Plus: making the passenger pay for 2 seats doesn’t guarantee they’ll be two seats together. I wonder how the airlines deal with that?
Let’s say you’re on Southwest (one of the airlines that does this), and you board late - and there are 2 seats left but they’re nowhere near each other. Are you (and your seatmates) SOL? What about airlines with assigned seating? My husband’s grandmother (who was petite as a person could be) used to book 2 seats on cross-country flights: she got more room to be comfortable and it was a LOT cheaper than a single first-class seat.
(snip Beelzebubba’s tale of acting like a toddler)
It is absolutely bullcrap.
There is no way in hell an adult could get his (her?) feet into position to kick the back of the seat in front of her on a modern cattle car, short of standing up on the seat, hanging from the luggage rack, and kicking them that way.
This would have gotten him(her?) unwanted attention from the flight attendant, and most likely guys in uniform would have been waiting at the arrival gate.
On SWA the two-seat folks are pre-boarded so they have the opportunity to pick their two seats early. This was mentioned by somebody upthread who does it.
For assigned-seat airlines the whole process is outside the norm. I doubt there’s a checkbox on the website to select “two-seats, one passenger”. If so, it’d have to be done via a live agent. Who could presumably grab 2 adjacent seats out of inventory. This would be days before everybody else gets to start selecting seats. And for sure this option might not be available if the traveler books at the last minute.
Interesting anecdote on extended-room coach which turns out to be a two-edged sword …
For reasons that don’t matter to the story I recently had to buy an ordinary non-employee ticket to travel about halfway across the US on a major airline. I bought the cheapest advance purchase highly restricted fare I could, which was about $300 each way.
The day before the first flight I went to check in online. It required me to pick seats. The only seats left were the extended-legroom coach. So I was required to buy the extra space I don’t need. I sure wasn’t expecting that. The fact all the other smaller regular coach seats were taken indicates that for this particular flight, the supply of oversized seats exceeded the demand.
The upgrade price varied from $28 for a middle seat to $35 for an exit row aisle seat. So 7 to 12% of the price of the el-cheapo baseline ticket I’d already bought.
For the return flight the next day (IOW 2 days in the future as I’m checking in) the situation was the same, but the upgrade prices were higher. Again there were zero plain old coach seats left and I was required to buy the extended-legroom upgrade. Which this time varied from $37 for a middle seat to $44 for an aisle exit row. Now we’re at 12-15% of the baseline fare.
The two airplane types were identical; I think the price difference is just their auctioning system jacking the price because it thinks it can.
I’m going to ask the gate agent about this when I get to the airport; I’d never expected that I’d be forced to buy an upgrade to travel coach. Optional, sure, but forced was a real surprise, and not a pleasant one.
Bottom line:
So far it appears that exactly the fears some folks voiced up-thread are coming to pass: some regular-sized people are paying extra unwillingly to have an airplane configured to be more comfortable for oversized passengers.
My daughter sometimes flies with her cello. It is too fragile for baggage, so we buy a seat for it. Most (all?) airlines accommodate this. But it is a pain in the ass, and absolutely requires that you telephone the airline and negotiate with a live agent early enough the seats will available. You also need to check in with a live agent (not via internet or kiosk).
Having ridden my first flight, a further irony appears …
Not only did I pay extra for fore/aft space I didn’t need, so did the short obese guy with sleep apnea next to me who intruded into my space for 3 odd hours. The product he wanted/needed was a wider seat, not a deeper one.
I look it as you were “forced” to buy a ticket in coach plus, if you wanted to be on that flight. Just as you would be* forced* to buy first class if those were the only seats open on a flight you wanted to take.
That’d be true doing booking. But sometimes in online check in, when you’ve already bought your tickets, they let you choose your seat. And sometimes in that process only premium seats are available and you are asked to pay an extra fee on top of the ticket you’ve already bought.
On the online interface, it’s not clear how to check in without having to pay extra. In this case, I always just check in at the desk rather than online.
I take it a step further… if I can’t get the seats I want at booking, then I don’t book that particular flight (unless circumstances really, really force the issue). I don’t want to be subjected to a lottery after spending money.
@even sven Checking in at the terminal with a live human can involve waiting in a massive line full of the most clueless passengers with the hardest problems. And you’re not getting through security without having checked in someplace.
For me it seemed that avoiding that line was worth about half the upgrade fee anyhow.
@Balthisar You’re far more experienced than I at regular travel, but ISTM that tickets can be bought months in advance, but seats are only selectable a few days in advance. Maybe I’m doing it wrong.
Lslguy, it depends how you buy the ticket. Usually, if you buy a domestic ticket directly from the airline, or through a travel agent, you can book the seats right away, often months in advance. Rarely, when you do that, they change the equipment after you bought the ticket, and you get bumped from 17a to 18a or something.
I almost never buy a ticket without also booking the seat.