To Thank Thomas Cook for clarifying the matter of paying to sit beside your children

[Groovee]

I flew Thomas Cook today to Florida. I paid extra for seats together and got to choose where we were sitting.

We decided to go on last because we had seats and there were near the cabin door. When I got settled a family were not happy that they had 5 single seats. The cabin crew were quite adamant that they could not ask customers who have paid to choose their seats to move.

So last weeks thread is solved

It isn't a question of over focusing on stranger danger. It is a question of considering both. Nobody on this thread has claimed that most children are abused by strangers, so there is no reason for dismissing people's concerns about strangers by talking about abuse by people the child knows. On a plane, everyone apart from me is unknown to my child. There is no Uncle Dave flying to worry about.

It's just typical MN that it's mentioned on a thread like this, it just screams hysteria to me. Most people don't think like this.

CD, that's your perception, not factually based on anything said on this thread. For every instance of child abuse, there is always some excuse as to why the adult should be trusted.

Stranger abuse: most abusers are known to the child.
Uncle Dave: why are male family members considered less competent than female ones?
Teacher: why would anyone enter the teaching profession with all these hysterical allegations flying around?
Youth club leader: do you realise these people are giving up their time for free?

And on and on. There is always some reason why we're told to stop being concerned about child abuse for the well being of adults. I would consider concern about paedophiles to be a problem when it prevents children from playing, going out outside etc. Telling children to avoid sitting with strangers on transport, to sit near the driver etc is giving them strategies to keep their freedom while being safer. I want my children to go out, travel etc. I just want them to use strategies that will increase their safety and to do the same when they are adults. The strategies for working out the likely behaviour of people they know is a different skill set.

Hulababy, we had exactly the same problem with virgin, it was only after paying for the whole booking we found ourselves unable to book seats. Spent weeks on phone to Virgin trying to get it sorted, had notes 'added to our file' to guarantee seats and still ended up with them sitting my autistic daughter of 5 separately as well as my 7 year old, for a 9 hour overnight flight. We turned up an hour before checkout and spent most of that hour arguing with the ground staff before having to shell out £5,000 for upgrades to get 2 pairs of seats.

And to really rub it in they swore blind it never happened when I complained.

That was 18 months ago and I have since spent more than £20,000 flying BA instead of virgin. I will never forgive virgin for fucking it up, for not sorting it when they could, and then for acting like cunts when I complained.

Buyer beware. If it happened to hula and to me, it can happen to any virgin customer.

I honestly think a lot of the problems come from people who either don't check in online, or show up to the airport just before check in closes. I always seem to be one of the first to check in for any flight, and I've always been seated exactly where I wanted to be. Pre-DS I always got seated in the exit row, without paying any extra for a ticket (show up early, ask nicely), and every time I've flown with my infant DS they've blocked out a spare seat next to me to use (once even a whole row). Oh, and politeness always seems to go a very long way! The ranters and ravers never get anywhere with staff who've seen it all before.

I'm sure that if people travelling with a large group, particularly with children, that haven't checked in online or prebooked their seats, would show up early to get their seats assigned and organised, that there would be an awful lot less problems. Once boarding passes are assigned, it's a lot amount of effort to try and shuffle seats around.

Scribbler, when it happened to me I checked in exactly 24 hours before the flight (had been refreshing for a few hours before that), then spent hours between then and flight itself on phone to virgin, and then turned up an hour before the airport check in officially opened. And still got fucked over... And that was with a full price, scheduled airline.

I am with you there MidNiteScribbler- I always find that politeness gets you much further- the ranters upset staff at the start and are less likely to get a good outcome.
I think that I you have more than 2 people in your party, and want to sit together, you need to just pay the extra.

Maybe it's because I am a bad flyer (verging on phobic since DD was born) that I am so anal about us being sat together. I wouldn't get on a flight if it meant we were separated (DH, DD and I). I would be polite and ask the airline to change it, but if they couldn't/wouldn't then I just wouldn't fly. I suppose that would cause pain to other passengers due to the unloading of bags etc, but it shouldn't actually get that far - I'd know at boarding surely?

I have a knee jerk response to people that say things like "well if someone else ends up sitting next to my kid more fool them." I couldn't be that blasé about it - God forbid if the worst happens then I want to be holding my daughter to me, holding my husbands hand and telling them how much I love them. I want my daughters last moments to be in her mothers arms, not sat next to a stranger, screaming. No matter how old she is 3, 8, 12 or 16.

I KNOW I am being dramatic. I KNOW that it isn't going to happen... but what if?

It's a visceral response and it means that I will always always pay. I don't care if the airline is making more money out of me. I don't care if people think I am being a mug. It's the only way you are getting me on a plane.

If airlines want to charge additional feed for something people have a choice/preference about, that's fine. But parents of small children don't have a free choice about whether they are prepared to pay to sit togehter or not. It is a safety issue. Paedos, emergencies, putting oxygen masks on, ettc, not to mention toilet trips etc. So families are forced to pay for something that the airline should be taking into consideration.
If the airlines had a firstcomefirst served pick your seats at booking, that would help. And if most eople had not paid for their seat choice they could and should be asked to move if necessary.

Oh and i stopped flying virgin when i was travelling alone with a toddler and a baby in a sling and their staff refused to lift my suitcase sic inches onto the scales due to health and safety. When i asked her to hold the baby so i could lift the suitcase she said she wasn't allowed and said i should have brought someone to the airport to help me.

Paying extra to be seated together is airlines needing to find ways of making money on tight margins.

