Soccerdad1995

In which case they were doing you a favor by not letting you sit in the middle of them. Same can be said for some other groups of people.

relangford

Does the "a" (both places) mean anything? This non-statement SEEMS to say "A" customer" can hold "A" seat for "A" someone. Or, do singular and plural not mean anything any more?

InkUnderNails

Got anything yet on that SMF flight?

InkUnderNails

I once had a flight on NW. After they called the elites, the card holders, FC, and all of the other special groups, there were exactly 5 of us remaining to board a completely full DC-9. (Yeah, it was a while ago.) The following suggestion may go a ways toward making that happen on some WN flights but here goes. (Ain't gonna happen anyway. But, that is what we do here: make suggestions that go over like a COS pole vaulter with WN.)

You can elect to board as a group, board after preboards and before Business Select on one and only one condition: You must take seats from back to front.

That is correct: the first group of six to step up gets the last row. They also get to sit together without any deception or anti-social activities. They do not have to worry about check in. They can all be C's and they get to sit together. It would possibly knock some time off boarding. (Hint to WN, you do want to reduce boarding time, right?)

Groups and large families get what they say they want. "We just want to sit together."

I am willing to bet they don't just want to sit together. They also want seats near the front or to get off early or whatever. They want to sit together in certain seats, a much different thing.

GrinAndBearIt

I think it's a great idea. The policy could even be more general and state that seat-saving (or seat-claiming or whatever it's called) is allowed only after the exit rows.

On each of my last three flights, I've seen passengers saving premium seats: on one flight, it was seats A-C in row 3, on another flight the entire row 4, and on another flight seats A-C in the exit row. On several occasions, I heard boarding passengers make unhappy remarks to the seat savers.

nsx

Someone wrote here that this was tried once long ago. The FA's were unwilling or unable to enforce it.

SCGustafson

Actually, there was a time when they tried to enforce all pre-boarders had to sit in rows 14 or higher. It lasted maybe two months. It was around the same time as the "bin hog" campaign to reduce the amount of carry-ons.

rove312

Was there a rule that athletic teams could preboard if they sat together in the back rows?

SCGustafson

Check-out February 2nd, 1998: http://www.swamedia.com/channels/By-...or-initiatives. Of course, it does not give the details or the rescinding date of either one.

InkUnderNails

I preboard, and that would be an inconvenience but understood. However, a lot of people that preboard with me struggle to get seated in Row 2. With a mobility impairment, Row 15 could be very difficult.

SCGustafson

I remember that the rationale was two-fold. First, while those who preboard and require extra time to get settled would be far enough back to not block the aisle at the front of the plane, thus delaying others from boarding and getting seated more quickly. The second was on landing, the assumption was that those who require extra time to board would also require the more time to deplane, so this way they could take the extra time without hindering others deplaning in front of them.
I am sure that the struggle for those with mobility impairments to get to the rear was a reason for the rescinding of this policy.
Also, this was at the same time when families were allowed to preboard before general boarding, so this placed all of the families with smaller children in the rear of the plane, allowing them the extra time to get situated without impeding the rest of the boarding process.
I can see the overall rationale to help speed the boarding process and turn planes quicker. But I am sure the public backlash, even in the pre-social media days, was not worth the gained time.