Seat allocation

Hi all

I booked my seats some time ago on the virgin website for our return flight from Las Vegas, checked yesterday and these have now been taken of us for some reason. Called virgin and the only seats they have available now are crap!! Had to book the only 2 seats available together, well according to the website anyway, as I don't want to be seated separately from my wife.

Does anyone know, is there a possibility that we might be able to get better seats for our return flight if we make enquiries at check in when we depart. I've been told that they only make so many seats available on the website for passengers to pre book.

Another thing that really bugged me about this situation, when they took my original seats of me, why didn't they send me an email informing me.

Thanks

Trevor

As Virgin hold back 40% of seating until the online check-in opens 24 hours before the flight your best bet is probably to try to get access to a computer the day before your return and use this facility.

-Steve

[honey lamb]

I booked my seats some time ago on the virgin website for our return flight from Las Vegas,

Another thing that really bugged me about this situation, when they took my original seats of me, why didn't they send me an email informing me.

Hi Trevor, while it is disappointing and annoying to lose one's seat allocation, they are in fact only requests and not bookings and can be changed at any stage for various reasons, the most common one being an aircraft-type change. There has also discussion here in an earlier thread about lost allocations which seems to indicate that some seats which were available for pre-allocation are now being held back in addition to exit rows and bulkhead seats.

The thread also mentions the difficulty of contacting passengers to inform them of the change in their request since people use different methods of booking and not all are able to use pre-allocation since only 60% are available for this.

The best you can do is, as Steve says, to try as soon as OLCI opens 24 hours before your flight.

Thanks for the replies.

Now I fully understand, I'll have to be quick and do the OLCI, just before we come back.

Thanks

Trev

Have to say Trev, I was completely under the same thought process as your goodself, until I joined this site!

It does seem a shame that Virgin Atlantic do this, so much so, I'm doing nightly checks to ensure my seat hasn't changed!

Hope you get the good seats. If you go on to the VA website again, and looks at seat allocations the seating FAQ's are quite interesting... in summary the only commitment Virgin has is for family groups.... however they don't define 'family'...

While I understand that seat requests are only that (requests), it does irk me that we never get an email when this happens. Attempting to call everyone isn't realistic, but it isn't difficult to set something up that would email everyone on the flight who provided an email address.

[honey lamb]

Originally posted by baldbrit
While I understand that seat requests are only that (requests), it does irk me that we never get an email when this happens. Attempting to call everyone isn't realistic, but it isn't difficult to set something up that would email everyone on the flight who provided an email address.

It's one thing considering trying to email people if it is an aircraft-type change for one flight and its return, bearing in mind that some of these substitutions may be last minute. It's another if it is a policy change and system-wide decision to withhold some seats from pre-allocation which heretofore had been available which this scenario may have been. You are then talking about all those passengers booked on those aircraft up to a date 11 months in advance. In the meantime new bookings are being made on to those aircraft and there may be no way of knowing if they have requested a seat allocation.

Think also of the several ways of booking; on-line, direct phone call to VS, Virgin Holidays - either direct or through a travel agent, travel agents, via other websites, other third parties.... the list goes on. Even if it was only one flight that was being affected, by the time you have sorted that lot out the flight will have long gone. In fact the plane would be on its next cycle.

Maybe an easier way to inform PAX would be to have 'My upcoming flights' as a panel on the VS homepage when they're logged into their FC account woth a small summary. Currently you have to delve down about 4 layers in order to see your seat numbers. OK so there's no alerting going on but at least your seat numbers are prominent displayed.

[honey lamb]

Currently you have to delve down about 4 layers in order to see your seat numbers.

I'm not sure how you get 4 layers and, bearing in mind that not everyone is a Flying club member, I checked it out. It came out as follows:

1. Click on Amend Booking link in panel on the home page, fill in the details and press Enter

2. Click on the arrow next to your name and there is your seat number as requested.

You only need to go down further if you want to amend your booking or check your seating if it has disappeared from next to your name

Strange - I decided to check on my flights coming up, and sure enough, my outbound seats were changed [:0]

Fortunately, I was able to find decent alternate seats . . .

[Neil]

This subject seems to becoming such an issue lately. Over on The Dibb there has been some very heated discussions about 'myseats' being changed and how terrible VS are for doing it.

I do wonder if VS should stop offering this service to everyone and just maybe make it a UC/PE/Au benefit, a bit like BA do. People seem to get so annoyed when there free request changes, I do wonder how they cope flying BA/Charters where selection is either not available or something you have to pay for.

TREV2283 - what was the outcome of your seating issue on LAS flight? Having the same problem just now.