Lomapaseo

Neat arguments between the members.

I don't care who wins ... but if AC had allowed the kid to remain, then I for one would avoid flying AC .. we have choices that top any soft feelie type arguments

tartempion

Yep, flying next month in J with my 7 year young daughter, it's or both of us in Y or both of us in J, since I loathe Y I paid for 2 in J.
I always fly Y short haul with her (not worth the expense for J), curious for a long haul in J with her, I haven't told her yet, she has no clue how different it will be anyway.

rankourabu

Did you miss the thread where the toddler who tried to use the sacred J lavatory got roasted??

MSPeconomist

Are you well behaved?

Low Roller

[QUOTE] I'm more disturbed about the lesson that it is teaching the child. Not only did the father abandon him (and presumably whoever else was flying with him) in order to enjoy the comforts of J, but then he teaches the kid that it's ok to move up front if there are any empty seats. For those of you who use the "he's only a kid" argument, just remember that he won't be a kid forever. He will be an entitled teen in a few years and an entited adult a few years after that. [QUOTE]

How is this twisting or inventing the facts? Seriously, that is exactly what happened. The father chose to fly in the comfort of J and made the kid slum it in Y.

Jeannietx

I really, really don't like AC Rouge and I'm also amazed at all of the hostility back and forth.

After Burner

People Express Airlines collected all fares onboard during the early part of the flight. They didn't offer an option to buy a ticket on the ground.

CZAMFlyer

All of these transactions are completed before the airplane leaves the ground, are they not? Which was - again - not the case in the example we're discussing.

If you can pass convincingly as a 6 year old boy whose father in First has asked you to join him, then we can debate this tactic. If you are an adult, your example does not effectively address my argument. I had thought I had made the child/adult distinction abundantly clear, but it appears I have not.

No kidding. I have dared to pose a question contrary to the collective ethos, and challenge the responses. The reaction has been swift and harsh, if not actually pertinent. Some will argue an unconnected point, and when advised that point wasn't being advanced, will argue it more stridently. I'm retiring for the evening to strains of Samuel L Jackson's Ezekiel 25:17 tirade - with great vengeance being rained down upon this poor shepherd by the compassionate members of the Aeroplan forum.

MSPeconomist

24left

If someone wants to sit in Business or Premium Economy and they did not pay for it prior to boarding, and their BP shows they are seated in Y, there are airlines who will accept payment onboard and it can be done in-flgiht as with BoB.


In the end, there are at least 3 different views here (possibly more if one were to bring in a professional analyst ) and clearly, a few of us feel the discussion is worth going beyond the OP by @capedreamer

At the very least, this thread has been a well-mannered and most enlightening discussion.

Allan38103

If you ask them to let you move, and they say "Yes." you're home free

vytas315

I believe @CZAMFlyer is advocating for a compassionate response for a father and his son. There's nothing wrong with this. In the issue of keeping parents and their children together I think we all agree, they should be allowed to sit together.

In this scenario the solution would be simple: book your tickets in the same class of service and there is no issue. No one forced the father to sit in J. The problem is that the father found himself worthy of better treatment than his son, then wanted the privilege of his son joining him in J. I'm with the vote saying if they want to sit together, either buy two J tickets or go and join the son in Y.

If the airline wants to make an exception it is up to them, but I wouldn't find them under any ethical obligation to allow the child to sit in J.

Adam Smith

Why are you opposed to an adult consuming a service that they did not a pay for, but not a child?

How is it not stealing?

If I break in to a rental car lot after the agency has closed for the night, take a car and drive it for a few hours, then return it (with tank refilled) before they open the next day, I didn't deprive the rental company of any revenue, because they were already closed for the day.

If I sneak in to a sold out concert without paying for a ticket, I didn't deprive the concert promoter of any revenue because they already sold as many tickets as they could sell.

I go to the theatre and walk in to a movie just after it has started and there's no ticket-taker, plunk myself down in an empty seat and stay for the movie. They won't sell any more tickets for the movie, so I haven't deprived them of any revenue.

