Gerry K

For a recent British Airways flight from JFK to LHR, I chose my seats using the airplane seating chart diagram provided by the tickets issuer. Unfortunately, the only seats shown as available were middle seats (no aisles, no windows). However, when I got on the plane there were quite a few aisle and window seats available. I asked a BA employee why this was, and he told me that often the only seats shown as available are the seats that nobody ever requests, so that the commonly requested seats remain available. Did anyone ever hear of this?<BR><BR>Cheers,<BR><BR>Gerry K

Postman

Well that's pretty shabby. Sounds like it might be a good idea to call when booking the actual seating assignments. Thanks for the tip!

Christina

no, and it doesn't really make any sense, does it? Why save the commonly requested seats rather than the other ones? In my experience you can hear anything from airline employees, but if BA does indeed does this, I'd say they are alone as I have booked several tickets online with seating charts and they seemed to reflect reality fairly well compared to when I was on the plane. It is possible what you are seeing was a function of ticket pricing, not just random perversity. I think airlines do reserve certain seats for the lowest discount fares (even within coach) and that may be what you were seeing, not sure. For example, an airline knows they will get some later reservations at a higher price than the really advance one, so they may reserve some of those aisle/window seats for the 1-2 week APEX ticket, or full fare, rather than giving them to the heavily discounted 4 wk APEX tickets (which always claim that seats are limited)--a hypothetical example. If you were paying full fare, I would be really po'd. I don't think calling will solve this problem as the phone people often are working from the same charts, it's all computerized.

Rhonda

I think you can remedy this by talking to the gate desk when you get there. They have up to date availability.

Gerry K

Rhonda, now that you mention it, I did request an aisle seat at the gate, and was advised that there were none. So their computer showed the same thing I had seen when choosing.<BR><BR>Christina, your point about ticket pricing is well taken. I paid only $340 for the RT fare.<BR><BR>Cheers,<BR><BR>Gerry K