Seat allocation

After changing my PE dates for LHR-NYC the A/C or J/K seats are no longer available for the return leg, only middle seats. Talking to the VS person helping me she advised that 72 hours prior to departure Exit row seats may become available for allocation and to call then. I must admit I thought that exit row seats were only available for allocation a the the airport on day of departure. Is this not the case?

Naturally the remaining 40% of seats will also become available 24 hours (or sometimes slightly more) prior to departure too.

[honey lamb]

She is wrong unless there has been a distinctive change in policy. Exit rows and bulkheads are only allocated at the airport.

The remaining 40% do become available when OLCI opens but it is well worth checking a couple of hours beforehand as they have been known to be released earlier

Thanks that's exactly what I thought too. I wasn't aware of anything being available 72 hour prior to departure.

As you rightly say sometimes extra seats become available earlier than the 24 hours. On a recent flight to EWR a lot of extra seats were available 48 hours prior to departure.