[SimonS1]

SwissExpat. You were offered something subject to terms and conditions. Unfortunately this was one of the occasions where the airline had to move the curtain and hence your seat. Annoying but hardly the end of the world. Or maybe you really were expecting the airline to rearrange the seating of the whole plane to accommodate you.

You didn’t pay for your seat. You paid for economy travel and so got what you paid for. You were not entitled to a refund of something you hadn’t paid for – the seat reservation was free as a Gold member as you stated. No reason at all why you should have been upgraded.

These things happen. Move on.

[Ab0dache]

BA744fan,

I was on a CDG return flight yesterday in economy selling class M.
Both of the two flights were only with 3 rows of CE seats occupied and 4 rows dedicated to this cabin.

I am only a blue tier BAEC.
I was surprised and happy to see that seat 5A was available to be picked on the first leg and that seat 5F was assigned to me for the return leg.
It means that was a 2+3 seats row configured for CE but assigned to economy passengers.
I checked-in at 1am in the night before my morning flight. So i am not sure if I was lucky or if it is because of the business quiet summer time.

Of course I took the seat and enjoyed to have some more space between my neigbourgh and myself.
5F was fine also for my return. 5A of course was the best but not available for my return leg.

All of that to say that it may be the same for your week-end trip (if you are interested) with no need to book the exist seats. No extra legroom however (A319 on the first leg and A320 on the second leg). But
I cannot comment on the exist seats legroom.

Scream 4 on saturday night and Quadrophenia on sunday night, both at 10:30 pm during the “movies under the sky” festival at La Villette (metro Porte de Pantin line 5): all free: free entrance, free seating on the grass and big inflatable screen. Another way to enjoy the real Paris.

[JohnHarper]

Well the one sure thing is that the new seating on short haul will stop this problem ever happening again because like LH NEK those two seats will simply not exist.

As for the complaint, there isn’t one. Seat moves are a risk and for all you know there might have been several solid rows of gold card holders behind you, gold cards are relatively common. Should they have been moved to accomodate you and if so why?

This also bears out my view that unless you are one of the very few at the top of a frequent flyer programme then your perceived value to the airline is probably very distorted, after all how many gold card holders do you think BA or any other major airline have? They can all afford to lose a few without worrying.

I suspect at the end of a call like this the call centre operative probably had scawled DYKWIA on their pad.

[ImissConcorde]

Mindful that there is always someone else worse off……….
I flew back from Dublin on BA last week. Somehow someone was given a boarding card for that seat between A and C behind the curtain. And he was a large lad!!

[GlobalFalconCitation]

I think maybe that what was wrong here was how badly the staff handled you complaint rather than the actual seat change. (It sounded pretty dreadful – especially considering it was the gold line!)

The fact you had to change seats is not too bad as you did not have to pay to select your seats and also they are all the same! Euro traveller on a short flight is absolutely fine as the legroom is fairly decent. My tactic is try to find a free row after everyone is on the plane, then essentially you have got yourself a free upgrade to club europe (except for the food etc.) I hope this will help as an idea for the future.

I am sorry that you had the misfortune of being disappointed but BA clearly state that your selected seat can be changed at any time. Personally I just try to be flexible and adapt when things like this happen.

[TheRealBabushka]

*cringe*

[AnthonyDunn]

Personally if not up front, then I grab the exit rows and hang on to them for dear life. With the new “revenue enhanced” CE seating, knee and leg room is going to be at even more of a premium in future. Other than doing TP-induced front-end flying, I now prefer to take my own grub rather than endure the polystyrene that suffices for short-haul in-flight “catering” in Y on BA or (anyone else) these days. I am well used to the look of bemusement from fellow pax and CC alike as I get stuck into real food whereas they are masticating on, what I assume, is a by-product of the North Sea oil industry.

[IanFromHKG]

BA744fan, yes the exit rows do have additional legroom (to enable people to get through the row to the exit). However (and this is a big caveat) if there are two exit rows together, then the additional legroom is relatively small and you should only book the rearward of the two row. This is because this cnofiguration signifies window exits – and for the same access reason, the forward row do not have ANY recline at all (so that in an emergency they are not obstructing access to the rearward row). Even on single-row exits (which signify doors) the row immediately in front of the exit may have no recline.

