Not selecting seats on plane... risky?

[Worriedmotheroftwo]

Flying with Wizzair. 2 parents 2 children. Not selected seats. Selecting seats for all 4 of us would cost us £80 total. Their policy is to seat a parents with a child...

We will obviously try to check in and get seats sorted at first opportunity. Happy to be split up as long as each of our children is with one of us. But what if the plane is full of people who have booked seats though and there's not 2 pairs of seats available for us? Would we not get to go on the flight?

On one hand, £80 is a lot of extra money. On the other hand, I don't want us to not get on the flight at all!

We haven't travelled much with children so not sure how risky this is. Would welcome opinions. Many thanks!

"Absolutely, anyone who has paid extra for a specific seat who is asked to move should be reimbursed, plus compensation!
Families with kids should be seated together but it’s not the fault of other passengers if they’re not. People often choose seats because of specific needs which may not be obvious or something they want to discuss in public if a cheapskate CF wants their seat."

I agree. I pay extra to sit by the window and my partner to sit next to me because of my anxiety around flying and my dislike of being elbowed or stepped across by random strangers. That's how I tolerate flying. I won't move because a parent was too irresponsible to book a sit next to their child.

I think this is true. I flew twice with them last year, once in a group of 7 once in a group of 3. Nobody paid for seats, and nobody was sitting next to each other. Wasn’t a problem either time as the flight wasn’t full so we just moved after take off.

I don’t think it’s a reason to “never fly Ryanair” though. If you’re not fussed where you sit then you don’t pay, and if you are fussed you do - simple!!

Personally when booking the holiday I build the cost of seat bookings into the total cost. It might be okay, it might not. It depends if you’re prepared to take the risk or ask strangers who have paid to book to move. I’m not.

‘Next to’ can mean in the seat in front, or behind, or across the aisle.

It’s part of the cost for us. £80 is much less than what we’ve paid.

We were on a long haul flight last year where a family with children were split up for 10+ hours, with one adult with each child but they were at opposite ends of the plane and having to walk past us to see each other.

For us the experience is much more enjoyable sitting together as a family and the flight is part of the fun and the start of the holiday.

Christ these airlines are cunning and greedy. I don’t think parents should be forced to pay some sort of child tax to sit together.

I wouldn’t move for anyone as we always prebook our seats. It costs so why would I give it away for free to a random stranger who couldn’t be bothered to organise themselves or who are too tight to pay?

If you can’t afford the £80 to book your seats then you can’t afford the holiday, it’s really that simple.

Budget airlines have to make their money somehow and paying to prebook seats is one of their ways. Everyone knows that.

How are they 'cunning and greedy'? They say up front that if you want to choose a specific seat, you need to pay in advance, otherwise you risk getting a seat you don't like. They're not hiding anything from you. Plus, as has been pointed out, traditionally the cost of choosing a seat was included in the much higher headline price, so you were paying whether or not you cared where you sat. Same with luggage and meals. Budget airlines operate on a very low profit margin, and this is how they make their money.

I much prefer the system whereby you only pay for the services you want. Being a parent doesn't entitle you to special treatment.

We have never paid and have never had to have a child sitting alone. I dont think they are allowed to seat very young children on their own and once they are older it's fine. Its not like a train where they could hop off and you would lose them. I would never ask anyone else to swap seats though. That's the gamble you take. However I wont support the airlines policy of ramping up prices with added extras. It would be perfectly possible for them to assign seats on booking and group people together. Thats how it used to work.

Personally, I wouldn't risk it. The extra seat costs need to be factored into the cost of the plane ticket and the entire trip, just like a hotel tax. It's annoying, but it's the way it is.

I've always booked my seats when travelling with my children. We have never been split up. I also wouldn't move from my chosen seat for someone that has taken a chance.

I don’t follow the logic though.
Firstly why is allocating seats people gave already paid for an £80 cost to the airline?
Secondly if the ‘cheap skates’ as delightfully referred to can be asking booked people to move why is anyone paying to book seats at all?

