CanadaDH

Was travelling yesterday in a party of 2 from BOS to YYZ in J, and found another passenger had a boarding pass with the same seat assignment as me.

Fortunately, there was 1 empty seat in the J cabin, so the FA worked everything out. But I'm curious what would have happened if the cabin was full?

If they had to bump someone down to Y or off the flight completely, is there a published formula for the compensation calculation or a list of passenger options/rights? I was flying in paid business, but with it being a P fare, could AC try to offer something stupid like the difference between what I paid 6 weeks ago and what full Y was selling for on the day of travel?

tinchote

I don't know the answer to the question, but I'm interested in seeing an answer.

InTheAirGuy

Most often, this is a reprinted boarding pass error. They can easily check it by looking at the checkin sequence number.

canadiancow

Yeah, what did the manifest say?

That's where I'd look for the solution.

HerpaYvr

...and if there was no empty seat is it rock paper scissors or status?

Diabeetus

Every time I've had this happen, it's because one of us has the wrong boarding pass out from a different flight.

CanadaDH

I didn't look that closely. The other PAX showed his electronic pass and the seat did indeed say the same seat number, but I didn't check the flight number to see if it was the wrong pass. It was flight 7495 yesterday and seat 2D in case it was another FTr!

The other thing that I find odd, is that I was right at the front of the boarding line, and by the time I got on the plane when they started boarding, this guy was already seated with his bag stowed and seatbelt fastened in my seat, so I don't know where he even came from.

If both were current boarding passes, and the system did assign the same seat twice, I am still curious what the procedure would be.

bingocallerb22

This. The SD didn't check the BP for route, found a free seat, and one of us ended up in the wrong city.

canadiancow

I don't think it's that someone was on the wrong flight.

Just that I'm flying SFO-YYZ in 1D and YYZ-YOW in 2C, and happen to pull up the wrong boarding pass when trying to figure out where to sit, and when questioned about it.

CanadaDH

I also don't think he was on the wrong flight. Just getting past the security check into the small Air Canada gate area at BOS (which is separate from the other gates in the terminal) limits the number of flights you could incorrectly board. And then to not realize that you're on a flight to Toronto instead of the right city after making the boarding announcements would be strange. All of the other AC flights out of BOS to YUL, YHZ or YOW are all on aircraft (I think) that don't even have J cabins, so it'd be hard to not notice the difference when stepping on the E75. Not impossible, but I seriously doubt it.

Still, the SD said to us that we're supposed to have one empty seat in the J cabin, and so the other guy can move to that one. Once he moved to that seat, the J cabin then filled up, which suggests that we still had one more passenger than what the SD was thinking we should have, or perhaps just an upgrade clearing at the gate made it full. I thought it odd that the SD never actually looked at either of our boarding passes when I mentioned that we both had the same seat assignment, and just took my word for it. Maybe he was just busy.

westbeach

This happened to me once on a TK flight. The willy old lady connecting used her previous flight's boarding pass to upgrade herself. When she showed it to me and the steward, she covered the flight info and showed only the seat number. She wouldn't move nor would she release the bp from her grip. Eventually they spoke to her in her native language menacingly and she moved.

Qster

It happened to me once and it was my error. YYZ-YEG, did electronic check-in and received e boarding pass the night before. Afternoon meeting did not go well, quickly checked seat availability for a later flight using my phone, in doing so, UNCHECKED myself and freed up my seat. Another PAX took the seat. When I showed up at airport and checked my luggage, the agent asked if I needed paper BP and I said no and proceeded with my e version not realizing that I had been assigned a different seat. Went through security, MLL and GA no issue to find seat taken on board. The FA quickly sorted it out with a call to the GA.

tkyoshi

Electronic passes don't update automatically so it could have been re-assigned to you and he/she never updated.

However technically when they scan during the boarding process I would think it should error out? I know I accidentally tried to board w/ a non-refreshed electronic pass once (I changed seats online after checking in), and the computer beeped saying someone was already in that seat.