I’m all for holding airlines accountable, but I do not appreciate hatchet jobs by cheap parents who either should pay up to ensure they are sitting with their young children or not fly in the first place.
Mother Angry That She Was Separated From Three-Year-Old Daughter On Flight
Jennifer Keller wrote a story for Insider this morning in which she laments that an unnamed airline refused to seat her next to her three-year-old daughter.
“I’d tried unsuccessfully to fix the seat assignments online. Then I’d struck out with the airline’s customer-service rep on the phone. The rep had passed the buck to the gate agent. The gate agents then passed the buck to me. “We couldn’t get anyone in your rows to change seats,” they said. “You could get on the plane and try yourself” was the extent of their assistance.
“We boarded the plane. When we got to my daughter’s row and she grasped what was happening, she burst out crying.”
Oh no.
Some questions for you, Jennifer:
- Did you buy a “basic economy” ticket to save a few bucks?
- Did you buy on a budget carrier that offers a low base fare but charges extra for seat assignments?
- Did you have a chance to pay for seat assignments and decline, thinking you could get them free onboard?
My “BS” radar is deployed when the airline and route are not mentioned. The only insight we have is the following admission when talking about guidelines from the US Department of Transpiration to ensure families are seated together:
“One of the department’s top suggestions is to purchase higher-class seats if sitting together is important to you. To me, it’s a bogus suggestion. In my case, I was a pretty broke mom trying to scrabble together a postvaccination trip for my girl; it was economy or bust.”
No, it’s not a bogus suggestion. Nor is the DOT suggesting you buy first class. The DOT is saying that you may wish to avoid basic economy tickets or not adding a seat assignment if you book with an ultra-low-cost carrier.
Jennifer tries to analogize the situation to leaving a child in a park unattended:
“If I were to leave my child with strangers for several hours in a public place, I’d likely be reported to child services and the police. So why is that fair game on a plane?”
I’ll tell you why: because in all but the rarest of cases (which I will address below), you do so voluntarily in both situations and therefore it is your fault in both places.
In the end, another passenger onboard agreed to move:
“A passenger right behind us, also waiting in the aisle, moaned, “Well, I’m not going to listen to that for the whole flight. I’ll change seats with you after all.” Nothing volatile, but not exactly the kind of behavior I’d like directed at my child as she reenters public spaces after two long pandemic years.”
What To Do About The Problem Of Families Being Separated?
Perhaps airlines should simply refuse to sell “basic economy” tickets to families traveling with young children. Or perhaps if they do, they should require that seat assignments be purchased in advance.
It is better for everyone if airlines seat families together. A gate agent should not just refuse to help (though that was not the case here). But people who choose to book cheap tickets when they could pay a little more for an advance seat assignment have no basis upon which to complain. Caveat emptor: seat assignments do not come with the cheapest tickets and all airlines now make that abundantly clear.
If not sitting next to your child is a dealbreaker (and it should be), then make sure you are booking a flight in which you can reserve seat assignments together at the time of booking. It is only in those cases, including cases of a schedule change or aircraft swap that separate families who were previously seated together, that airlines should be on the hook for respecting those arrangements.
Even if you buy a pricier ticket, if you are buying on a flight in which only middle seats are left, do not expect that another passenger must move for you. Book another flight.
So how does this vary from my story last week in which I chided a passenger and the airline for refusing to accommodate a child who cried over a seat assignment snafu? Because in that case the family had paid in advance to sit next to each other: they not only bought a space on the flight, but purchased a specific trio of seats next to each other. The airline messed up and the family found a woman with the same seat assignment. She refused to move so the boy lost his window seat and the family was separated. A totally different case than this one.
> Read More: Selfish Jerk Refuses To Switch Seats With Boy In Airplane Ticketing Snafu That Left Him In Tears
CONCLUSION
Sorry, but if you want to be cheap and buy the cheapest airline ticket, not pay for seat assignments in advance, and then expect the airline or other passengers to take accommodate you when you find yourself separated from your family, then I have no sympathy for you.