SwissExpat, I generally share the views of others on the forum. However, I am staggered by BA’s inability to predict with more accuracy where the curtain should end up. On my last BA flight, with a pre-reserved exit seat in row 9, I was moved to row 26!!! I was about the same number of rows behind the curtain as I would have been in my original seat according to the OLCI seatplan (I had already checked in on-line). Did they really not know within that on-line check-in period about the 60-odd extra CE passengers??

[manxman123]

Anyone who has travelled extensively with BA knows how the small print is enforced in a cavalier fashion leading to some people to vow they will never fly with them again. BA flies some 34 million passengers internationally every year, and if they piss off 1 passenger in 1000 that is 34,000. They’ve made the decision not to bother to address the concerns of this minority, as they feel it’s easier and cheaper to recruit new customers than to address all those problems. So the instruction is to rigidly enforce the small print no matter how unjust it might seem. So they can change your seat at will as the small print entitles them to. They are still a good airline, but don’t expect them to always be human or nice or kind or understanding . . . . .

[esselle]

Except that it is not “small print”. It is normal size print, and the phrase sits right alongside the seat number confirmation at the time you make the selection. Not hidden, no sleight of hand, no room for uncertainty.

I am not sure, based on my 25 odd years flying, that it happens that often. I am sure that, if it does, it can be a bit of an irritation, but it is hardly the end of the world.

[James2508]

We have just cancelled our BA AVINO card.
We try NEVER to fly through London because of the extra costs, and baggage problems.

[EU_Flyer]

In defence of BA, I have had this happen to me on several airlines including BA. When it comes to how it’s handled, I’ve always found the BA staff on the ground and on board quite willing to assist, where they can.

On a long haul flight or even a flight over 2 hours, I can understand why people may get upset if their preferred/requested seat is changed last minute. But that change rarely results in a significant change in the quality of our flying experience. Bar perhaps getting off the plane 5 mins later, there isn’t much difference between 6A and 25A. Granted, where you go from a window/aisle seat to a middle seat or where you and a flying companion are separated, it can be awful, but I’ve always found BA and most airlines will do what they can to fix what is usually a computer error and not an evil human deliberately separating 2 travel companions.

In short, we wouldn’t huff and puff if we didn’t get our preferred seat on a 1.5 hour train journey but when it comes to flying 1.5 hours we get angry and frustrated when even the smallest thing goes wrong.

Perhaps the issue here is that our expectations as travellers, with all these shiny gold and platinum cards and the advertising that accompanies them, have made us believe that we’re still travelling in the golden age of air travel.

The truth is, an airline is obliged to get us from A to B in the class we’re booked in. If we purchase something, like an exit row, and we don’t get it, the airline is only obliged to refund us the cost of that purchase and not re-arrange the entire aircraft/order in a new plane/upgrade us to Concorde or any such gesture simply because we didn’t get 4A as we though we would at check in.

And that goes for those of us at the top of the frequent flyer pecking order as well.

Now… where’s the lounge? I want to change my seat to Paris as I believe we’re landing to the south and 7K won’t give me a view of the Eiffel tower on approach.

[MrMichael]

Absolutely right Alexupgrade, provided the airline gets us to the correct destination, safely, without scaring the whits out of us, within a reasonable time of that timetabled, and in the right class of travel, then we have got what we paid for, and the airline have delivered the contract. Period.

[MrMichael]

Absolutely right Alexupgrade, provided the airline gets us to the correct destination, safely, without scaring the whits out of us, within a reasonable time of that timetabled, and in the right class of travel, then we have got what we paid for, and the airline have delivered the contract. Period.

[manxman123]

But what about when you’ve paid for Club World out of your own pocket and because of a catering strike they didn’t load any dinners and they offer you just a dry roll, a yoghurt, a couple of chocolates and a cup of coffee? No legal redress. If you’re very lucky they might give you 5,000 Avios. Not much compensation when your ticket cost you maybe an extra £2,500 and you’ve spent 3 weeks up the Amazon or something and were looking for a nice comfortable flight home with all the comforts and service we know BA can provide . . .

[Author]

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