LIH

Flying back from LAS > ORD on an A fare last Friday. Night before I selected 3B on check-in. Didn't even really look at my boarding pass and boarded and took 3B. Turns out I was moved to 2A at some point. No idea how it happened. Not a big deal but that was the first random seat assignment change I've had it some time. To my knowledge there was no aircraft swap, though I do think one seat in steerage went out of service.

lincolnjkc

Had something similar happen on an IAH-something a few weeks ago. Selected 2A at booking, confirmed 2A at OLCI. Verified 2A when I checked my bags and got a paper boarding pass at the origin airport. Go to board and the gate reader makes "angry noise" displays something like "SEAT CHANGED - NEW SEAT 2F" and spat out a new boarding pass.

Agent tried telling me that "I must have gotten upgraded" uh... nope. F fare.

I just smiled and continued down the jetway to my new seat. In the end, a F window is a F window. (I get slightly claustrophobic in aisles/if I can't see outside). 2A was occupied by someone who appeared to be associated with 2B so I'm guessing in my case an agent somewhere along the way just swapped me to seat them together without bothering to warn me in advance.

The other interesting thing is the change must have happened relatively late and FAs apparently weren't given an updated manifest because they were asking a very confused new 2A if he was "Mr. LincolnJKC"

harryhood

I feel like random seat changes happen all the time on the 787's, especially when I try for anything in 1D/E on either plane (with the 789 featuring more involuntary shifts of my seat assignment IME, and also featuring a lot of shofts when in row 6 too). At one point, with a reserved seat on the 789 LAX-PVG last year, I would check every day, and every day I would have been moved from 1 or 6 D or E to another random seat, I would duly move back to my preferred seat in row 1 or 6, and then the next day I would discover I had been moved again.

On some occasions the seat assignment "firms up" 5-6 days before departure, and then on other occasions I get moved until 1D/E are both occupied and I am forced to find something else.

I don't get it.

JK-SFO

I used some of my miles to help an elderly friend get back to the city he grew up in for one last time in his life. He flew SFO-Another Hub-Hometown. He is 79, hasn't flown in 10+ years, probably won't fly again. He wanted window seats to enjoy the view.

Well . . . his outbounds were on the 737-900, then E175 (I think). He was moved from E- windows sometime between the afternoon before the flights (I was checking every day!) and when we were checking him in at the lobby in SFO the morning of. I was able to get a gate pass and talk with the agent once we got to the gate. She had actually already put him in exit row windows (could she tell that I had obtained the ticket for him - I'm 1K MM), but he is too frail to qualify for there. Of course, there were no windows left. He ended up with 7E (middle) and then 7B (aisle) in the bulkhead rows. These are great seats but not windows. Also - I think he had to put his little bag up in the overhead, which meant he had to have someone help him with that. Again - the gate agent was apologetic, very nice, really helpful, got the best possible seats for him that she could. I stayed until after boarding to thank her. She was great.

Coming back (A319, then A320) he got to keep his pre-assigned window seats, on the A side, which made his return flying looking out the window really wonderful! I think his niece checked him in online the day before, which may have made the difference -?

We all know that seat assignments are not guaranteed but why does that also mean that they are so ridiculously fragile with United's IT systems? Why?

Why would a company want someone's experience to be: (1) United has advance seat assignments for free; and (2) When I use that feature it doesn't work?

JK-SFO

wco81

I completed a trip and the return routing was AES-OSL-EWR-SFO on June 3rd.

When I booked this trip months ago, I selected seats.

But when I got my boarding pass from the SAS desk at AES, they put me and my companion on 38D and 38E of UA212, the EWR-SFO segment.

It was very early and I didn't notice it.

In fact when I boarded, I realized we were in the very last row of that plane.

Then I dug up my e-ticket email and saw that I had chosen 23C and 23D.

All the other seat selections made at purchase time (back in November or December) held but not the seats on UA212.

I know it's a heavily in demand flight. Anyone ever get bumped out of E+ seats? I'm a Premier Gold?

KAFlyer

I've found that this is happening quite often in the past few months. Just this morning I was bumped out of my E+ window seat and stuck in a middle seat in economy. This is the second time this has happened to me in the past two months. We're going to have to reconsider our business with United. I never had this issue with AA.

