Originally Posted by Luckytri
Being polite goes a long way!! Years ago before reaching Silver on NW, I flew to LAS with my mom. My mom being in her 70's, I had requested a bulkhead seat for her. Upon entering the plane, a younger gentleman was in my mother's seat. Both boarding passes said 5A. The FA had asked him politely if he would give up his seat so an elderly person could sit there. He refused and said that this was "his" seat and was not moving. He was very upset that they would assign 2 people to the same seat. FA asked for both boarding passes and took them to the GA. So here we were standing in the aisle while others went around us to board. FA came back and said that you can stay in "your" seat. She turned to my mom and said to follow her. HER seat will be 2A. That made my day.
I have had the similar run in with elderly people wanting the bulkhead (although in F). I was in 1C (my preferred seat) and an 80 yr old lady was in 1D. Her daughter (still 40 yrs older than me) just hovered in front of my for 15 min. No one asked me to move or implied I had to move, but I still felt like they were pressuring me to move. She was in 3C (not the end of the world although it was a transcon). Finally I figured this could get ugly and just asked her if she would like to sit in my seat. All she had to do was politely ask in the first place.