Let me put it this way: parents who buy these sorts of tickets show bad parenting skills, full stop. Know what you are getting into and spare me the faux surprise that you are not seated next to your kid when you won’t pay for it.
If the federal government is going to get involved in forcing airlines to seat families together, then it should ban families from booking basic economy tickets unless they pay in advance for seats together.
image: brainfunked
Another entitled Millennial / Gen-Zer
Nah, this is something we see in all age groups. But if you get your online kicks from screaming at the youngin’s to get off your lawn, then have at it…
I’m sure, also sounds like your typical Biden voter
Biden seems to live rent free inside your head.
when you ruin peoples nation that tends to happen
My nation started to be ruined on January 20, 1981. The ruin was stopped on January 20th, 2009. Then my nation started to go like a descending roller-coaster on January 20, 2017. You are the type of person that makes me happy that we in Chicago essentially outlawed the Republican Party in 1931.
You really can’t help yourself, can you?
@Aaron: How original. I think that stolen line is played out.
When anyone rehashes other people’s lines it’s clear they let others tell them what to think.
And I say that without any political overtones.
Played out but 100% true. Also not sure what it is telling me to think lol
@Aaron. That’s my point! You don’t know what people are telling you to think.
Exactly… the airlines won’t let me book a ticket for my 2 year old without an adult companion, they could just as easily put a lower age limit on buying basic economy. It would cause them a lot fewer headaches if they just did that.
What a great point, min agree requirement will at least push customer support issues out of the plane and airport and back onto the airlines’ phone agents
THANK YOU! Common sense is a lost attribute and social media gives uneducated (about a subject) people an outlet to complain about their own mistakes without taking any responsibility.
I think this subject is one we all can agree on.
The parent has bad strategy. Get the best seat you can and trade it with an inferior seat. Try to get an aisle or window. If you cannot and can only get 2 middle seats, then buy a better seat.
It may be possible to trade a middle seat near the front or middle with an aisle seat near the back, stressing that those with close connections may want the seat closer to the front. Once you have an aisle seat and a middle seat, then you can trade it for 2 seats together.
Here’s the root of the problem: People are idiots and airline tickets are too cheap. This combination has ruined travel.
Whether it’s the crowds of Instagram-driven would-be “influencers”, drunken thugs on board, or the entitled morons acting out at airport gates when their demands are refused, it’s all caused by the same thing: idiots and cheap tickets. This kind of bottom-feeeder acting out behavior once was confined to Grayhound bus travel…back when flights were considered a luxury.
You can’t fix the “idiot” part (that’s our society, it’ll take some kind of national fundamentalist crackdown or several generations of better parenting, neither of which is ever going to happen).
You CAN fix the cheap-ticket problem by imposing some kind of “moron tax” levied on low-cost air tickets. I’m all for it.
Regarding greyhound: Back in the early 1970’s, people generally dressed decently for public transportation including the bus. Look at the photos of the era sometime. Matt probably doesn’t wear a suit when flying but back then, that was the expected norm. People just dressed (and acted) better overall. I could go into the sociological factors, but don’t want to kick that off.
I’m surprised that Matt, whose a lawyer, doesn’t argue that there’s a legal precedent that you can’t restrict people from basic fares for “safety” reasons. I personally don’t think a child isn’t “safe” on a plane if not seated with a parent unlike a park where someone can steal the kid and run off but… there is the issue of assisting the child in the event of an emergency and THAT, really, should settle that: The parent shouldn’t be required to pay an extra fee in order to ensure a child’s safety. The DOT is trying to “encourage” airlines to do the right thing but that’s what Big Government Regulations are for.
Now “families” being seated together is another matter. Sometimes that’s just not possible even if you pay extra. A family of 6 is unlikely to find a full row empty. I’ve sat a row away from my daughter and wife a few times and all was well.
