International Airline Seat Reservations

[killbill2]

My wife and I are planning a trip to the US West Coast in late 2009 ex Brisbane with our young children.

What I was wondering is whether any of the airlines which service that route [Qantas, Air NZ, V Australia, Delta] allow you to reserve confirmed seats when you book and/or pay without risk of being bumped from those seats. We don't mind paying a fee if that's necessary but don't like getting to the airport hours ahead to be told the only seats left are near the rear toilets. The travel agent we made enquiries of told us seats could be "requested" but there was no guarantee.

We don't have enough FF points with anyone to pull rank and we prefer to do our bookings online.

Many thanks.

 

[futaris]

If you don't fly a LOT and don't have status with an airline, generally you can't expect to get a "better" seat. Even more so, if you've paid little for your fare.

As your travel agent says, you can put in a seating preference (generally window/aisle). Even if you select a seat, it can always be changed by the airline (for operational reasons), so it can't be guaranteed.

You can also try flying United, Air Pacific or Air Tahiti across the Pacific.

AFAIK, the only airline that will let you check-in online (48 hrs prior) and select seats across the Pacific is Singapore Airlines. However they're only really a suitable option if you're flying from the West Coast of Australia, i.e. Perth.

Otherwise, if you don't mind LCC, you can preselect a seat on Jetstar from SYD-HNL...

NB, QANTAS may be introducing paid exit rows, but I think children aren't suitable for those seats. See this thread.

 

[NM]

No airline guarantees pre-reserved seat allocations. They will do their best to honour the requests, but there are sometimes circumstances that require them to move people away from their pre-reserved seats.

One of the reasons that an airline sometimes has to change people's seat assignments is if the aircraft has a maintenance problem and is substituted with one with a different seating configuration. Some airlines (such as V Australia) only have one seating configuration that they fly on the route, so an aircraft substitution on such an airline should not require changing seating assignments. However, this is due to the small fleet of aircraft available to the airline which may mean a maintenance problem results in longer delays that for an airline that has a larger fleet and can substitute aircraft even if it means a different seating layout and hence changing pre-allocated assignments.

Some airlines, such as Qantas, allow seating pre-assignments only until a certain percentage of the cabin has been pre-assigned. So if this limit has not yet been reached, any passenger can pre-assign seats. However, Qantas does reserve what are considered to be the better seats (normally those nearest the front of the aircraft) for their higher status Frequent Flyer members. Qantas stops pre-assignments after the threshold has been reached to ensure there is flexibility for airport check-in staff to ensure families and groups are able to be accommodated together on the aircraft.

However, be aware that Qantas is just now changing their pre-allocation seating policy so that Silver, Gold and Platinum FF members can make their own seat selections on-line. I am not sure if this will replace the existing policy where anyone can call and request a seat assignment until the pre-assignment threshold is reached.

I expect Delta and United will allow anyone to pre-assign seats as this is a common policy for US-based airlines.

But in all cases these are requests (whether for a specific seat or a preference such as aisle/window) and are never guaranteed, even for the highest status frequent flyer member.

 

[futaris]

I expect Delta and United will allow anyone to pre-assign seats as this is a common policy for US-based airlines.

United Airlines - Seat assignment FAQs
United Airlines - Airline Flight Online Check-in at united.com

You can do seat selection on United, at purchase or at checkin. That being said, their planes are probably the oldest and feature-lacking...

About Online Booking
https://www.delta.com/help/faqs/checkin/

You can do seat selection on Delta, at purchase.

You can do OLCI, if a Visa isn't required. So I don't think that you'll be able to do it transpacific, e.g. SYD-LAX.

 

[trooper]

With NZ anyone can request/select your seats online after booking.... There are some seats not available to "non-status" passengers... but the usual rule of getting to the airport early and asking no doubt applies there...

Here's why......I'm Gold with NZ and always "request" an exit row seat as well as putting in for a standby upgrade with points... Why is that relevent? Simple.. If my upgrade clears then that exit row seat becomes available if not at the last minute, then certainly quite close to departure...

I scored an exit row on QF LAX-SYD with no QF status.. I assume something similar happened there!

Having said that, I should emphasise that while NZ (and most other airlines?) say it is "only a request" I really think that is a "CYA" type of thing..:mrgreen: They might have to move someone from a bassinet position I suppose.. or there might be an aircraft substitution....

I have NEVER lost my requested seat allocation on NZ.... not once. (And I have only had "status" for two years)