Problems reserving airline seats.....Help!
 

My husband and I, along with another couple, are going to France next June for a Uniworld river cruise. Everything is taken care of except our airline seats which I would like to finalize so that I can relax. Since we would all like to sit together and are in economy (Ugh!), I wanted to select our preferred seats ASAP. I've gone to the KLM website (flight over) and to Air France (return flight) and, upon selecting our seats, they did not hold. I tried again after awhile and the same thing happened. I just spoke to a rep. at KLM, who even checked with his supervisor, and I was told I should just keep trying back as they could not bring them up either, stating that perhaps it was too soon. I inquired as to why so many other seats scattered about the cabin were already reserved, and I no particular answer was given. I totally understand that there might be plane changes before our date of departure, but I have always been able to select seats; even a year out.

Has anyone ever had this problem before? Any tips on what I might do other than just try back every day? I don't want to get STUCK in some random, leftover seats. Please help!

I'd talk to a different agent as well as a supervisor before doing anything else.

Pam,

Post this question in the air travel forum. The Fodorite's there are very knowledgeable. There is likely to be someone familiar with the AF-KLM procedures.

I feel your pain. We always want our seats assigned in advance. Keep trying.

If the airline reservations were made by the cruise line as an intermediary, that may be causing the issue. in effect they "own the reservation" You may want to call the cruise line.

It is all a torture test anyway---why does it matter?
Pick your best seat options and hope to endure.

Thanks everyone! I'm going to take the advice of Jeff801 and move this question to Air Travel. I've used these forums forever and have never used that Forum, and didn't even think to look.

Seafox - Thanks for you thoughts, but I checked the the travel agent and, in this case, the cruise line does not "own the reservation.

We had some similar issues with Air France last year. I called Delta since I am a medallion member and they were able to reserve our seats.

I've flown Air France many times including just last year and have never had a problem reserving my seats. I buy my ticket through the Air France website. So I don't know what to advise except maybe it has something to do with how you bought your ticket, which you don't say. But I have never tried to reserve seats this far in advance, so maybe that has something to do with it, also. I think some seats are just blocked off and you can't reserve them, they are for special passengers or something, who knows, or not your type of ticket.

If the tickets were purchased from Delta, you need the KLM or Air France locator number in order to book seats online on their sites. Delta can give you the numbers.

We've flown KLM a few times—it doesn't say anything on their website that I can find but I was told you could only choose a seat a certain number of days ahead (and I can't remember whether it was 90 or 30).

Agree with Outwest. I've never known it possible to reserve your seats 9 months in advance. Airlines can and do change the aircraft and seat configurations from what they may be today.
90 or 30 days rings a bell with me too.

Seats can be assigned on Air France at any time. KLM used to have a 90 day restriction but this was eliminated in June of this year so seats on KLM can now be assigned at any time as well.

I have no idea what the OP's issue is because I've never had a problem getting assigned seats on the KLM or Air France websites to stick but it has nothing to do with timing.

I have never been able to get seat assignments on KLM or AF flights when bought from Delta. I have come to term that it is a "feature" and not a "problem." What puzzles me is why the airlines are not transparent about the seat reservation process involving codeshares. If they want money, why don't they say so and list the prices. If they have quota on reservable seats, say so on web sites. For Delta ticket on Delta flights, it is very clear if everything fails, buying economy comfort would get me an assigned seats. My experience calling KLM on Delta issued ticket pretty much always come back to call Delta, it's their problem.

When flying on KLM with a Delta ticket I have always been able to get seats by going to the KLM website and picking the seats ( I have not flown them since June so could only do it 90 days in advance) and then they did show up on my Delta reservation even tho they did not show up on KLM when I looked at the KLM site. The seats I chose were always the ones I ended up with when flying.