Originally Posted by
iluv2fly
This may be great in theory, but I predict it will backfire in practice. Can you imagine the gate agents trying to seat families together on a completely full flight when things went awry during booking? And instead of paging someone to the desk to ask if they would switch, they will do it unilaterally and you find out when your boarding pass beeps when you board? And of course the excuse will be that we have to change your seat so the family can sit together - you'll have no say-so whatsoever.. Can't wait to see those arguments at the gate.
I don't see a bridge from this announcement to gate agents shuffling seats at the gate. It absolutely
does not say that UA will move already seated passengers to accommodate families, just that they'll waive fees on available Preferred Seats. Rogue agents are going to rogue but I don't think this will change the number or frequency at all.
If anything this will
decrease gate agent interventions because families will be automatically seated together (if possible) prior to the gate -- and if no seats together are available presumably the app/kiosk would prompt something like "Sorry, we can't sit you together but you can change to another flight at no cost, would you like to see those options?" which may help to prevent families from even asking the GA in the first place.