Back to sociology: Before my daughter traveled at age 3 (I didn’t subject her or fellow passengers to her being an infant lap child at age 2 for free), I prepped her for the journey. If she wasn’t willing to behave, I (lied) told her she couldn’t come with us. We rehearsed the plane flight including me taking her to the airport a week before and showing her passenger screening and airplanes. With snacks, toys, and other goodies (including even a new one that really helps take her mind off of things), she would be fine in a seat on her own next to a stranger. I notice that people respond well when they see me (gently but firmly) disciplining my daughter to behave around them.
In the early 1970s, most of the male passengers on airlines in the US, Europe and Asia were not wearing suits. It was just a much higher percentage then than in the 1990s. But with the dotcom boom, suits became less common office attire and also less common on flights.
The lady did what she couldn’t afford and made it problem for everyone else. When did taking responsibility end? Mother of the Year
Or the missing option: or don’t travel.
We don’t yet have enough information about this to take great umbrage.
But in any event, families traveling with children under 15 (exit row eligibility age) should be required to book seats such that at least 1 adult in the party is sitting next to each child, even if that requires a premium seat charge (or better yet, the airline should waive the fee when only premium seats remain available).
The fact that such key info was withheld leads to reasonable deductions.
Matthew, far be it for me to defend the person in your article, but there are not enough facts to make a judgement at all.
Could the person have erred as you write, absolutely, could the person have tried to keep the family together but ultimately failed, also possible.
I more than understand your frustration with the author of the Insider article and to some degree I would too, but we just do not know enough to make any conclusions.
Honestly, the Insider article is short on facts and the editor should never have cleared it for publication as we just do not know enough to understand what actually happened.
Dude, you’re all over the map on this issue. Last week, a passenger unwilling to change seats so that a child could sit with both parents (the child was already seated with one parent) was a “selfish jerk” for making a child cry. But, here, Jennifer is cheap because she didn’t buy up to a fare that allowed advance seat assignments.
Which is it?
TLDR?
Maybe you try reading the article? I addressed this and clearly distinguished the two events.
I did read it. Your attempt to make a distinction was not remotely convincing, counselor.
I’m sorry you slept through reading comprehension in school. Not going to argue if you cannot see the clear difference between paying to sit together and expecting to sit together for free.
Ryan, did you get separated from your mommy on that flight too?
KLM makes it for free for families. Delta should learn from them in this regard.
Or better yet, the DOT could just ban charges for seat selection. We all pay a little bit more but get peace and quiet in return.
I think that favors those who book early far too much.
When it comes to my bookings made within less than 72 hours prior to departure, I do worse with seat assignments in economy class now than I did in the decades prior to this seat selection change thing becoming a widespread nuisance. Same could be said for my trips booked 7 days out and one day out as well.
I concur. With status I’ve often left my seat unassigned assuming the gate agent or upgrade processing will result in me getting a better sear than the middle one in the back row.
I’m with Jennifer Keller on this issue. Mandatory post-advertising, post-purchase money grabs are bad and bad for safety. They are also a liability risk for airlines.
But that’s not the case. If she booked a basic economy ticket or on an ULCC like Spirit or Frontier and failed to pay for a seat, then risks were clearly and unequivocally spelled out. There is no post-purchase price increase here.
I’ve seen DL and some other airlines do this kind of messing around with families (or other groups with an adult and accompanying young pre-teen children) not booked in “basic economy” or its equivalent. I’ve also seen a variety of carriers do this to families (or other such groups with adults and young pre-teen children) booked in premium cabins.
I’ve even known of this seat nonsense from airlines when there is no option for customers to pay a premium for the flight to get seated together.
Remember this: when airlines got into the business of allowing customers to select specific seats themselves the airlines, the airlines indicated to customers that there is no guarantee that the booked seat won’t be changed. There were multiple reasons the airlines would not guarantee specific seat assignments, and children and safety/security reasons were part of why that was (and still is the case even with these cheapo scummy airlines aiming to shake down customers for more money after baiting and hooking the customers with bait pricing.
