Seat map on ual.com vs actually load
 

This is a question that comes up fairly frequently, and perhaps someone (nate?) might be able to help. Who doesn't assign seats with reservations? Since I generally only book my travel on ual.com or via UA reservations (where a seat is always assigned), and historically on Travelocity where although there was no seat choice, it was assigned in the confirmation. Do TA's often not assign seats?

John

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From a kiwi who can fly!

There are several cases in which seats are not assigned when bookings are made. One is when the flight is under "airport control" meaning that the only way to get a seat is at the gate or airport during check-in, however you will be able to make a reservation earlier. Some customers (infrequent flyers) don't ask for specific seats when booking. For those reasons, you can guage the seat maps as only a very rough indicator of booking capacity.

Yes, I'm aware of this but what I was trying to fathom was who (TAs?) don't assign seats, because in my experience UA and at least Travelocity does, even if you don't ask. I've also had occasion to call about ual.com itineraries that have been changed and no seat seems to be now assigned, but when I call UA, they already have me in a new assigned seat.

Does anybody know about Expedia and Orbitz - do they automatically assign seats?

John



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From a kiwi who can fly!

Many OZ travel agents don't assign seats - maybe because with QF you generally can't get seat pre-assignments and so they don't realise this is the norm with UA (and others?).

My first experience with this was a couple of years back (before I made Premier) when I arrived in SFO from SYD to find that my DEN flight was overbooked and I had no seat assignment. I got bumped and was handsomely rewarded (cash and an upgrade). :-)

Being concerned that I couldn't afford to be bumped when flying DEN-SFO to connect with the SYD flight I got them to check seating for that and found it too was full in coach. So they gave me another upgrade to C :-)

Since then I've been premier or premier exec and so always ring through to UA to get my seat assignment. Even though the TA can do a seat assignment they can't (in my experience) access premier seating, so it's a waste of time getting them to do it.

My TA uses Apollo, and provided they've entered my MP number, they can access the E+ / exit row seating for pre-assignment.

Ditto for me. I just booked an itin through Amex and as soon as she plugged in my MP# the surprised gasp on the phone was a delight ("oh look, I can put you in these exit rows!" - like I just told her... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif ). Also of some note she snagged a SK exit row seat for me, which may or may not be a *G perk (who cares?! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif )

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RichardMEL, UA 1K
A Star Alliance Member.