How about I buy cheap seats to the upper bowl of a hockey game then move down halfway through the 1st period to the premium seats just behind the bench? The tickets weren't sold, or the ticketholders didn't show up, so I didn't cost the team anything.

In each case, the revenue loss to the service provider was "exactly nil". But in each case, I have taken something that did not belong to me. Something that everyone else has paid for.

No one here is arguing that the kid or the father should be locked away for life for it, but it's a pretty clear theft of services. (That's probably a more appropriate term linguistically given that "steal" often has a connotation more related to physical goods, e.g. "Take (another person's property) without permission or legal right and without intending to return it" from the Oxford Dictionary, but "stealing" is certainly correct in spirit).

If he wanted to sit beside his son, he could have gone back to Y. Surely someone in Y would have happily taken the father's seat in J if Y had been full. The kid (or rather his parents) did not pay for him to sit in J, yet he would be sitting in J. Unlike every other person who sat where they had paid to sit (in one currency or another) or were upgraded at the discretion of the airline (if there were any op-ups).

That's a pretty textbook case of special treatment.

How terrible it must be for the poor boy to sit in Y for you to feel compassion!

• compassion, per Oxford Dictionary: Sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others
• compassion, per Merriam-Webster: sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it
• compassion, per Cambridge Dictionary: a strong feeling of sympathy and sadness for the suffering or bad luck of others and a wish to help them

Sufferings, misfortunes, distress, bad luck! My oh my, how awful is Y?!?

You know, I really would like to be able to drive a Ferrari. Would you mind using your compassion to help me get the Ferrari dealer to drive one around on Sundays? They're closed anyway, so it's not like they'll be doing anything else with the car.

Okay, so, the scope of the debate is that this six-year-old child who you assumed to be well-behaved (I thought assumptions we unhelpful?) wanted to sit with his father in business class (or vice versa) and you're happy to debate this but:

• anyone who argues that taking something without paying for it is theft is out of scope because you disagree
• anyone who refers to a child of a different age is out of scope because we're only referring to a six-year-old child
• anyone who refers to a child that's poorly behaved is out of scope because you have assumed this child to be well behaved

So what exactly is within the scope of the debate? Which one of the father and son should have gotten the window?

It has been argued by many here that the event in question was a theft of services - the father attempted to have his son consume a service (a business class seat) that he had not paid for. Taking things that one have not paid for is commonly considered to be theft and is not widely condoned in our society.

Should we condone liquor store robberies because we weren't affected? Is someone embezzling money from a company okay if it's not the company we work for?

So what? If anything, teaching a child to get things without paying for them is worse.

You and CZAMFlyer seem to think that things happen in a vacuum, but life is not that simple. While BenL's infamous cheapening comment may have lacked tact, he was saying something that had been said for a while by other airlines. DL, in particular, has been vocal for years about the fact that much of its front cabins have been filled with people who got there through complimentary upgrades (i.e. paid no premium for their premium experience). In any one case, letting a customer sit up front without paying for it (either through comp up or, as in this case, just taking the seat) teaches customers that it can be done without paying for it and they adjust their behaviour accordingly.

While CZAM used the term "slippery slope" in a pejorative sense to imply that this assumption was fallacious, but the airline industry has real life experiences that bear it out and has been pushing customers to move away from this model.

Your boundless self-righteousness is truly extraordinary. Others have, in fact, made logical, coherent arguments as to why this should not be permitted and you have dismissed them out of hand as irrelevant.

quantumofforce

AC won't let a six year old sit alone.


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Well, if the FA had those little BoB credit card readers set up, it could be quite trivial. Scoot does it, almost considered last weekend, but then I'd have left my 2 year old in a seat by herself, lol.

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You should run a discount airline.


​​​​​​​I'd the father asked before, and the door SD said yes, then I would be OK with it. Heck, the not asking probably upsets the SD for his authority is being circumvented.

Badenoch

Even if just limited to children if one parent does it all the rest may too and you end up with J looking like a day care. No thanks.