Checking seat availability on united.com
 

I had been assigned aisle seats for an upcoming flight due to the lack of availability of window seats. The day before my departure, I visited united.com and proceeded to go through the mock steps of purchasing a ticket on the flight I was booked on just to use the "select seat" option to view empty and occupied seats.

I found that the seat I was assigned was appearing as available. I also saw that the window seat I would have liked (8A) was appearing as occupied.

I called res anyway to request a seat change. The agent was able to give me the window seat (8A) which according to the seat map was already occupied.

Is the seat map feature on united.com reliable?

koppelman

Is it a 777?

If so, sometimes 8A and 8B are blocked as crew rests and are only released closer to departure.

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Latitudes.

For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move; to feel the needs and hitches of our life more nearly; to come down off this feather-bed of civilisation, and find the globe granite underfoot and strewn with cutting flints.
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894)

Interesting point. Yet why would the seat map have indicated the seat I was originally assigned was available? Moreover, 8A was showing occupied at the time I called reservations and was given 8A.

Are you sure you had the correct seatmap on ual.com? I've had called before with the seatmap in front of me and while talking with the agent realized I had picked the wrong flight or made a typo on the date.

BillJ