Bought airline seat to Celt, could t use it but it was taken anyway …

[agieselbow]

Genuinely, was I being unreasonable…

Flew home from abroad last night. Had bought my daughter a ticket but she needed to leave early. I decided to keep the ticket rather than sell on so I could have two seats: sleep etc. it was a late night flight and I had a three hour car commute thereafter.

just as plane was about to disembark , a man sat down beside me. I explained that he had the wrong seat . He simply said it was his in a rude tone.

The flight attendant saw this and hurried over to tell me that this man was’ actually a pilot’ and needed the seat. She further explained that he was off duty but a pilot nonetheless and again she was taking the seat.

she saw from my face that I was not happy and apologised as I explained , again, to both, that I intentionally held onto the seat knowing my daughter would t be travelling.
The man sighed/ tutted and was generally rude through the flight if I needed to go to the bathroom and in the end, he just got up and walked off the flight when we landed without even a thank you .
Am I being unreasonable to be very pissed off here???
I feel like emailing the airline and asking for a ticket refund.
I think that if he had been mannerly and pleasant, I wouldnt be so cross but the entitlement and obnoxious manner got my back up .
AIBU?

And yet people still use the gotcha of 'Did you pay for a seat for your bag' on trains. Implying that you can do the double.

I think the way you are being I here is that it was in daughter's name and airlines do check you in, so reallocation is likely. But I read a case of a woman who deliberately booked herself a double because she was fat and the they took the seat off her AND didn't refund.

he was a pilot so he'd be flying on stand-by in the event that any available seats came free. If your daughter had checked in but was a "no show" at the gate then they'd have put him in the seat. Same when flights are overbooked or passengers have missed connections and need a seat on a later flight, people are on stand-by for available seats at the last minute.

It is possible to book two seats for yourself for comfort but you have to contact the airline directly. You can't just book two seats for yourself.

And in the OP’s case the plane was full so the pilot - as a standby passenger - was given the seat beside her.

But surely this is miscommunication from the airline? In which case you could try writing a polite letter and seeing if they will grant you something complementary but not by right

If you need to book a second seat for a reason and need two seats next to each other for one person, eg. You're travelling with a cello, or you are large enough to require two seats to travel comfortably, you can't just buy two tickets - you have to ring the airline and book a special companion seat that won't get filled with a staff member or standby. The name on the second ticket will be "comfort seat" or "extra seat" or something like that (depends on the airline).

I am guessing you have not travelled much by air?

Yes, and you have to do it well in advance, so OP wouldn't have been able to change the seat to a comfort seat.

I assume you didn’t check in on that ticket and go through the gate with that ticket? Then it would be a no show and the seat is free

Agree with many of the above posts.

What happened sounds standard, once the DD failed to check-in the seat would have been released and a passenger on standby may well be given it..most UK airlines don't do commercial standby but they'll allow staff to do so.

If those on standby do get a seat they'll may well get a boarding card with the seat number on it so there's no reason for them to know the details ("your seat formerly belonged to., " or for them to go around thanking people etc.

At some airports even checking the DD in may not have preserved the seat..some airlines/airports allow gate standby in certain circumstances, so if the DD doesn't appear just before doors closed or make conformance in time the seat can still be released at the last minute.

The seat was his though!!

Yes? Which is that I said. Or are you just backing me up?

I think you would have had to pay a fee to change your daughter's seat to being a "spare" one for you in the same way that obese people too wide for a standard seat, or musicians travelling with delicate instruments that need a seat, have two seats assigned to them. Your daughter's seat wasn't in that category.

I think the person at check-in should have picked this up.

You communicated this to her. It’s not your fault you don’t know the ins and outs of how it usually works.

She should have either told you what you needed to do to change it to a comfort seat, or explained that it wouldn’t be available to you.

The check in desk closed and your daughter didn’t check in, so the seat was now available to someone else. What you should have done was call the airline as soon as you knew your daughter wasn’t flying and asked for her seat to be changed to a “comfort seat”, it would have then been added to your ticket along with the seat you already had.

£150?

Perhaps the crew member or pilot could have been a little more friendly in explaining how overbooking/standby works, as various people have done on this thread and which OP has now taken on board.

It’s unique to flying (unless anyone has other examples?) so not fair to assume everyone is aware of it. I recently bought four tickets to a concert and one person dropped out last minute - in that scenario we were obviously free to use the spare seat for extra space and to pile up our coats and bags.

It’s worth a complaint - you might not, technically, be due anything but they may give you a credit for a future flight as a goodwill gesture. Doesn’t cost you anything to try, other than the time to call or email them.

Trains work the same way too. Train staff can move a passenger to an empty seat if you are not using it.

But I agree, the check-in staff should have explained when OP brought it up.

Makes sense with any form of travel I guess - better to enable a person to travel than to leave an empty seat.

Only grounds for complaint was if the seat had been converted to a comfort seat by check-in staff...and with it being a full flight I doubt they would have been allowed to do that.

How do people who need two seats because of size book them then?

I get your point, OP. You might not be right, as per the rules, but i get why you are peed off.

Where I worked the individual had to contact the airline direct, it couldn't be booked on line.

There was an option to try and arrange/pay at the airport on the day but it would only be allowed if the flight wasn't full.

This. It wasn’t your seat, op. It was a no show.

That’s rather an over-reaction OP (calling me an asshole) You still haven’t explained what you meant to say, instead of Celt?