wayoutwest

Did a dummy booking in business class from CHC to SYD - you have to pay $5 extra if you want an exit row seat on the domestic CHC to AKL flights, now that is tight fisted especially on full fare business fare.

treadsoftly

I never thought the LCC direction of travel would take us quite this far. Like many have said, the crew are wonderful. Management seem to be focused on revenue and have perhaps lost sight of loyalty.

Or perhaps not. Perhaps it is just a very different view from mine.

oranjemakker

from reading these posts it is not possible to select any seat without paying? Is that right?

QTFLYER

sitting in zqn (don't you hate it when fellow pax finger the cheese) and has a wee natter to the staff. I was purposely moved from 17 to row 2 on the atr. I was told that as Ge/G etc use rows 16 and 17 more frequently they will become "hot seats" and would incure a charge from now....

kiwi_harry

Gold Elite here too and have a number of main trunk flights coming up. Likewise, it looks like the seats I had selected after the booking no longer show. Shows all of the Space+ seats as unavailable.

I don't normally book my flights. My client's book them, so if the requirement is that we can only pre-select seats at time of booking, then it looks I can't select a seat until 48 hours out?

stephen2d

I know people from NZ are (periodically) reading these pages. Please have the balls/guts/mana to come and talk to us before it is really too late! What is wrong with you people?

pbl22

[Not until 48 hours out from flight, is my understanding.]

Edited to add: This doesn't appear to be true. Sorry. See below.

baldingeagle

You can select a seat without paying, just not one in a "special" area such as exit row, bulkhead, etc. Just tried a dummy booking and you can select regular aisle/window/whatever seats without an extra charge.

If these kinds of fees are what's needed to make the airline profitable then I think they should address whatever fundamental profitability problems they have, rather than dump it off on customers. This can't be the right solution.

Heck, make the website more useable and maybe they wouldn't need as many call center staff.

jeffrocowboy

I just made a dummy booking domestic booking for next year, and was able to select seats in space+ at no charge (across all booking classes).

The seat maps now show pitch in cm, rather than inches, maybe to give the illusion that there is more space then there actually is.

Thai-Kiwi

Which website are you making the dummy booking on which shows seat allocation? AirNZ unsigned in? MyAirNZ? Or other?

Usually for domestic booking I don't see seat allocation until after booked and paid......

johnnyfive

Just remember the domestic prop fleet doesn't have space+. So if you're GE and you book on an ATR you have to pay $5 to select a 'standard seat'

MattNZ

Hello, first time poster but thought I might be able to add a little info to what is a pretty confusing time for us.

Looks as though as others have said that there are some IT issues with current bookings that is preventing seat selection in seat+ or exit rows, but still 'holding' the booking (ie for my flight to ZQN I am still in 4F, but cannot select anything in seat plus if I try and change it).

Thai Kiwi - in conjunction with this change, Air NZ have also allowed seat selection prior to payment, hence the talk of dummy bookings.

So the reason I think it's just a bug is that if I make a booking for AKL - ZQN return, booking 1 grabaseat, 1 saver, I can choose seat + section as normal. In fact the only difference I can see is that if I want to choose the exit row, it will charge me. But this has been well flagged. FYI I am NZ Silver, Koru.

on a side note, it now deems row 3 on a Q300 as 'preferred' and wants to charge $10. row 2 still available for free. odd.

Hope that clears up for some what is a very murky change

MattNZ

Hi Johnny, on this note, not sure if this is accurate. Just did a dummy booking WLG, CHC and I could select all but 6 seats for free. Those I could not select were 'preferred' seats and included 1A,B 15A,B 16A,B. could select 15 C,D 16 C,D for free.

pbl22

They still charge $10 for "Preferred Seats" on a 1900D (on a grab-a-seat fare).

Hadn't realised the seat booking now able to be done prior to purchase.

johnnyfive

Hi Matt. It seems you are absolutley right on that. For new bookings. I just tried some dummy ones myself. But for some reason I am still getting charged for any seat I select on my pre-'new choices' bookings even when it's one that would be free for a new booking on the same flight!

Oh boy... this is getting confusing!