Originally Posted by
Kevin AA
Yes, but that's assuming that every BE ticket does not get a seat assignment at check-in. While that would solve the problem, it means lots more work for the gate agent. The purpose of using the kiosk is to have a computer assign seats.
If a group of three BE people, mom, dad and small child, check in at the kiosk an hour before departure and there are only middle seats left, then what?
Last two rows of the aircraft are blocked. BE pax receive automatically generated seat assignments as normal (not sure if this is at OLCI or at airport kiosk right now, but no need to change this). If there are no seats to assign, they get a --SEE AGENT-- boarding pass. A family who reaches out to UA (phone or airport agent) during this time can be manually assigned seats together in the last two rows. Then, under gate control, the GA gives arbitrary assignment to the --SEE AGENT-- holders to the remaining blocked seats.
This is not a huge load on the GA unless there are many families with children traveling on BE fares, which is going to be a hassle under any system. There are in fact already standard sets of seats blocked exactly like this (e.g. 7DE and 23DE and 25DE), and this is how they are assigned.