Singapore Airlines Not Family Friendly

[jas121]

Have had an awful time trying to book longhaul london to Australia with a bassinet. Each airline has different size bassinets and max weights. Everthing on internet here and other forums is out of date - inevitable when planes or airline policy changes I guess. So posting some uptodate info I have gathered.
Thai air - Max age 6 months 10kg
virgin - depends on plane - (9kg or 11kg max)
Qantas - up to 11kg (recommend to 8 months as bassinet only 71cm long)
BA up to 14kg
Singapore up to 14 Kg

We decided to book with Singapore airlines- what a mistake............their website is useless. Keeps crashing when trying to search, extremely slow.......will not let you see available seats until passengers details are entered and if no seats together for a family will not let you go back and change flight time or date except by restarting whole search process, names etc again..... We gave up and booked by phone - that took 90 minutes - yes its true, with hopeless call centre. Eventually booked the bassinet and family (2 adults 2 kids) together (they promised or we wouldnt have booked) - but they couldnt give us seat numbers at that time but would allocate them on their system. Next day I tried checking our seat allocation with their 'manage my bookings online' guess what no seats allocated except a bassinet. 4 times we contacted reservations - supervisors, managers etc Finally it emerges that the call centre cannot see the seat plan! cannot allocate seats and can only see if a bassinet is available - not if there are any seats with it for rest of the family. But they kept reassuring me 'you will be together, we make it happen at check in'.

After 2 weeks I finally got hold of someone in customer relations after being continually fobbed off with recorded messages saying that complaints must be written in etc. The truth is that reservation staff cannot and should not promise seats together for a family (but they do). And that seats next to bassinets are not reserved for families with babies but can be booked by anyone online, and since they are bulkhead and perceived as maybe more legroom get booked up quickly leaving no seats for families next to the bassinet. Result, there are not 2 seats left next to a basinet seat for us. Our family will be separated on 4 lengthy flights of 13hrs.

So unless you book a year in advance online you will not be able to sit with your family. Qantas on the other hand do block out seats next to bassinets and then allocate those seats for families and babies when you book by phone.
And when reservations told me 'you will sit together, we make it happen at check in'. Apparently this means maybe someone who booked a bulkhead seat will be bumped out of that seat and others juggled around. Will that happen so our family can sit together we will have to see. And if you are someone who booked a seat next to a bassinet and you dont have a baby start worrying that you may lose that seat.

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who was able to switch seats with passengers sitting next to bassinets or hear if you too were left with family separated on the flight.

I'm no inside expert, but I have flown a lot and don't think that they finalise seating allocations until check-in. Too many changes and no-shows.

I know on BA that you can't book yourself into the bulk-head seating when you check in online. They can only be allocated by the check-in staff because they are held in reserve and they are often emergency exit seats anyway, so check-in staff need to suss out the passengers for suitability.

Get to the airport on the dot of the check-in opening, they usually find a way. I've found Singapore Airlines to be one of the best ones for families in Economy class - on-board crew go out of their way to be helpful.

We've been separated a couple times, and that was fine - both extralonghaul flights. One parent with baby at the bassinet seat, one with older child a few rows back. We weren't next to each other, but we could get up and communicate during the flight, swap seats, help each other out. I think you're getting unduly stressed about that possibility.

Never believe check-in staff if they'll tell you it will be sorted out on the flight. It will not. You will sit in your ticketed seats. And while I have managed to make the crew shift a single man out of the bassinet seat so I could have it with the baby (I had pre-booked the bassinet, yet they had assigned it to someone else), they wouldn't shift people just so you can sit next to your DP. They MIGHT ask the person, who will likely refuse to move.

Really, being separated is not that bad. I agree it's much nicer to be all together on such long flights, and it's beyond infuriating how the airlines go about it, but you'll be fine.

Have flown with SA several times & never had a problem. But as far as I remember, they never allocate seats until check in, so we always get to check in with lots of time & were always among the first to check in & got the seats we wanted together.

The first couple of times we flew (dd babe in arms) they moved the passenger from the seat next to us, so we could have more room (on flight staff did this). We had bassinets too.

In flight staff WILL move you & check in staff will not book just anyone nr a bassinet, they aren't stupid. There are only 3 areas where they can hang the bassinet, so they are unlikely to put someone without a baby there, tbh. If they do, in flight staff are intelligent enough to move people around.

Also, don't count on the bassinet being much use. Dd hated it. As soon as she seemed settle to sleep (and she was a placid little thing who could & still would, sleep on a washing line if she had to , we had to lift her (they have to be in arms when seatbelt sign on). They aren't allowed to sit in it. Ours ended up being an extra storage place for most of our flights & if honest, it was in the way!

Completely disagree with you on this. Or rather yes it kinda happened to us (because me and kids were on a different booking reference from DH) but they sorted it right away. No way would they book a random person around those seats where you can hang a bassinet. They aren't dumb you know. And even if they did they'd see your point when they see you laden with kids and give you those seats.

If you book directly with Singapore Airlines on their website you can choose your seats at the time of purchase. We have flown with them over 10 times and have always found them great, sounds like you were really unlucky.

Well I found Singapore Airlines to be great on this - though their bassinets were up to 9kg only Ithink. So you experience is not representative.