Seat changes

Hi
I booked a block of 4 seats,23H + K, 24 H & K, in PE last November. LHR to JFK, leaving 9.30am on 30/04/2012, coming Monday. I did a check to-day and my daughter and her husband have been moved down the plane so there is now 2 rows between us,
1)is this something that happens often?
2)is there anything we can do to reverse this?
3) Why do they do this?
As it's my son in laws b/day on the way out we had planned giving him his presents, cake, and cards on board and making a bit of a fuss for him, quietly without too much distraction to other passengers. This is now going to be rather spoilt for us and I can see other passengers getting a bit fed up with us if we keep going backwards and forwards.
Cheers Virgin. v(

Hi
I booked a block of 4 seats,23H + K, 24 H & K, in PE last November. LHR to JFK, leaving 9.30am on 30/04/2012, coming Monday. I did a check to-day and my daughter and her husband have been moved down the plane so there is now 2 rows between us,
1)is this something that happens often?
2)is there anything we can do to reverse this?
3) Why do they do this?

a. It's not unknown
b. If "Manage My Booking" doesn't allow you to change it now then you'll get the chance again at OLCI which opens T-24
c. Usually it's an aircraft change

VS (and other airlines) take the line that you book a seat on a flight, not a particular seat on a particular aircraft. All else is a request....

Hope this helps in some small way

Paul

[honey lamb]

It's probably because the aircraft has changed from an A346 to the brand new A330-300 which only came into service last week.

Can you not change them on the Manage my Booking page? If not it's because the 60% of seats available for pre-requesting are now filled. More will become available when on-line check-in opens 24 hours before the flight so try to do that as soon as you can after that. Once you have checked in there should be a facility to change your seats

A little hint: Try and check the seat map a couple of hours before OLCI opens as more seats should be released then.

If all else fails, try again at the airport or even on board. The people in the row between may well oblige