to not want to pay for seat allocation on a short flight

[PookieDo]

This isn’t a thread about the rights or wrongs of seat allocations on flights in general. I want to know if you think AIBU to my 16yo DD.

I have booked a short domestic one hour flight this year with my 2 teenage DC. I got an absolutely grear rock bottom price for return flights within the U.K. I hate flying and have never flown with my DC but they have flown a lot with their father. I can’t afford holidays usually to be honest but I’ve budgeted this one on a small scale. I flew recently a very short flight to see if I could do it at all and although I hated every minute of it (not just anxiety it makes me feel ill) I can probably tolerate it for a short period.

I did not reserve the seats on the plane when I booked because it’s £25 for all 3 of us both ways and it is 1 hour! I think this is a silly extra price that’s only worth it on a long flight or small DC. We will be in the airports longer than we will likely be on the plane. My DD16 thinks that I am being unreasonable, as she might have to sit next to a stranger 🙄 and I think she’s lucky to be going on a holiday and that we might all get lucky at check in/when we board and I can ask that at least the DC sit together. If not then just put headphones in and ignore the stranger next to you.

AIBU?

To be honest, we do it to avoid having to queue and physically check in/get there even earlier. I just accept it as part of the cost and I'm a nervous flyer so want to be clutching DHs hand/turning it blue and not some random strangers.......

Check in online together and as soon as check out opens and you should be ok. I always do this, and have never been seated apart

I wonder whether more people are caving in and paying to sit together.
I have never paid and in 22 years of holidays with DC we have always managed to sit close if not all in a row. I go online as soon as check in opens.
Last time was different. Three of us flew with Jet2 to Canaries. Check in opened 4 weeks before and there were zero seats together, in fact they allocated us as far apart as possible .

If the company didn't charge for reserved seats they would simply put the cost onto the flight ticket. You'd be paying anyway.

£25 would pay for a cheap meal out for you all while away. Surely she must agree that's a far better use of that money?

I went long haul on my own at this age. At some point she will want/need to get on public transport for an hour on her own, or is she going to take you with her on every trip? I agree it's not nice sitting next to a stranger, she doesn't have to like it (who does? unless you're hoping to get sat next to your long lost prince charming?) she just has to accept it. Not liking it is perfectly reasonable, not putting up with it is unreasonable.

Yabu

Your daughter is clearly anxious about being on her own on a flight and you don’t seem to care? I think you should make the effort, even if she pays the extra.

My 15yo would cope with sitting next to a stranger but would infinitely prefer to next to me. My 12yo hates flying and would be very, very stressed if sat with strangers.

I also went through some quite scary turbulence on a short flight recently and would have been in bits if my children had been down the other end of the plane. So yes I would (and do) pay the extra when we fly.

Take Stugeron, I am a bad flyer (even on short haul) and it stops me feel dizzy AND numbs my fear with sleepiness

Just check in early (online) and get seats together or close.

I would never punish a teen DC for their fear, I'd wonder what happened to make her fear strange men. At that age I had already been felt up by my guitar teacher, and my swim coach, so I was worried about men too at that age (I was also "young" for my age fwiw)

Agree that she is being unreasonable.

As for carry on luggage, I'm really pleased Ryanair have changed their system. We fly regularly and the amount of cabin baggage people were trying to ram into the lockers was ridiculous. It delayed people from getting onto the plane, delayed take off, people sitting down regularly got whacked by cabin bags being squeezed through the crowds, it was a complete pain. Hardly anyone needs their cabin case during the flight - you can bring a small bag with your bits and pieces in anyway. The new system is so much better, and Ryanair make it work very smoothly. Which is surprising

Yanbu. At 14 I was flying long haul by myself, and sitting next to strangers, shock horror!

At 16 she can cope.

I used to be like your daughter about sitting next to strangers- it could make me really uncomfortable. It still does actually- I do now pay to reserve seats. Especially the sound of heavy breathing or strangers - particularly men- eating noisily would affect me- I know it was my problem not theirs but it would make me quite anxious. I would offer her the choice to pay for own seat reservation if she wants to, or say she can choose between the random seats your group are allcated (as one may be by aisle/next to a woman as opposed to a man). I have found listening to music or even using ear plugs to block out noise helps a lot. I know it might be hard for people who haven’t experienced anxiety like this to understand but hopefully you can kindly and gently help her improve her confidence in situations like this, rather than forcing her to feel uncomfortable and trivialising how she feels, as some have suggested...

I use budget airlines frequently. I don't pay for extras and I take my chances.
Air fares are amazing value for money these days, I can fly to, say Dublin for £40 whereas a return train ticket to London costs £180. At least you are guaranteed a seat on a plane, unlike the train.
On Ryanair you either pay to take your hand luggage if you absolutely can't live without it for the duration of the flight, or take it to the gate, where any extra hand luggage, after allowing for the number of passangers who have paid the extra, up to the limit of what will fit in the bins is also allowed on free of charge.
After that it goes in the hold, free of charge.
Seems reasonable to me.
Your daughter needs to either give you the £50 for allocated seating, or suck it up for an hour. She's 16 not 6.

When I was 16 , I flew on a plane for 3 hrs next to a male stranger
We had a great conversation and it helped pass the time
Time for your 16 yr old to grow up I think...and if she's anti social and puts her headphone on, what's the problem?

