No more soft block for OWE AND soft block for cash coming very soon? (perhaps?)
 

So I was checking in for my AY flight this morning and asked politely for soft block of the seat next to me :) No go but the lady mentioned also that soon I can buy this service as its being introduced as a pay add on!

Other then overcrowded lounge and one drink on board there soon wont be much need to be OWE on AY! Just my soft rant :D

Seems like AY is on a roll with less then great changes, making Oneworld more of a TWO world program alliance and less attractive for me and perhaps others EX HEL...

Again if this too has been discussed here allready please feel free to chastide me and merge but I did not find this here atleast on my phone :)

Ok, I was dreaming then. I had a middle seat blocked yesterday with clear sign "enjoy complimentary free seat" or sth like that and I was thinking how nice for a non-AY OW Sapphire . Maybe it was for the another guy who was kind of overdressed.

Sound like you were sitting in a "business class seat". It might happen if they move the curtain but forgets to remove the special markers. But it isn't part of any block system.

Hardly surprising, since they've been clear on ancillary revenue being "the future". They will try to monetize anything and everything possible.
And since "soft block" isn't something that really exists it is easy to add it to the list of paid services. It's not like they are making a previously free perk into a paid service, they are introducing a new paid service.

And no. Soft-block does not currently exist. Here is me in 9A, a pre-selected seat, checking in as sequence 1. Seq1 means that this is the raw seatmap as it was when it was handed over from Altéa to departure control. Why is there someone in 9B?

Is there? Could it show as occupied because they have blocked it for you?

Yes it can.
I have seen this now many times, check-in shows next seat occupied but then in real life, it's empty.

So far there always have been sitting someone next to me, yes. On this particular flight I don't know, since I didn't fly it in the end.

But I guess it is a question of belief. People want to believe that the empty seat next to them is empty due to a soft-block and not due to coincidence.

Why are 9E, 10B, 10E and 11B free? Are they all paid-for seat selection by people who are excluded from this magic seat-block that only works on some people?

CDG-HEL last week. Two free seats behind in the curtain: my neighbor seat and the one behind.

On a statistical basis, I am pretty damn sure that the seat block exists.

Yes it was 6th row and felt like more legroom (is it?) than normal economy seat and the curtain was on third row.

It has ALWAYS been for the past year or so so that if I try to check in on mobile app the seat next to me is shown as occupied. If I don't finish the check-in on mobile but go online from a laptop, the same seat is shown free. So yes, the seat next to me has been blocked but it's shown differently on different user interfaces.

However, if I have chosen an exit row, sometimes the seat next to me has had someone in it (usually a couple on seats BC). I guess that they still can override that soft block if someone requests an exit row at the check-in counter even though it might not be possible on self-service check-in?

I asked CS about the seat block so that we don’t have to speculate. This is their answer:

If there is plenty of space on a flight, our system tries to offer free seat next to our frequent flyers so that traveling would be more comfortable. This isn’t always possible, for example when the flight is fully booked. We can’t block the seats manually.

Thanks! I wonder if this ends all the speculation, though.

Also, are they really not able to override what the system does?

This is just the normal function of the Altéa seating. Algorithms control how people are seated. High valued customers are treated differently, but there are so many factors in play, you cannot not compare it to the simple logic of "platinum member -> seat blocked"

Oliver2002 posted a great tutorial video on how this works.

Can we now please stop talking about a seat block?

Just curious did you ask if it exists for all FF or a specific group ie AY Platinum.