I had an incident with QR before the pandemic where the airline told a family with young children that they couldn’t seat any of the kids with a relative because the flight was sold out and every seat occupied. [Their tickets almost certainly weren’t cheap tickets, as it was peak vacation travel time and they had very recently bought the tickets.] That claim from the airline about every seat being occupied was nonsense from the airline, as the airline had blocked the seat next to me and it remained empty even after the plane doors were shut. I managed to help do for the passengers what the airline — that is its airline’s reps and FAs — wouldn’t do: find a customer-friendly solution that made sure the young kids would sit at least near one accompanying adult.
If the next suggestion is that families (and such groups) should pay UAM fees if not able to book seats together, note that airlines UAM service isn’t back to what it was in 2019 and that an airline demand for UAM fees would be a post-sales scam when its the airlines that are in charge of seat assignments. Something that becomes obvious to me whenever I’ve seen passengers displaced by airlines for the purpose of satisfying FAMs (or their foreign equivalent) or delivering for VIPs/CIPs and associated entourages.
It’s a post-purchase money grab from the airline. The end result for the customers from any post-purchase money grab like this is that it may be experienced as the de facto equivalent of a post-purchase price increase.
Even from purely a safety perspective, having families’ seats separated on a flight is a bad idea and a set-up for problems to hit ib sensitive situations up to and including emergency landing (attempts) and evacuations of planes. If your child is seated 20 rows from you in a sinking plane in the river, are you going to have blind faith on your child being someone else’s priority , or are you going to fight like hell to make sure the child is off with you and prioritized in the way you would do? The mere act of acting like a normal father to save your own child could well be a danger to other passengers on the plane ….. and it would be one less of a problem if airlines defaulted to seating families together.
I believe when you traveling with a child in a FAA approved car seat, the airline is required to place the seat and child in the window seat. The airline will make customers move to accommodate these seats.
Or maybe airlines should just follow existing law and DOT should enact tougher implementing regulations, pursuant to the 2016 FAA Reauthorization Act:
In General.–Not later than 1 year after the date of enactment
of this Act, the Secretary of Transportation shall review and, if
appropriate, establish a policy directing all air carriers providing
scheduled passenger interstate or intrastate air transportation to
establish policies that enable a child, who is age 13 or under on the
date an applicable flight is scheduled to occur, to be seated in a seat
adjacent to the seat of an accompanying family member over the age of
13, to the maximum extent practicable and at no additional cost, except
when assignment to an adjacent seat would require an upgrade to another
cabin class or a seat with extra legroom or seat pitch for which additional payment
is normally required.
And this can best be accomplished by blocking the sale of basic economy to minors.
Or simply seat families who purchase basic economy tickets together. Some airlines manage to do that already, e.g., AA. Why penalize those with kids? Doesn’t that harm those who least can afford it – the marginalized, etc.?
That defeats the very essence of basic fares or the ultra-low-cost model.
Sorry, there is no right to fly and if people cannot afford to ensure they are seated with their toddlers should not fly in the first place.
Yes, this! Airlines should follow the DOT regulations. Airlines splitting up families with young kids is absolutely intentional and preditory tactic to try to get parents to pay extra, which is against the DOT regulations. Flying regular economy buys other things like baggage, etc. Families flying basic economy are not asking for a specific seat (advance seat assignment) or even asking for the whole family to sit together. They are asking for an adult to be seated next to minor children, as protected by the DOT regulations. They should not have to upgrade classes (e.g. pay more) for this right. This could be hundreds of dollars for a family.
This is BS. I’m old enough to remember when you booked seats at the same time, your group got seated together. The airlines are perfectly capable of seating families together. Instead they choose to nickel and dime their customers for what used to be included in the price of a ticket. This even happens when you pay full fare for first class. I was recently separated from my 6 year old in first class when an airline rebooked me on a different flight. They have separated me from my child in first class when he was 3 before. The airlines need to do better. Under no circumstances should a 12 year old or younger be separated from their adult traveling companion.