I'm not sure an airline such as Easyjet making well under £ 10 on the average passenger (before tax) is particularly greedy TBH.

People will probably spend.more than that on their first round of drinks at the bar having got off the flight.

I think of it as, if you’re not bothered where you sit you get your tickets cheaper. Rather than thinking it’s £80 extra. It’s part of the cost of travelling with children.
I book my seat when flying as I have really bad anxiety, if I had to move for someone else I’d be really distressed to the point I don’t know if I’d be able to fly.

How it 'used to work' is that passengers paid for services even if they didn't want them, making flying much more expensive for everyone.

I don't much care where I sit so won't pay the premium. However, if someone does care, then they have the option of paying. Even with that extra cost, the flight is likely to be much cheaper than it 'used' to be. Airlines aren't charities and if you want an extra service, you have to be prepared to pay for it.

So how do you think that works? The cabin crew know who have paid and who haven't? Guess what, they don't. So what will happen is that when you ask the cabin crew to arrange to sit next to your young autistic child, they are going to ask people around you. The people who will say no will feel guilty, which is a crap start to their holiday. The people who will say yes will feel morally superior to the people who say no and the people who said no will feel even worse, even though they paid for their seats in advance.

If you don't ask people to move, your young autistic child is going to be someone elses problem when the child becomes agitated or bored or starts wandering around the cabin annoying everyone.

If you have small kids or kids with needs, call the airline and ask for seating together or pay the fees. You are a CF if you don't.

All children. At least under 12s.

I think people are forgetting how much flights used to be before the no frills airlines existed, and the price you paid included booking seats, luggage allowance (cabin and in the hold), food and drink.

Now you can opt to have none of those and just a seat somewhere on the plane with a very small bag and no meal.

Look at it this way, £80 is too much for someone else to pay for be guaranteed two seats together only to be moved and not benefit because you think having children entitles you to special treatment.

But next to doesn’t mean directly next to, which maybe fine for some children, but I wouldn’t have risked it with our DC and I also wouldn’t expect some random passenger in the row behind or in front to babysit my child

Airlines overbook their flights by around 10% due to no shows and then hope that not everyone turns up. Wizzair are an awful airline and whilst I might have risked it on easyJet and Ryanair, if I want to sit with my family I would pay.
As others have said, together or with doesn’t mean next to. We have watched as people have refused to move because parents didn’t want to pay to choose seats. Equally, we have found that very often we are seated next to each other when we’ve checked in. Depends on how stressful you find the whole thing.

Not booking seats could mean the start of your holiday - and the trip back - might be super stressful if you take a chance with checking in and don’t manage to sit together or 2 and 2.

Some people are getting more and more arsey about moving seats to enable families to sit together, which makes it an unpleasant atmosphere.

I pay to guarantee an aisle seat so I can get out for the loo easily, and would hate feeling pressured to move, because often the people who refuse to move are blamed for being unreasonable.

Not necessarily the case. Our family holidays as a child were always affordable. Much more so than today. It doesn't cost the airline more ton seat people together. It is not like baggage.

I expect we will see another thread on here about someone being called a Karen because they wouldnt change their pre booked seats for someone who didnt book their seats because they HAD to sit with their child.

Exactly ! DS 18 just had an impromptu weekend to Malta for £50 in flights because he just took a backpack small enough to fit under his seat and didn’t book a specific seat as travelling with friends.

We always paid to sit together when he was under 10, after a stressful package holiday where I had assumed that seat allocation would be included in our “luxury holiday “ what with traveling with a 5 year old and all, but it wasn’t and I made us get to the airport hours early to ensure we sat together.

Now that we don’t pay my observations are that Easyjet, Jet2 and British Airways will generally seat you together provided you check in as soon as you can, and Ryanair deliberately splits you up ( but on the other hand Ryanair has a very sensible policy of charging a nominal fee to ensure all under 12s are seated with an adult)I don’t know about Wizz air as I haven’t flown with them.