Empty seat on airplane - someone moved to it

[bloxe]

Booked an extra leg room seat for an overnight flight in economy. Sat in the aisle seat. Middle seat was empty. Great I thought, I won’t feel claustrophobic and can sleep.

Just after the lights went dim, a guy came and plonked himself in the empty seat so he could get extra leg room. His wife now had three seats to herself so she could spread out too.

But this guy was over the arm rest so I couldn’t sit straight in my seat as I’d be touching him, which meant I had to lean towards the aisle instead. So I kept getting bumped by people walking up and down.

Was the guy right to move? Should I have said something?

The free seat wasn’t your seat, so I guess he saw the opportunity and moved. You maybe should have asked him to move his arm, so you could sit straight, but nothing more.

I think it's a 'perk' of a flight that's not full tbh. Any time I fly a budget airline (eg one you have to pay for assigned seats) it's like Jack In The Boxes with everyone switching round after the doors close - sometimes they ask the flight attendants who say it's ok, sometimes they just do it but I've never heard a flight attendant tell someone off for it.

Shit luck for you, but yes he was fine to take an empty seat.

If you booked and paid extra for leg room I would have complained about him moving. On my last flight there were some empty seats and a family group of seven tried to move some of their party to them as they hadn’t pre booked so weren’t altogether. The air hostess told them they had to stay in their assigned seats as they hadn’t purchased a pre booked seat. They were really pissy about it but the air hostess was pretty firm about it. They were still whining about it at baggage claim 🤣

No problem with him moving. Good luck for him, bad luck for you.

The rules can vary.

On some airlines there’s a rule about not moving until airborne (and that usually is enforced fairly rigorously on at least one airline that has that rule) and theoretically it’s often the case that if you have moved you should go back to your original seat before landing (it’s down to aircraft trim/balance and individual company procedures)

It depends on if you paid extra for it.

If you did, I don’t think he’s justified in taking it just because it’s empty. Otherwise, you could just plonk yourself down in a free Business Class seat with an Economy ticket!

If there was no extra cost (just a pre-booking), I think he’s justified. Still pretty annoying for you though - I’d not be happy having someone else’s husband bulging onto my armrest whilst his wife enjoyed free space away from him!

Why should he get a free extra legroom seat when the OP had to pay for hers?.

Other seats are fine but seats that provide extra privileges provided you pay for them aren't IMO.

You could have told on him to cabin crew

@bloxe fine for people to move to empty seats at same level as their booking but for example Emirates returned people who tried to move to extra legroom seats when I flew with them (having paid the extra). They said they could pay the difference 🤷🏻‍♀️

I would have elbowed him off my half of the arm rest, but I think yours fine for him to sit there.

Why didn’t you tell him not to invade your personal space ?
I had a similar situation ; the man next to me kept spreading his legs , hogging the arm rest and leaning towards me . After asking him twice to move , I snapped at him and he learned !

We paid for extra legroom on Jet2 last year and a guy tried to come and sit in the spare empty third seat, the air hostess came over and asked him if he would like to pay the extra upgrade fee, if so she would get the card machine. He quickly moved back to his seat. She had no issue with me moving to the aisle from the middle seat though so we had the middle seat as our table.

I think moving to the same level of seat is fine, moving into something you haven’t paid for is not fine.

We booked extra leg room for OH and I sat in regular seats a few weeks ago. OH was on his own in hus row so I moved after we got in the air. I was told I couldn't stay there as I didn't hear the safety briefing. The flight attendant was very apologetic and said if I had moved before take off it would have been fine. I moved to an empty row and had 3 seats to myself instead!

I am surprised the man was allowed to stay in the extra leg room seat unless there was no emergency exit (I thought they all were though). Sometimes people get extra leg room without paying or booking if it's a full flight and not all the extra leg room seats aren't booked, if the seats are free I can't see the issue. But if he was taking your space then you should have said something.

The empty seat does not belong to that person. You can remind him to make room for you because you specifically bought the seat next to the empty seat to have more space, right?

If I've understood correctly, OP bought the seat to have more leg room (in front of her seat). She did not pay for the middle seat to be empty — that was a nice bonus, or so she thought when she boarded. Then she lost that nice bonus when the big guy came and sat next to her.

I sympathise a bit with OP, but for all she knew the guy who ended up sitting next to her could have bought the same seat. So it's one of those situations where you think you are going to get a nice deal and in the end you don't. Hell is indeed other people.

It was an empty seat. Of course he can take it. You should have used your words at the time to tell him you didn’t have room to sit straight.

If you were in a row that cost extra to book, many airlines wouldn't have allowed him to move to it, but it's up to the airline to enforce. I've been on airlines that have this noted on the headrests and seen them (and other airlines) enforce this if people tried to move into them from non-extra cost seats. Other airlines don't care once the flight is boarded (i.e. the extra-cost seats are fair game for everyone).

I'd have asked him if he had paid extra for the seat, never mind cabin crew.

If you’d had any sense you’d have asked him to move his arm so you could sit properly.

You weren’t entitled to have an empty seat next to you. You thought you’d dropped lucky but it didn’t work out.

Lots of airlines are fine with people moving, so he took advantage of that.

That's not how planes work, you can't just sit where you like.

If you booked and paid extra for leg room I would have complained about him moving.

But she got the extra legroom. She didn’t pay for two seats.

I guess you don't fly very often. I see flight attendants who are very strict about procedures, especially for emergency rows and when seats have been left empty on purpose.

Most are emergency, but not always on all planes.

But as a passenger, your only rights are over the seat for which you paid. It’s nothing to do with the OP if someone took a different seat.