US Airways Dividend Miles (Pre-FlightFund Merger) - 757 reconfiguration to start soon

According to this thread on usaviation.com (http://www.usaviation.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=8123&st=0) the long awaited reconfiguration of the 757s will begin on December 15th, with as many as a third of the fleet redone by the end of the holiday season.

Elsewhere in the thread, it states that many of these 757s have been sold as F24 as part of the first class sale to LAS. The reconfigured planes will be F8. This means that apparently some people who bought first class tix are going to be downgraded to coach. Other posters suggest that the way it will be resolved will be that people in row 1 or 2 will hold their seats in F and people in rows 3-6 will find themselves in coach.

I checked my res to LAS on 1/15 and back on 1/19 and our seats are in row 1 both ways. Does anyone have a paid F ticket with rows 3 or higher on a 757?

I may be generous, but I'm guessing US's inventory management will shuffle folks around if they are on F fares to make certain they are actually in FC. It should be easy to see the loads this far out and accomidate or re-route.

I'm not as certain. January is a pretty busy time in LAS as conventions kick into high gear and when I tried to book another pair of discount seats in F, I couldn't find any available. I would have assumed that they were only selling these planes as F8, but for the usaviation post. I would also be a bit nervous around the holidays, when the flight schedules are pretty much wall to wall. I do agree that it is pretty easy to anticipate, so I'd expect they'd keep the old configuration on the LAS runs as long as they can.

Folks in F who cannot be reaccommodated on a US operated flight will be rebooked on a UA codeshare flight. No one should be worrying about their *booked* F seats! Upgrades are another matter, but this far out that shouldn't really be a huge issue.

Ms. rtpflyer and I have award tickets in first class on 757's to/from LAS in March. Our original seat assignments were for row 6, but I see US Airways has changed those seat assignments to row 2 already.

Hmm, guess my chances for upgrades on 1/16 to LAS and 1/18 back to PHL are fairly slim, eh? http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

Interestingly, my BOS-CLT-CUN rountrip has the BOS-CLT segments on 757's. Both were booked as F24. When I looked at the seat map on Expedia (prior to the Expedia-USAir blowout) no seat map could be displayed for the return (1/4) CLT-BOS segment. However, all our seats are in rows 1 and 2, and both Expedia and USAir's automated system still confirms our F seats. I suspect the conclusion that the back of the cabin people are in trouble is probably accurate.

There was a thread on the UA forum recently about the computer re-assigning Y seats to F passengers in change-of-aircraft situations whereby the new aircraft has a smaller F cabin. There were some true horror stories posted, and I would hate to see anybody on this board suffering similar fates.

I wouldn't put too much stock in US averting the problem with yield management. If I had a "confirmed" upgrade in F on a 757, I would be calling now to attempt to straighten it out, and calling back frequently to confirm. At the very least, if you're kicked out of the F cabin, there may still be time to snag an exit row or bulkhead seat.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by geo1005:
I may be generous, but I'm guessing US's inventory management will shuffle folks around if they are on F fares to make certain they are actually in FC. It should be easy to see the loads this far out and accomidate or re-route.</font>

You are being generous! The auto reaccom process porotects the common seats only. The airport staff, if they have time, will often try to look for the top tier passengers and higher fare passengers and protect them. A word to the wise, book row 1 or 2 on your 757 trips!

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"I am serious...and don't call me Shirley"
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