI) advised me that this would enable me to take advantage of the greater baggage allowance, and we would also be able to book our cases all the way through from Heathrow, rather than having to recover them at Manchester. Virgin told me this was not possible, since they only handled return domestic flights. I would have thought that, seeing that they have a ticketing department, they would be able to do this.

Are my expectations unreasonable?

PS - it is also annoying to have to contact them on an "0870" number. even after I have made a reservation. These calls cost me 8p/minute and recently it has been taking an average 15-20 minutes to get through!