Your first class example is a totally different situation than someone deliberately buying a ticket without a seat assignment to save a few bucks.
Yes and no. She deliberately chose to forego choosing where the airline would put them, but she presumed it would be together: 31A/31B, or 26D/26E. She didn’t care where the hell the “block” of two seats was, but she assumed the block would be indivisible. Airlines have birthdates. They could figure out the computing around not breaking up same-PNR seat assignments when one of the passengers is below 13.
Long before airlines started to charge for seat assignments and even after some started to charge for seat assignments, there have been airlines that make it a priority and deliver on making sure families with young children are seated together. Too many airlines in the US have lost the plot on service and the money-grabbing from the airlines just gets worse and worse as a result of governments providing too many waivers and favors for too many airlines without meaningfully holding their feet to the fire on service levels.
If it was me , I would have the DECENCY to swap seats for the benefit of a 3 year old child. It isn’t like it is a lifetime commitment, it would be for the few hour(s) of a flight. All I hear is a bunch of inconsiderate selfish so called adults. You whiners make me sick.
I sometimes think your comments, Klint, can be a little strident. In THIS case I am 100% with you. Flying is a privlidge, not a right. If you cannot afford to purchase a fare bucket or seats that are together during the booking process, perhaps you should re-think your travel plans. Stop it ! Grow up.
Folks who think they are entitled to seat trades are annoying, but in my mind this annoyance is exceeded by people who lack compassion and sympathy. Things happen in life- not all travel is voluntary, there are equipment changes, cancellations, missed segments, overbookings, etc… Young children have different needs from adults.
The amount of planning I do on this stuff is pretty extreme and I’ve been caught out a few times with a bad situation in terms of seating and kids. Generally I don’t hold back on spending for things like this, but sometimes you hold off on an expense initially and then you realize you need the product, but you can no longer buy it. Thankfully there are usually kind individuals willing to help me out, but not always.
Only one time in 15 years of flying with young kids did I ever have a problem, and it was a problem I could see coming when I booked the tickets. Typically we’d fly an airline with seat assignments. One trip the only viable price option was on WN, with a connection. First flight arrived late, we ran to the next gate to find boarding nearly complete. We did our best to sit with the youngest kids and to get those capable of sitting alone as close to us as possible. Throw in a few who were nice enough to offer and we made it work (we knew this was our mess and so we weren’t asking for any movement from anyone who got there first). But there’s no way I ever put myself or a three year old in such a position as this. Pay up to fly as needed or don’t take the trip at all. It sounds like this was a vacation trip, a funeral or sickness or similar would be very different
I booked a first class flight in December 2021 for travel in June 2022. Two adults, two children. Two days before the flight, it was cancelled. the alternate flights did not have adjacent seating available for us. It can happen even if you book months in advance and buy the most expensive fare class. People were kind.
It is an advantage to be in first class when a flight gets cancelled though– you’re only competing with a handful of folks in terms of rebooking, compared to hundreds.
First and foremost, ask POLITELY…..entitlement gets you nowhere!!!
Don’t pick on me because I’m old or because I’m a male.
And don’t try to make me feel guilty, or attempt to embarrass me, and don’t carry on like your child.
And if I paid extra for my seat, realize you maybe out of luck!!
In the future, take the advice given to Roger Thornhill, and Pay The Extra Two Dollars for matching seats.
Your comments apply to basic economy where the airline makes full disclosure that seating together is not guaranteed…but they always make the best effort to seat kids and parents together. You article could have been summarized in these few words. Not sure if you have kids but thinking that your small child would sit next to a stranger for hours would be unsettling for me.
I do have a personal experience where we booked international flight on a single reservation all seating together and due to being upgraded our single reservation was transformed into three separate ones. This was clearly and remains an issue with United which they have not commented on. In our case the kids were seat separately across the isle from wand other, y wife was seated on one side of first class and I was seated on the opposite side even though we booked economy plus and I have 1K status.
