brysal

I haven't flown Air France in years and was hoping for some guidance from the experts. We are on Delta business class award tickets flying Air France from BOS-CDG and the window and aisle business class seats we had reserved on the 747 for more than 3 months were changed to center section middle seat plus aisle. I am unable to change the seat at check-in --- the flight is tomorrow. Any other options? I called the US customer service number and they were pretty much worthless, saying that Air France doesn't allow them to touch the booking within 48 hours. I am Sky Team Elite Plus. I'm just frustrated that we were moved and really wanted the window and aisle. Is a last minute seat move pretty standard with Air France?

orbitmic

Did you select them on the Air France website or on the Delta one.

- If the latter, you will find dozens of threads on this forum confirming that in fact you never had any seat selected. DL shows inexistant seatmaps on AF codeshares, does not efficiently communicate the selected seats to the AF system (the two are different) and vice versa. So in short, you thought you had selected some seats but you hadn't.

- If the former, then I would guess change of aircraft configuration 744s are undergoing a major refurbishment as their shelf life has been extended and will get the latest AF product in every cabin, so if your flight was scheduled to be operated by an 'old' version and was moved to a 'new' one or vice versa, seat selections could be changed.

The reservation people are right by the way, at t-48h, control is taken away from reservations to be transferred to operations, if they had indicated any seat at that point it would have been ignored by the system. It is the same with most airline. You can check in online at t-24 from BOS to select your seats.

irishguy28

Just as a heads-up, it is now possible to select seats on AF via DL.com, as confirmed in the most recent thread on this long-running saga:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delta...ts-dl-com.html

SDQBound

- If there was an equipment change to a refurbished 747, there would be no middle seat, as the middle seat section now has only two seats.

I'm not very familiar with other European Airlines besides AF/KLM, but I have not seen any other airline ignoring seat requests at t-48. DL, AA, US, CO, B6, KE usually let you select a seat until airport control, often at T-3.

KLouis

Has happened to me with a paid business ticket on a LH flight: from aisle to middle seat, yak!

NB00

I actually read this thread differently - noticing so many still had problems since the thread was posted. So I would not count on any seat selections made through DL yet.

orbitmic

Like KLouis i have had that answer in the past with LH and also with BA (I could change my seat selection online but it would be explicitly ignored at check in and I would be put in my previously booked seat). I think DL has a different it system which integrates the reservation and operational systems so indeed when you select seats even when the seat is open for check in you are automatically sending the information to both systems, maybe it is the same with the other airlines you mention except KE where I suspect that if you manage any assignment change it was made manually (KE has the worst system I know, I have had my seat assignments changed very regularly, especially when they randomly decide to transform part of the J cabin into an extra Y cabin!!)

@irishguy28, thanks for the link, very good to know indeed, although personally I'd still recommend checking on the AF system as it is definitely not working everytime (have a forthcoming mixed AF/DL trip and information communicated correctly from AF to DL but not the other way round and I have had to change my seat on the AF website. Complex itinerary so not sure if it makes a difference...)

irishguy28

I guess, as with so many things discussed on FT, we should ALWAYS add the YMMV proviso: "Now Able to Choose AF Seats on DL.com - YMMV"