@RestingBitchFaced There has been a definite change in the last year or so. We have done several European return flights this year and have gone from never having to sit apart to always being separated. Personally I couldn’t care less for a short haul flight but we notice the poor cabin crew are now having to deal with requests from passengers to swap seats on top of their normal duties. Not to mention the joy of sharing the conversation your near neighbours are having with someone at the other end of the plane!

Mind you, I wasn't thrilled to be separated from DH on a Tui long haul flight in December, because so many people had paid extra to choose their seats that there were no pairs left to allocate.

It’s a policy to extract more money, and it’s working.

Ryan Air Re awful, you will be sat apart if you don't pay, no doubt about it. Agree that DD either woman's up, or pays to sit with you.

I am going on a short Jet2 flight in the summer, I have told DD that her, her BF and myself will all likely be sat separately unless she wants to cough up the £8 for her and her BF to sit together. £8 pp, each way.

I always refuse to pay for the Ryanair seating costs, DP and i do a lot of city breaks and it’s only ever 90min-2hr trips. They do it on purpose to force more cash out or you.
We only tend to read books and magazines/listen to music anyway so we don’t need to sit together for that!
What I do find funny though is you look around on Ryanair flights and everyone is shouting over seats to their travel companions as hardly anyone else seems to pay either

I think the wisdom of paying for seat allocation depends on the extent of her anxiety. If it’s mild, then doing the thing she is anxious about is the best way to stop it becoming a major anxiety. If it’s already major, you need to ease into this sort of exposure. From what you’ve said, it sound like it’s still minor - she’s uncomfortable with it, doesn’t like it and goes out of her way to avoid it, but it isn’t actually something that she ends up panicking over or that is likely to ruin the whole holiday. If so, it’s probably important you don’t indulge it. Unreasonable fears are best confronted to ensure they don’t become major and debilitating anxiety.

@wictional I don’t know where it shines through I don’t care. I have my own issues with flying and I’m on a tight budget though so there are other factors to this.

She is similar in the cinema. She doesn’t really like strange men, perhaps a young woman confidence thing - and yes eating! She doesn’t like that.

She doesn’t have £25 because she hasn’t yet been confident enough to get a job! I’m trying to build up her confidence so I don’t think I want to be harsh about it. Some children grow up at different rates to each other. I was much more mature at this age but it wasn’t a good thing on hindsight

Also now your DD is getting older she will have to sit next to/interact with strangers in more situations, trains, flights, the cinema, the theatre, people at work etc, it might be good that she starts getting exposure/used to that.

Yep chances are you won't be seated together because Ryanair will want to extract a bit more money from you!

I booked tickets home for myself and DS13. I didn't want to pay for seat allocation either so when I went to check in online they automatically produced allocated seats.

The plane was half empty - rows and rows of grey seats free to sit in.

They allocated me 9B and DS 23E.

Even though the seats next to me were empty. We needed to bolt off the plane as we had a 4 hour drive home. I couldn't afford the time for him to be shoved back into his seat by the usual disembarkation mob. So I had to pay to move one of us.

A shameless way to get a further few pounds out of us.

Some people are being a bit aggressive with all the "she needs to suck it up, learn that not everything is about her, grow up, she doesn't deserve a holiday" etc.

If the OP had phrased it as:

My 16 YO DD is very nervous about sitting next to strangers, even for short periods of time or for "fun" activities (ie the cinema). This fear seems to be even more pronounced if the stranger is a man. Do you think I should simply ignore this or is it worth taking seriously?

I don't think there would be a chorus of "OMG YOUR DD IS SUCH A SNOWFLAKE TELL HER TO GET OVER IT".

Your DD is not choosing to feel this way (any more than you are "choosing" to be afraid of flying) so think about how you would want someone to treat you in this situation. That doesn't mean you should definitely pay to allocate seats, but it does mean talking to her about how she feels, working with her to overcome it and treating her with respect.

pp "thieving airlines" - OP is paying £25 return for 3 passengers. How the fuck do you expect them to make any money? You get what you pay for.

OP - its totally up to you to decide how much it is worth for the three of you to sit together. If it's in line with the airlines charges then pay. If not, don't.

Really gets my goat when people get rock bottom prices with these cheap airlines and complain at the extras. These airlines are forcing trad airlines to reduce their service offering. Because people think that 3 people flying return for £25 is normal. But it isn't.

Supply and demand. Only you can decide what something is worth.

We generally fly BA for a number of reasons. I don't pay extra for seats but 48 hours before flight departs (i.e. 24 hours before online check in opens) they allocate families with children together. No needd to pay more, but I am paying the premium BA price (and not having to pay for luggage /car seats etc).

OP YANBU because 16 is old enough to sit alone - even if she is a bit anxious, she needs to learn as she will have to do this for her whole life.

divadee

This is EXTREMELY unreasonable and cheeky. If you have a 4 year old then fucking pay to sit next to them - it's fucked up and beyond entitled to expect/harass and make other passengers feel uncomfortable and swap seats so you can sit with your children. I have always refused to swap for irresponsible parents who didn't bother to ensure their children sit with them/expect some idiot to change. Selfish.

I think if you are trying to build her confidence it makes sense for her to face her fear, just for an hour. Is she worried about anything else other than who she will be sitting next to, eg, getting separated from you boarding or disembarking?

Make sure she can see where you are sitting, and where you will be meeting up as you get off the plane.