Agree this is an issue on United and also a totally different scenario.
I get your point but I have been in this situation. I am an AA Exec Plat and wife is AA Plat and we usually have our pick of seats. Once we were on a flight with no two adjacent seats for myself, my wife and 4yo daughter. I set alerts on expert flyer for weeks but nothing. Onboard I begged and pleaded with everyone around us — one full grown woman insisted on sitting next to her husband, who was also a full grown adult I might add — until one woman agreed to split up from her mom. (I offered to buy drinks for her mom) This happens and we have to rely on the kindness of strangers.
Maybe the woman was too cheap to select seats, maybe not. But common courtesy prevailed with me and (it seems) in this woman’s case.
And hey, she got a freelance article out of it.
These are the same people you aligned yourself with over the masking stupidity, so spare me Matt. Yes, this Karen should have gotten her and her spawn a seat together. But you were perfectly fine embolding their stupidity for two years, so this rings hollow.
I think you missed a lot of the nuance when it came to my position on masking.
Nope. You argued specifically with me on it being perfectly acceptable. Even when presented with persons like myself who can’t wear them. You chose the side of the Karen’s. Are you saying I’m wrong? Remember, your posts still exist.
You can wear them. Spare me, snowflake. I hate masks but an airline was within its right to require them as a condition of passage. That’s the extent of my “support” for them being obligatory. Don’t like it? Don’t fly. I haven’t worn one in months and won’t this winter. Don’t confuse my dislike of masks for my belief that an airline can compel them.
There was no basis in the acaa for them to compel them. You know that. They had to do an individual assessment, as delta did, to show you were unfit to fly. American, united and others didn’t do this until they were forced to support exemptions when the federal mandate was implemented. The fact that you refused to take them to task over this is why you shouldn’t be respected and why your whining rings hollow.
The statutory language does not require such exemptions during a public health crisis, though I certainly support their inclusion (and am glad the Biden Admin added them, even if abused by louts who really could wear them). Again, there is a difference between my personal policy preference and what is permissible under law.
Wow… what an arrogant, condescending, and privileged post.
As someone with a couple of million miles, top tier airline status and doesn’t purchase basic economy tickets, I can say that I’ve had my young kids separated from me after a plane change with a different configuration. Thankfully the fellow passengers were a little more understanding, had some compassion (as well as not having to be a babysitter for free).
Way to jump to the top of the list for Prick of the Year Award!
Apples and oranges; a totally different situation. But I suspect you know that…
The easy fix would be to get rid of Basic Economy but that ain’t happening. I don’t think the age to demand assigned seats should be 16, plenty of 12-year-olds, would be fine but if you are traveling with a young one, maybe 10 and under, you should be required to have side-by-siding seating before boarding. No passenger should have to change seats with you because you didn’t pay for one
No way I would have moved. This woman is teaching her daughter to be an entitled whiner — after all, everyone has a God-given right to go to faerie, buy the cheapest tickets and then get somebody to move and then CALL THAT PERSON A WHINER(!)
Matthew,
I have never read your blog before, but happened to come across it after reading the Insider article. My take even before I read your column was pretty much the same. I also agree that flying is a privilege not a right. A person pays money for the privilege of flying under the rules of the airline and government regulation. Do I agree with some that airlines are greedy bastards? Yes, I do. I do grumble a bit about it, but in the end traveling is important for me.
When you fly in a plane you are stuck in what is essentially a sardine can for hours on end. As you get older, it gets harder on your body to fly. An article in Newsweek discussed a situation where a person who was 6′ 5″ with bad knees booked an isle seat. A woman asked this person to move so that her child could sit next to her. The person refused (with a damn good reason). When they got off the plane the woman was rude and yelled at the person. This is perhaps a worst case situation, but it does show the entitlement that some have when traveling with children.
