Paying for seat reservations on flights

[MidnightPatrol]

I have just booked a flight and as increasingly seems to be the case, they want me to pay to reserve a seat.

I have a young child so I can’t ’risk it’ on the day, and the trip will be more enjoyable (by which I mean less of a nightmare) if we are seated together in one row (me, DH, DC).

The cost of this? 66 euros.

I just want to ensure I am seated with the other passengers in my booking, specifically my toddler. Feels grating to incur an additional expense for this ‘privilege’.

I agree, being single is really expensive. Let us have this one 🤣

It depends on the airline. They're often allocated randomly. BA do let you choose, but only from what's left, obviously.

It really, really annoys me that this is also the case on a package holiday. If I've paid to book a holiday through Tui, then I expect to be sat within the group I booked for. If I book a flight through a budget flight seller- fine. But a package holiday should come with all aspects of a holiday included, not the risk my 4 year old might be sat on the seat in front of me, next to a stranger.

I’d be interested to see those studies because when the LoCos came in it was the absolute reverse….

I was working at a legacy airline when deregulation struck and many supposedly loyal passengers couldn’t get away from us fast enough once they realised they could depackage their flight bundle by travelling with the likes of Ryanair and Easyjet..and hence the race to the bottom started and the likes of BA had no choice but to join in.

Lots of people will tell you they’ll pay a bit more for a fully inclusive price but put them in front of a computer to book their annual hols or a weekend alway and often as not for a lot of them lowest ticket price starts to become strangely attractive….

Perhaps they should initially give you the full price with all the bells and whistles, and then let you take them off to reduce the price. That might be more acceptable psychologically and make it clearer that you're not paying more for something, someone else is paying less not to have it.

I think the issue here is similar to the anger about holidays during school holidays being so much more expensive than holidays in term time.

It is irrelevant that it doesn't actually cost any more to service the option that parents of young children want.

The fact is that if there's a thing that is popular and a lot of people want (the ability to sit all together on the plane, the holiday that fits nicely with the school year) then it is intrinsic to facilitating that thing that other people get to take up the less popular "slack" (sitting in the randomly scattered individual seats left over after the families have baggzied what they want, taking the holidays that have less demand for those dates).

The various businesses have year-round running costs and have pricing structures that allow them to meet those costs and make an appropriate profit sufficient for it to be worthwhile them doing business.

It obviously makes sense to charge the customers with more restricted requirements more, and the ones who are easier to accommodate less. It's irrelevant how much it actually costs to meet those requirements, the cost is set by market forces and if they set the price too high people don't pay it and their books don't balance.

It's clearly not too high as you have paid it. If it was too low there would be problems with more families per flight wanting this option than could actually be accommodated in a sensible seating plan. The price is set according to demand and will go up until the demand is at a level that can sensibly be granted.

This! And even passengers without children can try this one on!

So do I. It's part of the cost of the holiday as far as I'm concerned.

It's just part of the price of flying, maybe get a train

That’s only going to work if all airlines had to advertise in the same way.

If BA advertise a headline £150 all in (with subsequent options to reduce) but Ryanair advertise £50 (with options to add) who do you think people will tend to gravitate towards?

I'm old enough to remember the days before the budget airlines began. Sure, it was "all inclusive" and service was probably better but in real terms it was a lot more expensive. Air travel is now far more affordable than it used to be and more airlines have adopted this pricing strategy because it is successful.
Everyone knows that there will be extras to add to the advertised prices. It's a ploy that plenty of other industries use. A hotel stay "from £75 pp" will of course turn out to be on a Wednesday night in November, non refundable and not including breakfast or WiFi. Same kind of idea as selling things for £9.99 instead of £10. All just ways of drawing people to your product.
I'm sure there are airlines that still operate on an all inclusive basis but overall the cost is probably higher. On long haul flights when most people will want the meals, have hold luggage etc including everything for everyone makes sense to me.But if I am taking a short haul flight for business, a weekend break etc then I see it as getting a bus with wings - I don't need a meal, entertainment or a 22kg baggage allowance. People don't want to pay for elements of the package they don't need and that's why this model has been successful.

