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?

One of the passengers was a ‘no show’ so that changes everything

You don’t check in, you lose it.

plenty of people don’t show up for flights all the time. Airlines use those seats.

use it or lose it

He sat down just before the plane was about to disembark. He can only have been there what 5 or 10 minutes. What a fuss over nothing!

Yabu. As your daughter didn't check in the seat isn't hers and gets reused. It's in the terms and conditions and every single plane will do this. Why have an empty seat.

Your daughter didn’t check in so it’s no longer her seat.

as someone said, airlines always overbook as there are passengers not showing up. The only way to ensure having the extra seat is checking her in so the seat doesn't get reallocated. But if she is not checked in, the seats can get reallocated. it's totally normal. You cannot claim a seat for which you aren't checked in.

Once there's a no show the seat isn't yours.

It is very annoying op but posters are correct. Airlines oversell seats.

I think OP meant take off.

I can give a little bit of insight as I worked in this field but most of the advice given already has been correct.

If you purchase 2 seats for 2 people, the seats are obviously allocated to each person. As far as the airline and ground staff are concerned, each seat "belongs" to each individual. It does not matter who paid for them.

If only one person on a booking checks in but the other doesn't, the other seat is considered to be "available" to anybody on standby from the minute check-in closes.

Even if the second person does check in, the seat is still not guaranteed to be left empty. They will wait until very close to when the gate closes and if they have anybody waiting on standby, they are entitled to give the seat to them.

At no point will any staff at the airport check (or even be able to) to see who paid for the ticket. They only look at names and seat numbers and who turned up and who didn't.

Booking an extra seat in your own name for comfort reasons is an entirely different scenario from this one.

But the pilot was still unnecessarily rude by the sounds of things. Although entitled to sit in the seat.

Even if the passenger checks in, their seat can still be reallocated to somebody on standby if they don't show up at the gate before it closes. Not every flight is overbooked. Many, many flights aren't even at capacity. It's actually less common for them to be overbooked. But as you say, totally normal if they are and seats can absolutely be reallocated for no shows 🙂

@littleorangefox

Even if the passenger checks in, their seat can still be reallocated to somebody on standby

Agreed.

The idea that checking in the missing passenger protects the seat has come up a few times but is flawed (and may carry some risks).

Those airports keen on the conformance process may not be happy with someone trying to cheat that system by clocking a phantom passenger through to airside.

The gate staff will pick up the late/no show during boarding and (as you say) may reassign the seat to someone on gate standby.

Even post doors closed the crew may have to move some passengers into unoccupied seats for various reasons.

Pretty much the only way to protect an adjacent seat is to go through the "comfort seat" process, if the airline has one.

You’re not unreasonable, just inexperienced.

Airlines regularly oversell their seats and even if you buy two seats you aren’t guaranteed to have two seats.

They can move people around at their whim. Highly frustrating.

It's not yours until you check in. Flights are intentionally overbooked because they know there's always a certain percentage of people like your daughter, who don't turn up.
The pilot would be flying on a standby ticket, and would have been given that seat when check-in closed!

It is actually possible with many airlines to buy a second seat for yourself and it costs a bit less than a full second flight ticket.

So if it would happen again, maybe calling them and asking whether you can transfer the seat to be your extra space?

To be honest; we don't know if he was unnecessarily rude, or if the OP was rude to him about the seat, or if because the OP was pissed off about the situation she perceived him to be rude when in actual fact he wasn't!

I recently turned up with two friends for a flight and we had been bumped because it was overbooked. Luckily for us there were three no shows and we got seats. That’s the system and I’d have been pretty annoyed if the plane had flown away with unoccupied seats as I sat at the airport.

Because she'd paid £250 for the seat he was taking?

At many companies staff travelling in these situations have to be on best behaviour, if not they can end up in a heap of poo.

It can however get tough when your ear gets bent because someone perceives they've been disadvantaged by you for some reason ( your "travelling on the cheap", "nicked their seat,"..) best tactic sometimes is to turn a bit of a deaf ear and give the complainer a polite ignoring but even that can upset some folks.

That’s nothing to do with him. It was no longer her seat. It’s not his fault she doesn’t understand how flying work. Everyone else does.

You are being very unreasonable. This is perfectly normal practice within the travel industry. If someone doesn’t show for a flight, that seat will be used for standby/oversold passengers. Oh and just fyi, you can’t just re sell an airline seat. Most airlines don’t allow name changes. It’s to stop ticket touts from buying up cheap seats and selling them on at over inflated prices at a later date. Yes I do work for an airline.

My family works for airlines. They have standby seats available for staff. If there are no shows the staff can travel at a reduced rate in those seats.

If you were going to be angry with anyone it should have been the air steward, not the guy who was told he could sit there. But even then, they did nothing wrong & he had nothing to thank you for! I expect you made him feel quite uncomfortable

He was simply shown to an available seat and told he could sit there. He didn't know that she'd paid for that extra seat, and even if he did, that is of no relevance because that person hadn't checked in so the seat was then available for the airline to assign it to anyone they want to

Thanks everyone, was pretty tired when I read this initially and didn’t realise she hadn’t checked in! I thought she’d checked into both seats and one was taken, not that op just assumed it would remain free