While I’m at it, I will say that I think it is cruel to travel with a child under three years old. Their ears canals are still forming and that is the reason they cry on the plane. It is solely the parent’s fault for doing this to the child. In my mind it is child abuse. Children that young can not communicate when they are hurting.
That all being said, I book my flight in advance and buy the seat I want even if I pay extra. I pack my backpack with ear canceling headphones, earplugs, my computer and headphones. Also I pack Tylenol just in case. Being prepared on a flight is very important to me.
David
Ps-I have lived abroad in Asia for almost 20 years and have to go back and forth between the west coast of the United States to see my mother. The lengths of the flights are long, they will be even worse since I moved farther away and live in Vietnam.
If I pay for a window seat it’s for my own therapy, to look out the window. I also like to sit in the back where all the kids scream, and throw up. And I did buy a good pair of EAR PLUGS; we’ll see how that works.
The contract of carriage AND every major airline has rules which are quite clear: Your ticket does not guarantee a particular seat on an aircraft.
As far as people unwilling to give a hand an help out a parent are apparently forgetting that they, too, were once children.
Help the mom out, it’s the grown up thing to do.
Shame on airlines for taking advantage of families. No reason the airline Couldn’t have seated the toddler with her mother
I concur with the writer. I don’t buy basic economy or fly ULCC carriers for that very reason. And no, will not change seats for a family to sit together. But I usually fly economy comfort to avoid this situation. but I willing to pay more for the ticket
I absolutely agree with if you want to sit with your family pay to sit with the family don’t gamble and don’t ask to switch it’s bad form.
I have had too many experiences with Ryan Air where I pay for a forward cabin seat, I gamble and chose a window and an aisle hoping no one will pay to be in the center. Typically the route I fly No Irish or English national would pay for such a seat.
However, the Algorithm Ryan Air uses is a joke. The back of the plane would have open seats but many times it would put someone in the middle seat and they didn’t pay and for them to be seated in that class is bunk.
I would say something to the person and I would also mention it to the FA more times then not the person would move.
I have written to Ryan Air about the issue sent photos of the situation and they did seem to take my information to heart.
I know it’s bitchy, my husband is mortified when I speak up, but I don’t care. I’m paying extra for comfort. And I don’t want to hear him moaning.
I would rather not fly a budget airline, but timetables rule my travel.
One more point please if I may about airlines. Most of the time with the “extras”
If you do the math it doesn’t pay to nickle and dime yourself. Especially if you are older and can afford to travel, buy the upgrade, travel in comfort. Life is short take the trip and enjoy!
Pretty narrow minded article, there are plenty of situations where you have no choice but book a specific flight . Your original was cancelled and the only one left is the one with seats all over. Airlines constantly rebook people to “similar” flights on a same day. There are could be time constraints why a person needs to book a flight on specific date / time. Given there is a monopoly / duopoly for lots of destinations, there are not much options to choose from
“No choice” ? — I doubt it.
I never buy basic economy for this reason, still ended up in this situation several times, got lucky during check in.
Yes when your flights is at 7am and gets cancelled at 1am the same day along with bunch of other flights and you need to get home with small kids, there are not a lot of reasanoble options aside of booking any flight for the same day.
Americans are so protective of corporate interests it’s bizarre. Like abused spouses protecting their abusers. Flights booked together esp families used to be seated together. You guys are acting like she’s entitled and unreasonable for expecting a basic. It’s no handouts/pay for assigned seats until airlines need tax payer bailouts and then it’s “look at the bigger picture”. Over the years airlines have increasingly cut down on amenities, now charging extra for everything they can. Soon they will charge for chilled water. Corporations want to squeeze out the last ounce of profit possible (hyper capitalism) meanwhile you guys are in defending this practice as if you rest on the board of directors
The villain here is not the parents with young children. It’s the airlines who one day decided they could charge for seat assignments.
Airline fee creep has been happening for 30 years now. The seats are getting smaller, the fees are getting bigger, and passengers are getting angry at each other instead of the airlines for their awful practices.