When tickets are booked, if there are child tickets purchased in a group booking the tickets should automatically group together or at least each child should be attached to an adult in the booking. So one adult would be grouped with two/3 children and the other adult seated far away.

Better still when you book you should click on a seat and the earlier you book the more choice you have. As a parent I'd therefore not book a plane if my young child were separated.

When you have very young ones the last thing you need is to have to spend extra hours at an airport anxiously waiting to see if you've beaten the other families and can get seats together.

It's not just the flight. The scrum on some planes to get off is horrendous. If there is an emergency who's going to do the oxygen, life jacket, position child to brace?

Better still when you book you should click on a seat and the earlier you book the more choice you have. As a parent I'd therefore not book a plane if my young child were separated.

There is a lot of this self righteous I've paid, I'm alright, tough luck for you if can't and you're not ok, attitude in life at the moment. All that indignation and smugness would be better directed at getting better deals all round for everyone.

If we all said no, as parents we refuse to fly with you on principle until you revisit this policy ... None of us would be paying to sit next to our kids. Ok we might be paying more for something else but distressing, potentially unsafe and harmful situations would be avoided.

OMGerd - mmm - but whilst there is charging, some of us choose not to pay - so get there cheaper - but you are saying I should probably pay more so you can travel with your kids....

Last week I travelled to a Scottish island - was a double hop - changing planes in Scotland - if I had paid for seating I would have had to pay £54 extra - I chose not to...

most kids end up seated next to a parent whether they have paid extra of not.

OhMerGerd

As I said earlier, why not just consider it in the way that if you don't want to choose seats, you get a discount. Therefore as you want/need to sit with your child, you don't choose to have the discount from the full price?

Your position seems to be one of wanting the discounted price for not having a choice of seats while simultaneously demanding the choice that you've chosen to omit by accepting the discount.

Not really. I'm all for the cheapest option and we rarely fly as a family as a result. My children are too old for this to be an issue but I do feel for families who're affected and I wonder whether the discount should come on other things like the baggage, or time of flight or comfier seat sitting up front or whatever.

So although its generally agreed that its a necessity to sit for parents to sit next to a child in the interests of safety, many people think they should pay extra for that privilege. What about other groups of people that need particular seats? A guide dog owner who needs particular seating because of the dog? Generally the seats at the front with more leg room so the dog can sit on the floor. Should he/she pay extra for that seat? Or should they sit anywhere and try and squash the dog on the floor in front of them in the limited space there?

Nightmare Isat...

Tbf to VA in our case, we did get seats together on the time we couldn't prebook chairs. At check in there was no question that we would be separated.

It was on the flight where 7 of us ore poked seats in a row where we were moved. Still mostly together but split by rows and not same config. A pain but I guess we were close by and seated in groups, just lot 7 in a row.

Midnight - we couldn't check in online night before. We tried. But it wouldn't allow us as said there were no 3 seats together and wouldn't check in in apart. I guess as not VA policy to split groups ESP with children.
So had to wait at proper check in. They did sort it though.

On the occasion with 7 of us. We had done online check in. Seats were changed at bag drop.

Yes Shelley that's exactly the way I see it.

Brian, my issues with flying and the fear of being separated from my family are in no way comparable to someone with a disability. A blind or otherwise disabled person has no CHOICE in the matter and should not be treated as if they do. I can CHOOSE to fly, or not and I can CHOOSE to pay for selected seating, or not.

A person with a disability should be given the seat that best accommodates their disability, and for free.

What about tall people?

They can't help being tall, but they still have to pay extra for a seat that accommodates their needs if they want it. Or, just like parents, they can opt not to pay the extra and end up having an unpleasant flight.

I think tall people should be entitled to fee assigned seating before parents are.

Why should they clouds? A budget airline needs to make its money somewhere, as everyone keeps saying. If said tall person wants a more comfortable seat surely they should pay for that privilage.

Forget the paedo comments or safety issues.

Forget
Thinking of the pricing in another way makes more sense.
A ticket is £100 but if you're not bothered where the seat is, you get a £15 discount so it's £85.
If you want seats together, you pay the full price and don't get the discount

Regardless of that I do not want to be sat on a flight next to a child whose parent is no where near them. Whether it's classified as discount or because they don't want to pay a supplement.

I don't want to be next to the kid whose parent who doesn't keep an eye on them when they deliberately messing about, and having to tell other peoples children to pack it in (isn't this a recipe for confrontations on flights that airline staff have to deal with, when parent gets upset at another passenger) or the child does something like the kicking the back of the seat constantly because they lack the maturity to sit still for long periods of time unsupervised.

It disturbs other passengers, if the airlines don't give thought to seating families together.

Its not just about it being 'unfair' to families. Its about whether seating policies like this are fair to all the other paying customers (who may not have paid budget prices).

Nobody wants this situation. Its incredibly poor customer service. Airlines have a really tough competitive market out there; the smart ones will realise that there is very little profit to be made from having these inflexible policies which are actually worse than no allocated seating at all and are first come, first served.

If said tall person wants a more comfortable seat surely they should pay for that privilage.

In just the same way that anyone else who wants a particular seat should pay for the privilege.

I don't actually mind tall people being asked to pay for bigger seats, as long as the price isn't extortionate.

I just don't think that parents needs for free allocated seating are more worthy than the needs of many other people.

It's the entitlement from parents that annoys me, as if they are more deserving than anyone else. So if tall people have to pay for something they had no choice about, then parents should have to pay for something they did have a choice about.

In just the same way that anyone else who wants a particular seat should pay for the privilege.

guide dog owner? Person with poor mobility skills who needs to get to the toilet? Larger person who needs two seats?