A little late to the discussion, but thought I'd chime is as longtime Continental / Alaska and later United and merged United flyer.
Originally Posted by
dmodemd
This has always been a common occurrence with United on A319 for A320 swaps so it is something we will have to be careful of when selecting Row 16.
Yes, UA did like to swap planes, including CR7 to CR2, where one time my CR7 exit row turned into nonreclining seat next to lav on CR2
One of few things (besides combined lifetime miles all of sudden being north of 800K miles) that "you are going to like" was renumbering of ALL planes shortly after merger (CR2 was excluded) to bulkhead as
#7 and exit rows to 20 and 21 (some numbers were obviously skipped due to fewer seats on some models). This very simple shift made the life of a lot of people much better.
Originally Posted by
CalanMan
Piggy-backing off of what @
dmodemd said, though this might be a new issue for AS, isn't this something that VX has had to deal with since delivery of their first A319? The standardized numbering system is a good idea, generally, but no matter how good or bad the seat map system or the software (clearly, Alaska's is lacking here), the challenges of swapping from an aircraft with more premium/extra seats to fewer are always going to fundamentally the same. Similar to when a 739 with a full F cabin is swapped with a 738. The folks in row 4 have to go somewhere when the new plane doesn't have a row 4.
That is always a problem, especially with last minute aircraft changes. Recall sitting in bulkhead next to a couple who got upgraded to last row of FC only to lose their seat at last minute to a swap - lucky for them UA had a couple of bulkhead seats left at boarding, otherwise they would have been sitting somewhere in coach instead of at least Economy Plus seat.
Amazing how seemingly little things make for a more pleasant experience for pax with status and reducing headaches for employees @:-) ^