Even if the law said everyone has to advertise their fully bundled price, if airline A has a more extras on offer than airline B, airline A is going to look expensive in comparison and would lose out.

That would incentivise airline A to stop offering things in order to make their fully bundled price cheaper, so the people who would have been prepared to pay a premium would lose out and get a worse experience.

Please remember inthe Good Old Days families were split up on flights... it was just the ones who were last to check in. Happened to us when I was (9yo, youngest in family) in hospital, only discharged 2hrs before the flight. They knew we were coming, and we were rushed through the airport, but only had two seats together and two random seats left on the plane. Fortunately the single passenger in our row swapped with my brother so he could sit with my mum and me.

BA’s policy is all under 12’s are seated with an accompanying adult. Plus taking into account the free carry on and (generally) nicer staff and conditions of travel I tend to fly with them or similar. There’s not often much in the price difference anyway by the time you take everything into account.

More frustratingly - I found that with two kids I reserved seats ahead of time and ended up in the emergency exit row on a RyanAir flight - only to be told as we sat down we would have to move as kids cannot be in those seats and we could be separated if they could not find three people together to move. There was nothing on the booking to say this and you have to put the kids ages in on the booking. Madness !

I've never paid to sit next to DH but we have rarely ended up seated apart. The only time we did was on a transatlantic flight. All short haul have been sat together outward and return.

Charging for seat bookings is very much a different ball game to charging for hold luggage. Seat booking charges are a money spinner. In contrast, hold luggage charges are designed to put you off checking bags in. They don’t want you to put your bags in the hold. This leads to faster turn arounds and few baggage handlers being required.

It’s not an awful idea because I suppose the valid point is that people find it harder to compare like for like

I've just paid £300 for seats I wanted on BA, I was so annoyed at the price, but then just concluded get on with it. (And yes that was just the choosing seat fees) the flights covered as part of a holiday package.

Quite.
I think that most of us have a built in "sort by price, lowest first" function when we are shopping around for most things - assuming we are not multimillionaires looking for a super expensive watch or something. Retailers of all kinds know this and adopt marketing strategies accordingly. I've just booked a night in a Premier Inn that came up on my search as "from £83". By the time I'd booked what I actually wanted it was £140, which actually is fine, but I might not have opened the link if it had said £140 in the first place and somewhere else had advertised £100. It's not a lie - I could have had a room for £83 - but it's not exactly the truth either. But it's a marketing approach that works and is legal.
Why would airlines be any different? They're not charities, they're big businesses whose primary purpose is to make a profit. As long as they are not breaking the law they can use whatever sales strategy they like. The language they speak is money. If people were bothered enough by this kind of thing to stop using the airlines then they'd change their modus operandi quick enough I'm sure. There are other ways to travel after all. But what most of us want is for pur travel to be cheap and convenient and the budget airline model delivers that on the whole. So large numbers of people use those airlines and they make money. As long as that continues why on earth would they change?

It is what it is. Just pay it for the peace of mind.

This!
It makes cheaper flights available

The airlines have different approaches and don't really explain clearly which one it is.

One airline intentionally seats groups appart, one assigns seats at check-in, but tend to put people together, and another one lets people choose during check-in from available seats.

I agree there is a difference between wanting a specific seat and wanting to be seated together anywhere on a plane. There should be a guarantee that child will be seated directly next to one of the parent (unless last minute booking) as that is a need not a want

£300 just for seat reservations! Ouch.

How many people does that cover?

And? This is capitalism. It's all a money spinner.
Discouraging checked luggage is a money spinner by reducing expenditure rather than increasing income but the net effect is the same.
If airlines didn't charge for seats, in order to make the same amount of profit they'd just put the base price up or charge for something else.