camaross

You're making a lot of assumptions here. I won't tell you what assuming does, because it looks like you've already proved to everyone (here and on the plane) that the old adage is true.

mmbenidt

I'm certain that a moderately creative teenager saving a seat for their parents could make your flight far more interesting/exciting by you choosing to actually take that seat.

In fact while typing this I've just thought up a list of things that I wouldn't want to happen to me during a flight, and all involve the person sitting next to me.

Kudos to you for standing up to the injustice of seat saving on Southwest and taking your rightful stand! But I'm so sorry you're now covered in yak from complimentary peanuts. Btw-- they're salted, not honey roasted right now.

zceuxbhjutf

LOL it wasn't his rightful stand. It's just a matter of sitting down in the available seat of his choice. He only wanted one, not three.

jamesteroh

I wonder if the people that are defending the girl would feel the same if it was a business person saving the two seats for two colleagues.

If I'm flying and have an aisle seat assigned, I'm sure not going to move to a middle seat so a family can sit together on a three hour flight

SDCA

.....Then fly another airline with assigned seating.

Problem solved.

I don't think SWA will miss you with their millions of passengers they carried each year with the same complaints over and over to be honest with you.

qwertyasdfghzxcvbn

OP, you should post your info in this thread here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/south...d-list-bs.html

fireworksboy

This. ^

Orwaid

Sdca, I do fly other airlines to the point where I only fly WN if there is absolutely no other option.

And flying peak time during Spring Break, there was no other option.

Finally, it is somewhat amusing to have to resort to "well, if it so bad, fly another airline". It is precisely that attitude that United Airlines recently took, one that continues to cause them problems.

Instead, why not acknowledge that this is an undesirable side effect in their business model to a significant percentage of their passengers and work to fix it?

nsx

That seems odd. In my experience Southwest's prices are rarely competitive for peak travel times unless you have almost no advance notice.

How did it happen that Southwest was your best option for Spring Break?

djp98374

Applying your logic.....

If because my connecting flight came in late and I had A14 but got to the gate when C was starting to board and you had B25 do I get to kick you out of your aisle seat?

I have also been on a flight where the FAs kept open about 3 entire rows of seats about halfway between exit row and back of the plane because a D-1 college basketball team was on the plane. They boarded later in the process. How would you react to that??


Last flight. Had on southwest I had to rush to get to the plane....they announce door was losing shortly right after I got thru security.

That was a first in the AM flight. I was with my gf and her tonnage child. We had to split up where the teenager took and open window seat and in the back we got the last aisle w/middle seat so we could sit together.

Then on my connection, arrived later and just made 2 minutes before boarding started.

Orwaid

Nsx, everything was sold out. WN was the only option.

Djp98374, I do not understand what logic you are referring to.

Your boarding number does not get you a seat, it only potentially gets you down the jetway faster. If A14 winds up boarding with the C group, they get to claim any open seat, which would not include an occupied seat. It WOULD include a saved, but unoccupied seat. This has happened to me, where I was late getting to the gate and my A boarding number meant nothing. I took my middle seat with no complaints as that was what was left

If I was boarding a plane and the FA was saving rows of seats , I would ask them to find me an aisle seat if there were none available except for the ones being saved. The simple solution to this is to simply board groups after A60 with the families where there would still be empty rows. If that is not part of their boarding procedures, it should be.

nsx

Thanks. That's consistent with my belief that Southwest refuses to offer cheap fares even at schedule opening on peak flights. Instead they hope to sell high fares closer to the travel date. That strategy seems as if it would maximize yield.

texashoser

One important thing to remember is that this board is not a representative sample of WN's customer base. That means it's probably safe to say that the average Southwest customer doesn't hold strong feelings one way or the other when it comes to seat saving and more than likely the amount of complaints they receive regarding their lack of an explicit no seat-saving policy is negligible.

I myself have flown WN hundreds of times - sometimes saving a seat and many times walking by seats that are obviously being saved and have never witnessed the pissing matches over seat-saving documented in this thread and others.

If you're Southwest, their current policy is probably the best as it's likely to cause the least amount of heartache. I know that's not what many of you want to hear, but... If Southwest were to openly embrace seat-saving, that would destroy their early-bird and $40 A1-15 revenue-generation model by encouraging more open and brazen seat-saving techniques. I don't think anyone wants that. Not to mention this would significantly devalue one of the benefits of BS and A-List/+ status.

On the other hand, by banning seat-saving, it takes away flight attendant leeway and abilities to try and smooth a situation by a) forcing them to always side with a passenger who sits in saved seat and b) actively looking for seat savers and reminding them that it's against policy. It also will piss off families (which make up a substantial number of WN's customer base) unnecessarily.

For good or bad, their wishy-washy policy of neither specifically allowing nor banning seat saving pisses off the least amount of customers.

jamesteroh

The OP didn't kick anyone out of their seat.

Someone was saving a seat for others that had a later boarding number. If it was that important for the family to sit together, they should have purchased BS or EBCI.

If the girl was young enough she had to sit with her parents they could have boarded with family boarding. Regardless of her age, why did she have to sit with both parents? And I'm sure if she would have been flying alone the parents would have had a fit if an airline charged her a UM fee.

I have had an early A boarding pass before and gotten stuck boarding at the end due to my first flight comming in late (fortunately I never ended up with a middle seat, it was either a light load on the connection or a couple trying to save a middle seat and they would move over to the center as soon as I was about to take it). In those cases I just coimplained to WN and they credited back the fee with no hassle. I would not expect someone to move from an aisle seat but I am sure not going to take a middle seat on a three hour flight if there is an aisle seat that is unaccupied either.

Some flyers travelling with families have a sense of overentitlement. There have been a couple times were people have gotten nasty with me because I won't switch seats with them so they can sit with their spouse or kid. I have no issues with it if it's a better seat but I am not going to give up a seat I like because someone got upgraded after me when two seats available weren't together, I figure if it's that important for them to sit together, keep their seats that they probably had together back in coach or pay for a first class ticket when booking and the seat map is wide open. If it's a rare occurarnce where I check a bag or if it's an EJR or RJ and my bag will be valet checked anyway and I don't need to worry about overhead space I try to get to the gate about 10 minutes after the board in the lounge changes to show the flight as boarding, I would rather enjoy my cocktail or use the wifi instead of sitting on a plane. THere have been a couple times where people have been sitting in my seat when I boarded and had the nerve to say "I'm sitting in seat xx, I wanted to sit next to my spouse or my kid and figured you wouldn't mind", in those cases I flat out refuse to switch seats.

SDCA

Then don't fly United Airlines. Fly Delta instead.