joshua362

Probably because their lawyers have vetted every possible single permutation of seat saving scenarios and concluded that not putting something in writing affords the least amount of risk to them...

ursine1

By my observation, seat saving appears to be increasing. It is no longer unusual to see someone save an entire row, or multiple seats in the exit row, or witness verbal altercations between passengers over saved seats.

Much like preboarding abuse, this is a logical result of Southwest's monetization of their "open" seating system.

The lack of any policy regarding seat saving is a delinquent shirking of responsibility for the consequences of the situation they created.

I suspect negligence will indeed be cited at some point if the escalation continues and results in physical harm to a passenger.

Allan38103

They don't "publish" such a policy because there is none. If you want to "save" a seat next to you, you CAN. No prohibition. But if you want to sit where someone else has "saved", you also CAN. No prohibition here either.

And I am also for a policy of "No Exceptions", except for the exceptions I think are OK.

nsx

I see very little of it on my commuting flights. I surmise that there aren't many families traveling at peak commute hours on short flights.

sbrower

Simple and accurate summary.

ursine1

I do suspect that seat saving is higher on routes with more families and/or groups than on business ones.

And, not to get bogged down in semantics, but I believe when asking why they don't publish a policy the point is really to ask why they don't have a policy.

nsx

I think we know the answer to that. Any policy for or against would, if enforced, annoy more customers than the current non-policy under which customers can and do consider the specific circumstances. Furthermore any policy would create more flight delays than the current non-policy.

Tanic

Seat "saving" appears to have escalated to seat "blocking". A few years ago, a coat or purse placed on a seat was the method. Now it's become more egregious with some seat hogs doing whatever they want to make prime seats unavailable knowing that cabin crew does not intervene.

I wonder if enough paying pax demanded EBCI/BS refunds, or A-List compensation in these situations, that WN management might be forced to change their non-policies.

rsteinmetz70112

Eventually there is going to be a pretty nasty incident of this stuff and when it makes it all over the Internet and someone gets hurt they will change it.

I imagine a policy of saving no more that the seats on one side of one raw would cover 99% of the incident until some hyper sensitive parent with a husband and 4 children goes and Jerry Springer for the local TV news.

ursine1

I believe there is no policy because to have one would be to acknowledge the problems inherent in their current boarding system.

Leaving it up to the passengers to "work it out among themselves" (official language), implies that any resulting issues are caused by the passengers, not Southwest.

Again, however, I believe that this approach is unsustainable if the issues continue to increase, and suspect an incident (or incidents) will eventually force Southwest to officially address the situation.

Another consideration is that the problem becomes moot upon the implementation of assigned seating.

Troopers

Worst is the seat and bin saving that I posted in the other seat saving thread.

rsteinmetz70112

This is my favored solution. Plus I continue to believe monetizing seat selection will make them more money.

nsx

Unless A&E tapes a new "reality" show on Southwest I doubt this will happen. People fight on TV _because_ they are on TV.

rsteinmetz70112

We see people claiming all sorts of stuff to get on TV all the time, often things turn out not to be what was initially reported. There also seem to be an increasing number of disruptive altercations on airplanes, that may simply be the media being the media or it could be real. I think it's real because I'm seeing more bad behavior than there used to be.

jm2cc

I was on a flight on Monday June 13th. Charlotte to Houston. My DH & I were A30 & 31.
I walked on the plane 1st, we try and get closer to the front of the plane. My DH prefers aisle seat so I am searching for the 1st empty one. The 1st few rows had multiple seats taken and the following rows with just 1 person - people stated this row is saved.
So now I am at the exit row and there is a woman on one side and she says she is saving both exit seats and two directly in front of her for her family. The gentlemen on the opposite row also was saving a seat in the exit row.
So we sat directly behind the exit row, 1st aisle seat available on A30 & A31 boarding pass!!!
The flight attendant was standing in the aisle right beside the exit row and heard them "save" their seats. I made a comment to him that that the plane had an awful lot of seat savers. He said there wasn't anything he could do - he had been yelled at too many times about the issue. (although I didn't not expect him or ask him to do anything - just stated my observation).

In Houston while waiting for our connecting flight, I asked a SW rep what the Policy is for holding seats. Basically, he said there isn't one. So I said I should have saved my money and only bought one early bird seat and then saveda seat for DH. He said yes or wait until I get to the airport and buy the upgrade to get A1-A16. I said that that would be risk since that option is not always available. And in this instance, they pre boarded a group of about 9-10 people with no explanation. Then they announced the pre-board group who need assistance (again about 5-6 people) before they even boarded A1 to A15. So I would not be happy if I paid extra and some of those folks and can then also save seats! Devalues the whole purpose of buying the early bird! Frustrating!