Originally Posted by pinniped
- Once, I had an A card and was near the front of the informal line-up of A's in the boarding area. I knew I'd get a good seat. However, when I boarded and headed back to the exit row, I saw a lady had sat in the window seat and placed her luggage and coat all over the row to save it for her friends who obviously had B or C cards. It was a short flight and I didn't feel like starting a brawl with this lady, so just took a different seat. The passenger behind me did give her some sh** about it, but she didn't budge. What's the ruling here? Seems like this is uncool, but the FA's didn't exactly stop her from doing it either.
I actually think saving seats for friends / family members is fair game. Beats having them all board in C and then ask around for volunteers so they can sit together.
Originally Posted by pinniped
- Coming back from a destination where I didn't have a WiFi connection, I got stuck with a C card at the airport. Again, it was a short flight so I didn't mind too much. The counter agent told me that the flight would be full, so I knew I would have a middle seat or maybe a window in the very back if lucky. When I boarded, I noticed that bulkhead middle was available. I went to take the seat, and the people in A and C damn near threw a fit. They muttered something about how I should find a better seat in the back. I told them the airplane was full, so somebody's gonna sit there sooner or later. (As it turns out, they took bump volunteers and really did fill every seat.) The A passenger actually moved to B and gave me A (which I did not expect or ask for), but they gave me cold stares throughout the short flight. Wierd. What's the deal? Did they think they had a right to 3 seats for the price of 2 tickets?
Likewise, even on non-full flights, I consider clipping the middle seat from a couple trying to save it to be fair game. F*** them for being greedy. In the past, when I have gotten C cards due to going standby on an earlier flight, I actually look for couples trying to hold 3 seats... its an almost assured way to get a window or aisle seat while holding a C card.
Originally Posted by pinniped
Finally, on an MCI-MCO-MCI roundtrip, I noticed everybody and their cousins were lined up to preboard. Some appeared to be pushing the envelope on the Traveling With Children rule (if you are taking Little Joey off to college, you shouldn't be able to use him to preboard!), but more than that it was a big gaggle of senior citizens. I'm talking healthy, mobile seniors heading off for a cruise in Florida - not folks in a wheelchair or otherwise needing assistance boarding the aircraft. What's the rule here? Does WN let everybody preboard if they have an AARP card or something?
There have been numerous threads about pre-board-abusers. WN is supposedly trying to crack down on this.
Originally Posted by pinniped
- Lastly, if you are one of those preboarders, I firmly think it's dirty pool to sit in the exit row. If you are claiming to be "needing assistance to board", then you shouldn't also claim to be able to handle the exit door. Or if there are enough family members preboarding to sit with kids in non-exit rows and also occupy the exit row, then I'd say the cousins/uncles/whatever shouldn't be allowed to preboard. In either case, I've been among the first A's to board an empty aircraft (no through pax) and seen preboarders happily settling in to the exit row. That's cr*p.
I 100% agree that NO PRE-BOARDER SHOULD EVER GET AN EXIT ROW SEAT. As far as I can tell, EVERY condition which justifies pre-boarding disqualifies one from sitting in an exit row seat. The caveat here is that often, the exit row occupants are people who are pass-through flyers (they have a direct flight from point A to point C with a stop in point B). Of course, this will mean that the occupants you see in exit rows are different people than you saw in the pre-board line.