Originally Posted by
Schwann
I suspect they're expecting a busy flight, and encouraging people to arrive early so they can, well... queue early. My advice isn't scientific but I am positive you can just turn up at your usual time.
Agreed. If everybody showed up at T-4.5hrs, there'd just be a massive queue.
Originally Posted by
indomie
I would have thought that, too, but when I was rechecking our seats yesterday it looked like economy was barely 1/3 full. To your main suggestion, yes - I have no intention of being there 4.5 hours early (unless someone else knows something I haven't thought of).
This is the first time I booked a Qatar Airways flight through American Airlines because the price was close to half that of booking through Qatar. I wonder if that could be the issue. But.... I'm crediting to Qatar & am Gold with them, so I'd assume they can see that (if that even is the issue).
The seat map is a poor indicator of the actual load. You'll know for sure once the doors close.
And no, the codeshare has nothing to do with this.