Seat selection 2A/2K - LX F
 

Hi,

I wrote to SWISS to get a seat assignment for an upcoming trip from Montreal to Shanghai. It's an award ticket and I requested either 2A or 2K (they are available on all flights). In the past I never had a problem getting those seats in advance by calling them.

The answer I got by email is the following:

"Seats 2A/K on SWISS aircraft on the longhaul flights are facility seats which the airline needs in case of oxygen, wheelchair passengers, baby baskets etc. Therefore, we are at this stage unable to assign these seats for you. These seats could be requested at the check in desk two hours before departure if they are available.

However, we have requested seats 1D and 2D on the longhaul flights with SWISS. Should the other seats not be occupied, you could still check with the flight attendant on board or at the checkin whether you could change seats."

I don't really appreciate the "lie" in the first paragraph. If she said the seats were reserved for HON pax, I would understand, even if I was able to select those seats in the past. However, the "oxygen, wheelchair passengers" excuse... :rolleyes:
And the "two hours before departure if they are available"... Well, when you do the check-in process, you can get any seat you want as long as nobody selected it already,no? I don't recall not being able to select a seat in LX F when checking in online.

I am going to call them tomorrow, maybe that will work better than by contacting them on their website. But I am thinking about writing to the customer service again to tell them I didn't appreciate the lies... :rolleyes:
Or if she was not trying to find an excuse for HON reserved seats.. where did she get the information from?

Seats 2A/K are technically facility seats, so the agent here did not lie to you in the strict sense.

However, it is not true that those seats can therefore not be pre-assigned. The correct response should have been:

"Please note that your requested seats are facility seats. While I have gladly assigned them to you for now, please be advised that in case of passengers with special needs joining your flights, your seat assignment may have to change."

True, and also my experience. Also, if you don't like the answer, hang up and call again. Having said that, I noticed the holes in the wall at 1A and 1K for the bassinet and thought about this reply being somewhat odd.

I am also struggling with LX right now to get seat 2A or 2K assigned for a flight from BKK to ZRH. The answer from LX Customer Service to my request via E-mail was that they can not reserve seat 2K "without a special reason". Further I was told that 2A is already taken.

In the past I never had any problems reserving seat 2K. I never have been reseated.

Even if flying with an award ticket or an upgrade LX should not treat loyal customers like that. I fully understand that they have to add the disclaimer that you will eventually be reseated. But I do not understand that they refuse to make a reservation for seat 2K at all.

@thyeri: Please let us know if you were succesful to get seat 2K by phone.

In my single first class experience I flew Swiss F from ZRH to ORD and back on an award ticket. Naturally, since I was travelling alone, I tried to book single seats by the window (a/c was an MD11, back in 2004), but the agent on the phone told me that there were no window seats available for preassignement at the moment, so assigned me seats in the middle (D or G, I can't remember) but she said she'd make a note in the PNR that I would prefer window. When I checked in for the flight in ZRH I found I had been relocated to 3A, and when I returned from ORD I had been already put in 3K.

I have had the same experience as the OP recently, it is taking more and more effort to get the "facility seats":

The first request was by phone for 1K and 2K PVG-ZRH in May this year, the agent assigned the seats with no problem with a short remark about 2K being a facility seat and the possibility of being re-assigned.

The second request was by phone for 1K and 2K BOS-ZRH in June this year, the agent assigned the seats with no problem with a short remark about 2K being a facility seat and the possibility of being re-assigned.

The third request by phone for 2K PVG-ZRH in August this year, the agent was very reluctant and I had to mention my SEN status, and only after leaving me on hold for a couple of minutes checking with somebody, I was given the seat.

The last request was maybe 10 days ago, again for 1K and 2K on ZRH-BKK and PVG-ZRH, the agent first told me there was no way to assign those seats, and after I mentioned that I have had the seats reserved before (this is the same reservation as in my first call in May, but the date changed and one leg was added), she tried something and came back with a "not possible" again. I mentioned both passengers being SEN again and only then, and after being put on hold for a couple of minutes again, I was given the seats, "but only as an exception".

So it does seem to take more and more effort, maybe some internal LX rule has changed? :confused:

I still don't understand why 2A and 2K are "facility seats". What difference do they have compared to other seats?

Does facility seats mean that only SEN/HON can get them? I don't see any other reason why they would block these seats... :rolleyes:

I will call them again later. :rolleyes:
Should I mention my *A G status?

I hope that our LX lurker is also lurking around in this thread and can bring some improvement to the current situation.

Regardless of the outcome and of the way LX will handle reservations of seat 2A/2K, there should at least be some consistency in handling such requests and also in communication.

I never had any issue to get any of the window seats as a HON. But I recognized that such seats have not been visible before in a online seatmap tool and just show up as reserved after I requested such a seat. So it is very likely HON and mabye SENs (and maybe fullfare F pax :o) can access those seats anytime, whereas others may have to wait until checkin.

I was told this very same thing when trying to get 2A on a recent LX flight.

Which is okay IMHO. On LH it can happen, that all 4 window seats went to award bookings long before the 2 or 3 full fare pax make a booking and have to live with some of the middle seats.

In this particular case the flight to BKK was only booked 3/8 in F, with the other two passengers in 1A and 1K. So they would only assign me a middle seat and not one of the two windows in row two.

This was exactly the same situation on the return flight to ZRH, and they wouldn't budge on assigning me 2A or 2K.

I had to wait until check in on both legs to finally get my preferred seats.

I was in 2k on 8/23 jfk-gva. booked with miles through ANA 4 months out. Called swiss shortly thereafter and requested 2a or 2k. was told 2a was unavailable but we can put you in 2k. only 3/8 F seats occupied (2a empty). btw, there was a wheelchair passenger. She sat in 1k.

I have no status with anyone

Even with the HONcho status I recently had trouble to get 2A or 2K, even though the seats were not assigned. It took a bit of patience with the (usually excellent) LX HON call centre.

Normally, 1A and 1 K are blocked.
To get 2A or 2K, simply go to lufthansa's website, and go to the section 'manage my booking' and select your seat.

If it is blocked (like 1A or 1K), click on 'window' instead of selecting the seatmap, and with a bit of luck, within the minute you will get 1A or 1K.

If that still doesn't work, contact the LX call center and ask them and mention them that the seat is not taken.
They will tell you a bunch of nonsense such as the seat is blocked for HONs, or babies,...
Keep trying and it will work out.

I am talking out of experience for my recent flight HKG-ZRH in F.