Two Bee

Res agents are notorious for making things up and telling people anything that comes into their head, in order to move on!

WineIsGood

Absolutely - anything to close out the call!

All's well that ends well, I suppose. Was able to move into seat next to Mr WineIsGood during check in.

bocastephen

Thank you for the Air Canada notes on this thread - I just went to check both of us in, the AC website bombed the check-in for both of us (stupid airline in so many ways), I had both reservations open on United.com and saw our seat assignments in a totally full business cabin SFO-TPE disappear

Luckily I had the reservations open and got the seats back immediately, or we would have lost the 777-300 window seats we've held for months on paid business tickets, thanks to useless Air Canada.

Is there anything else I should be watching from this point aside from calling UA once we're seated on the AC flight to make sure the AC system passed the ticket lift through to UA correctly and don't arrive in SFO with the rest of our itinerary canceled? I guess next time we will avoid AC altogether and just book UA operated flights even with the lower service levels upfront.

Fizzer

I don't recall TBH. I went to check in on AC and selected seats on AC. Then, when I printed the BP, I noticed that the seat assignments on the UA flights were changed and we were moved from E+ to E.. As I said earlier once I had checked in I was unable to reselect the seats on the UA page. Once you check in on AC the UA webpage will not let you check in or change assignments. Somebody said to try the App and maybe that's the way to go next time. More than 1 UA agent tried to reassign them but couldn't and their only suggestion was to try and get them back at the gate. Of course by that time somebody else had selected them, presumably at check in at YYC. It was only a short segment but I avoided OLCI on the return trip, in case ANA, the operator of our first segment did the same and we lost our TPAC assignments..

In fact the only problems we had on the return were also AC related. At check in at BKK they were unable to access or print AC boarding passes, presumably because it was > 24 hours out . Tried again in NRT and IAH. According to the TG agents doing check in at BKK and the UA agents in NRT and IAH, they cannot print AC boarding passes once the trip is underway and have no ability to assign seats ( the latter makes sense but not the former) .Finally, AC once more failed to deliver our bags. They are batting at about 60% in that regard in the last couple of years. They made it on the first AC segment but not the second. I really dislike that airline and almost choke every time they announce their Skytrack 4 Star award, as they do on pretty much every flight.

As an incidental note I have noticed 2 things about how AC treat UA*G. If they are overbooked we have received U/G, presumably to make room in the back, but if not we invariably get the crappiest seats, typically the back row with no recline. Our experience with UA, as an AC*G was invariably better. Not as many U/G perhaps but at least decent seat assignment, with E+ where available.

washingtonian_2017

is it normal practice for UA to change seat assignment for bulkhead seats? We (my wife, daughter and I) were flying DEN-IAD and I had bulkhead seats booked for all three of us in Y (unfortunately, I didn't make sure that I had the aisle seat). However, during checkin, i noticed that my wife had been re-assigned to a window seat a few rows back and her aisle seat was assigned to someone else. I have UA-Plat status, but my daughter and wife do not have the same status.

when I called UA premier customer desk, they gave me the standard answer that UA can re-assign seats when aircraft is changed (not in this case) or if a passenger has special needs (the person seated next to me had no visible special needs. He walked in by himself carrying a couple of bags).


So, my question is, if I called United and maintained that I had a special need, will they move anyone seated in the bulkhead row to accommodate me?

GBadger

Depending on your special need, they might (or they might ask you to handle it at the gate). Also, if you happen to be an air marshal and for some reason are seated in Y, they would.

Kacee

As you can tell from this thread, it is common for pax to lose their assigned seats, bulkhead or otherwise. No one at UA will ever tell you why it happens (though they will often offer a ridiculous explanation). The standard response is "seat assignments are not guaranteed."

What we do know is that the only seat assignment which is guaranteed is the one they gave away to someone else. Because they will always tell you they cannot give that one back to you.

acader

I have made an award reservation for my family and selected seats together. Until a week ago everything was fine. I was checking in this morning and found that all of us have been randomly moved around!!! Moreover, for a long flight, all of us have been moved to middle seats, instead of the full row that I had selected. I am the only one on the PNR that has 1K status. Quite upset about this change, irrespective of intentional or United famous automated IT stuff doing it.

JBord

Threads about random seat changes must go back to the time UA allowed online seat assignments .

It's happened to all of us at least once, and it sucks. Hopefully you get it sorted out by the time you board.

JVPhoto

Hey don't question it! Makes perfect sense I'm sure...just like the time 5 of us got swapped around. My 3 year old nephew being put by himself while the rest of us were in 2 pairs...

Nick Hermann

Aircraft swap??

sfo789

So many possible reasons for this: craft swap, flight number swap that causes a scrambling, FAM, etc., etc. Unfortunate that UA doesn't even send schedule change email notifications most of the time, let alone seat change notifications. I would keep a keen eye on the seatmap for last-min drops etc. that allow you to grab the occasional pair together or similar, and approach the gate before boarding and ask if there's anything they can do. Otherwise, you might be SOL.

jp12687

I swear united is like schrodinger's cat they can be both great and awful all at the same time.

I am 2/2 on CPU's so far this year-- and within 5 minutes of getting my last CPU i noticed that within the last 2 days my wife (Silver) lost her seating assignment on an upcoming award trip to Hawaii (been booked for 4+ months been checking it every 2 days). Call up united "there was a schedule change back on dec 1 that could cause a lost seat assignment" i explain this happened in the last 2 days "well do you want to change your reservation to guarantee a seat?"

no-- no i want united to honor the booking...everytime this has happened in the past i have gotten to the airport to be told i'm sitting in Y. So i am preparing myself to lose the seat and swap with my wife to sit in Y (most likely in some god awful middle seat since its full and i wont be able to select a seat in advance since i'm "holding" a first class ticket.

Based on recent posts if the FA gives me a hard time about swapping i'm going to lose it.

What if anything can be done to protect ourselves? if we go to the airport and one of us is downgraded what can we do and what compensation can we get? force them to fly us both the next day and put us up over night? accept a bucket of cash? i dont want UA vouchers they are useless.

United is both a live and dead at the same time

DenverBrian

^

(HUACA may be the best advice for this situation.)

sbm12

Also, don't panic when the weekend schedule changes ripple through. They usually sort themselves out by Sunday afternoon. If things are still not resolved by then call back and come up with a solution. But the weekend changes have been running for YEARS now and the overwhelming majority of the time things end up just fine if you don't muck with the bookings along the way.