Question re seat preferences

Hi. A while ago my seat preferences disappeared and the flight was showing as no seats available for preference. I spoke to Virgin cs while checking out something else and was told that it will be because all the available seats for preference were gone and this wouldn't now change until olci. I've been checking pretty much daily for the past month or so (sad i know!) and today there are about a dozen seats available again dotted around the cabin. Could it have been a potential aircraft change and now they know which config it's going to be? If so I wouldn't have thought there'd be so few seats available as its only changed today and I would imagine everybody else's original preferences would have disappeared at the same time as mine did. I'll keep checking daily but it seems a bit odd.

[honey lamb]

Only 60% seats are available for pre-selection and once that is reached the seat maps become available. While the official line is that seats are not released until OLCI, there are occasions when seats may become available although this is rare. You do not say when you are travelling or where you are going but the possible scenarios are people with fully flexible tickets or reward seats changing their plans or indeed an aircraft change.

There was also an issue earlier on where all PE seat requests were lost because of a technical issue and they could not be retrieved. The seat maps became available again and people were able to reselect and that may be the reason for your problem.

Finally, although the remaining seats (with the exception of exit and bulkhead seats) officially do not become available until OLCI opens, the reality is that they can open up earlier so keep on checking

Thanks for reply. Flying from mcr to Orlando a week on Friday 28 oct on vs073. The seat preference went missing from economy a while ago. Virgin cs said the flight was nowhere near full at the time - no idea if that's still the case. Was a bit miffed as we had row 26 near the exit so would have been one of first off. It also lost our preferences on the return flight vs074 but managed to select alternatives on that one.

It's a minor thing as the holiday is the main deal and sure I'll get something ok at olci as I plan to be online early but was just curious.

Does anybody know what a restricted flight is? The seat map for vs073 on Friday has today become unlocked but when you try and select the 'free' seats it won't let you. Phoned customer services who have said the system says the flight is restricted and may not even be available for olci as the control of the seating allocation has been taken over at the airport for some reason.

[honey lamb]

Does anybody know what a restricted flight is? The seat map for vs073 on Friday has today become unlocked but when you try and select the 'free' seats it won't let you. Phoned customer services who have said the system says the flight is restricted and may not even be available for olci as the control of the seating allocation has been taken over at the airport for some reason.

This sometimes happens on a busy flight. The seat map would have been locked because the 60% of seat requests had been reached but on occasion, if the flight is busy (and correct me if I am wrong, but is next week half-term in the UK? It is over here and moreover Monday is a bank holiday) then seats cannot be selected at OLCI and only at the airport. The reason for this is that there are families to be seated and they need to be seated together as per FAA and CAA regulations. To ensure this happens the remaining 40% are only allocated at the airport and thus the flight is deemed a restricted one

Thanks for your reply once again! The flight is indeed busy. It's the last day of half term over here on Friday. Early arrival at airport for us then! Family of control freeks unfortunately!

On friday flight stats is showing

VS75 - PE=0 and Y = 4
(no UC as its the A330)

VS73 - UC=0, PE=9 and Y = 9

Ta. Does that mean its not full? Just checked on the seat map this morning and virgin have allocated seats for us right at the back. Suspect olci won't allow me to choose any different so will have to ask at airport.

[Neil]

Ta. Does that mean its not full? Just checked on the seat map this morning and virgin have allocated seats for us right at the back. Suspect olci won't allow me to choose any different so will have to ask at airport.

UC is sold out, but there are still seats available in both economy and PE.

Even if OLCI doesn't give you options (I have found it very rarely does on MCO flights) then there is always the possibility of changing things at the airport.

Thanks,
Neil