Seat reservations removed without warning.

Not sure if the link has been posted before but VS have released an update regarding the recent changes to customer requested seating. Have a look.
http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/pa ... /index.jsp

Lo & behold, follow that link only to see VS themselves branding this as "seat reservations"......no wonder so many poor passengers believe they are "reservations" when VS themselves promote them so heavily as reservations

I can understand people being annoyed at seat requests being changed - it's happened to me for a flight next April - but I do think we need to keep a sense of proportion.

The prime objective is to fly safely and in good time from a to b; what seat you end up sitting in is I think of secondary importance. I have lots of good memories of holidays; some started off with an excellent flight or a not so good flight but neither I think had much impact on the overall holiday.

This isn't to say that VS don't need to pay this issue more attention and keep pax informed - but falling standards? I don't think so.

I can understand people being annoyed at seat requests being changed - it's happened to me for a flight next April - but I do think we need to keep a sense of proportion.

The prime objective is to fly safely and in good time from a to b; what seat you end up sitting in is I think of secondary importance. I have lots of good memories of holidays; some started off with an excellent flight or a not so good flight but neither I think had much impact on the overall holiday.

This isn't to say that VS don't need to pay this issue more attention and keep pax informed - but falling standards? I don't think so.

I understand what you are trying to say here but the fact is, you could rationlise away almost any complaint or lapse in care if "getting you safely from A to B" is all you expect from a carrier.

The fact is, people have a choice of MANY airlines all of whom are capable of getting you safely from A to B. But when you have a choice of carriers at your disposal, then for many people its service that engenders them to one particular company over the others. For many its service that makes them decide to go with one airline who can get you from A to B - over another airline that can also get you from A to B.

I understand that seats sometimes have to be changed for operational reasons. Thats life. But an expectation of good service from Virgin is what leads me to expect that they should try harder to communicate to customers in advance if their requested seat has to be changed or removed for any reason.

Of course losing your preferred seat isn't the end of the world. But it is clearly a very important thing to many travellers - and it isn't for me or you to tell someone else what should or should not be important to them.

Yes, this is just one issue, but this thread is hardly the first to acuse Virgin of falling standards. I'm not sure you can really be all that dismissive of the claims that service standards are in decline generally.

Yes, this is just one issue, but this thread is hardly the first to acuse Virgin of falling standards. I'm not sure you can really be all that dismissive of the claims that service standards are in decline generally.

Is it really a "falling standard"?? I struggle to think of a time in the past when VS rung every passenger who had requested a seat to say that they had lost it.

In my mind it just another example of the challenges facing all service industries. That being that the customer expects far more than they did 5-10 years ago. Back then passengers would have been very happy to get a seat 'request' free of charge and would have adopted an 'oh well' attitude if it was lost for operational reasons. Today that is not the case and the passenger, as this thread proves, expects a call to tell them that. Half of this is probably because on other airlines (read BA) you have to pay for the request, so subconsiously now the VS passenger who hasnt paid expects the service that they would have got had they paid for the seat request.

Anyway in my mind it is not another example of falling standards (of which there are many others) but more of the customer expecting a lot more in terms of service without offering anything in return. Our expectations have increased that is all.

And lets not forget passengers can still OLCI or use Twilight (if ex LGW) or DTDCI (if ex MCO) and VS still hold a huge proportion of seats back for proper check in.

A similar thread on TripAdvisor.

Link

I can understand people being annoyed at seat requests being changed - it's happened to me for a flight next April - but I do think we need to keep a sense of proportion.

The prime objective is to fly safely and in good time from a to b; what seat you end up sitting in is I think of secondary importance. I have lots of good memories of holidays; some started off with an excellent flight or a not so good flight but neither I think had much impact on the overall holiday.

This isn't to say that VS don't need to pay this issue more attention and keep pax informed - but falling standards? I don't think so.

Well I call it failing standards when they lose a seating plan, have no method of recovery, and leave it to people to find out on a forum. Still, so long as I get there safely that's alright then.

I love fying with Virgin but sometimes i think they have taken lessons in customer service from RYANAIR