I think the only way to "solve this" it is to take away United reps' ability to bump other flyers out of their seats. United used to bump people only in emergencies or in very very special cases; now they seem to do it just to please other customers that complain (family of an elite flyer not sitting together, etc.).

mduell

Seat scrambling on the merged airline, and before that at PMCO, is a long standing practice noted on these forums.

See multiple prior threads on the issue, going back a decade:

PMCO 2006 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/conti...-changing.html
PMCO 2010 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/conti...signments.html
UA 2012 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unite...12-2014-a.html (thread started within a month after the PSS merger)
UA 2015 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unite...15-2016-a.html

gpicur

Like CivicDriver above, I purchased a business class ticket CAI-ORD-DMM on March 31 and selected seat 6B (my favorite) on the 777-200 MUC-ORD leg. I checked today and found that I had arbitrarily reassigned seat 8B. There was no aircraft change (i.e. it was 3 class when I booked and it still is 3 class) .

I'm not happy as 8B is a backwards seat and the only other seats are middles and one window, neither of which makes me happy.

I just sent my feelings on this issue to 1KVoice and asked for 6B back. If the pilot needs a crew seat, let her/him sit in 8B. Also, if this is not possible, I asked if they would waive the GPU restrictions on my "P" fare ticket and let me use a GPU certificate to upgrade to Global First.

What say you wise FT sages ?

Kacee

Don't ever pick 6B on a long-haul.

NH_Clark

+1 .. sadly, the right answer.

WineCountryUA

You can ask anything just be aware the answer will be no & no.

sciflyer

Flew PIT-IAH today. We started (at IAH a few days ago) with a Plat, Gold, and kid on a single itinerary, plus a second kid on a reward ticket. The PNRs were split when we were put on the upgrade list on the outbound. Seat assignments on the return were supposed to be 11A-D, and we had called United to get the reward ticket into E+. We show up at PIT today and find the wife (Plat) still in 11D, but the other three of us in random middle seats in E+. I am not aware of an equipment change and today's flight was a 737-9, so it's unlikely they switched away from a larger aircraft. The ticketing agent couldn't help and neither could a phone agent (neither of which surprised me), but the gate agent was full of crap about how a seat assignment is not guaranteed, yada yada. He ended up putting me and my 6 and 9 year old in row 15 which, he assured me, was still E+. I will charitably assume that he was unaware of which 739 version this was, because row 15 on this bird was not E+. As my wife is swapping on board from 11 to 15, the flight attendant asked what was up and she loudly exclaimed her displeasure. Three different groups of passengers in the near vicinity shared similar stories and, indeed, we had another seat change fiasco on a recent BOS-IAH flight a few weeks ago. Social media friends were full of these stories, too.

WTH, United? Splitting families up and putting them all in middle seats in different rows? Don't give me any BS about splitting the PNRs being the reason for this - that does not give cause to randomly change seat assignments (plus, if their system for tracking PNRs cannot link those that started on the same itinerary, then they need a new system). Lying (er, being misinformed) about what is an Economy Plus seat and what is not? Twice in a month? Not impressive.

Michilander

Have a trip IAD-LHR coming up in Sept. Got what I thought was a good fare and popped for GF on a 777-200. GF was empty when I booked, so I seated us in 2C-2H both ways. Every time I checked it we were still in those seats and all the others were shown as available. Until the other day. Checked the reservation and we had been moved to 2H-2K on the inbound and all the seats in GF were shown as booked, so could not move us back. Of course, UA just gave me the company line on seats not being guaranteed when I asked if they could move us back. Not the end of the world, but still irritating.

At least, we did not get downgraded. But, I am curious about what caused the cabin to fill up all at once and why they had to move us.

Outbound we are still the only two shown booked in GF.

Kmxu

I picked up seat 4A for UA 200 (Guam-HNL) on Hawaii configuration B777. UA sent me a text message and changed my seat to 3A two days before the journey. The excuse was aircraft swap. When I boarded this flight, a couple sat behind me (4A and 4B). Apparently, UA lied to me because there was no aircraft swap.

halls120

If I had bought C and H in GF for MsHalls120 and I, and UA changed us to H and K without asking, I would send a nice short letter to Oscar informing him that if this is how his airline treated passengers who actually paid for GF, that I would be taking my business elsewhere.