Well I have experienced this for the first time now, when the supervisor told me I could not take one of those emergency seats on the front row. I found it upsetting as the flight was delayed for 2 hours and the reason to ask to be on the front was to facilitate a speedy exit once in dubai for a connecting flight.

I finally got it because I was already seating in an emergency seat on the back, after she thoroughly checked I was on one of the ‘reserved’ seats, but otherwise she would not have allowed the move. She told me it was a new policy.

I find this a change in policy that brings very little extra revenue to Emirates (if any), and will create a lot of bad faith with customers, specially frequent travelers.

Whats the point really? Moving seats within the same cabin has been an accepted practice forever, when a seat is free, no issues changing. If one has a neighbor and there is another seat without neighbor, changing is fine. Taking a 3-row seat that is empty? totally fine and nobody asks us to pay for 3 seats. This is the practice and the ‘rules’ of travel we are used to.

If the emergency seat is empty, why not use it?
I would even say that emergency seats should always be occupied as the passengers there have a role to perform in case of emergency in helping open the door.

This seems like another cheap measure that decreases customer comfort rather than increase. Why? Have we seen any measures lately that go in the right direction for customers? I have the impression the answer is no.