Giving up seats to families and/or old people?
You have a window or aisle assigned seat and consider the following situations:
- an adult is sitting in your seat next to his/her small child (under 10) and refuses to move or the adult asks to switch with your seat with theirs which is a middle.
- an old woman is sitting in your seat, refuses to get up and just says to take her seat which is a middle.
You call the FA and you stick that you need your assigned seat, the FA takes the side of the adult or the old lady and asks you to take the middle seat and if you protest you will be removed from the plane so you have to comply.
Has this ever happened to anyone? What recourse do you have? It just seems really unfair/unjust to people to have done their due diligence by booking early/checking in early/paying for premium seating etc.
This has never happened to me in all my flying but was curious to know if one should summon the pilot/gate agent or tell the FA that they will be summoning them if they don't get their seat. How far can you push it without getting into trouble?