I am traveling from DXB-DFW by EK 221 in J on Sunday, 12th Feb. Expert Flyer flight availability reads as follows:

P4 A4 J4 C4 I3 O3 Y3 E0 R0 W0 M0 B0 U0 K0 H0 Q0 L0 T0 V0 X0

I am trying to block my seat online using 'Manage my booking' but am unable to. Every time I try, I get a message "Sorry, we are unable to save the changes. Please check all information and try again". I have tried doing this so many times now, a bit of that irritation is creeping into the conversations I have with my wife. And we all know how that is going to end.

The seat map shows only 6 seats available and only two of these are aisle seats. As as you folks can imagine, I am freaking out at the prospect of spending 16+ hours sitting between two other strangers. I know that a few of you might say that I could get lucky etc. etc. but I would not bet on it. God has never been that kind.

So the million dollar question is how good/bad are the op-up possibilities on this flight ( I am a Skywards gold and we all know how cool that is). If they are zero, I might as well prepare to drink heavily in the lounge before I board the flight.

EK does have a phone number... The amount of time it took for you to write the above post you could have called the Gold number and had them assign your seat!

LOL

-Phil

Honestly it took me a few minutes to write that. And I did try calling through to EK, was on hold for sometime and then got dis-connected.

When calling the number in the UAE (+971 421 44 44 4) and recognized as a Gold member, I always get surprisingly someone right away on the line. Maybe it is a good idea to call the UAE number from the country where you are (assuming you are not in the UAE)?

What is this mysterious "Gold number"????

I know the "Gold Desk" exists, but I have never been able to actually reach them. When I call +971 42144444, it just goes into a regular que and when I ask for the "Gold Desk" I am always told that it doesn't exist.

There is no special number. But by calling the above number it can recognise your number as a gold member. But I always call from my UAE cell so I don't know if it works with foreign numbers.

Works with foreign numbers, but try the regular booking line and it will recognise you as Skywards straight away. Never had to wait more than a minute

Your local office (if outside of UAE) has a Skywards desk which will handle seat assignments, and even unblock seats which show as unavailable online!