Originally Posted by
davetravels
I recently flew NRT to LAX, and had 7A, as usual, on the B777. When I boarded, someone was in my seat. Turns out that he was supposed to be in 6A, and was confused for some reason. He asked me if I simply wanted to trade. I declined, and went into a big speech about not wanting to seem snooty, and apologized because I made him move all his stuff, etc. but, oh well!
Take 7A! It's a tad more private, because it's kind of back in the corner. You won't regret it!
The last time that happened to me, the poacher had very deliberately grabbed 7A from me. I had to involve the GA to get the guy evicted, where of course he moved his stuff as slowly as possible all the while abusing me verbally about how all the (expletive deleted) seats were the same and going to arrive at the same time, so how could I be such an (expletive deleted) to insist on the seat I had reserved? Unfortunately he wasn't booted from the flight. BTW, his seat was 12C, so no way was he simply confused, although I guess the good news was that he wasn't a coach customer trying to steal his way into BE.
I really doubt that your Mr 6A had made an honest mistake. Somehow no one ever seems to take 6A when they're really in 7A, then offering to just switch seats with the rightful owner. It's the same prinicple as how those who beg to switch seats in order to sit together always seem to somehow try to swap the worst of their assigned seats for a much better seat.
Color me cynical about incidents where someone mistakenly sits in the wrong seat.