As known since about two decades, R12 methods, which include terms linear in the interelectronic distance r12 in the wave function, improve substantially the basis set convergence of the ground state correlation energy. In a previous study, however, it was found that the same approach does not give a similar systematic improvement if applied to excited states in the framework of coupled cluster response theory. In the present work, we examine the reason for this behavior and show that the inclusion of additional orbitals in the construction of the r12 pair functions leads to an enhanced basis set convergence (and thus a balanced description) also for the excited states.