Originally Posted by
derekvader
Why don't other airlines, particularly those that have a higher service class up front, ever seem to block out the front/back rows then?
They do.
Travelled in one of the last weeks on the BMI Inverness to Heathrow route, scheduled for an A319, economy only as much of BMI is nowadays. We got allocated seats scattered around the cabin as flight was "full up", which didn't seem to gel with only about 45 pax in the departure lounge.
One of the ex-BMed A320s had been substituted. Larger aircraft but has a big First Class section, which nobody was allowed in, goodness knows why not. To maintain Weight & Balance the rear about 8 rows of economy had nobody seated there either. Everyone squashed in 6-across abeam the centre of gravity.
For this we had paid getting on for 6 or 8 times what Ryanair typically charge for a sector of comparable length.