Emergency Exits
 

So if Virgin are now charging extra for an emergency exit seat, and no one buys one for the flight, who operates the emergency exit in the event of an accident? I noticed on a recent flight with empty seats that when a gentleman moved to an empty exit row after take-off, he was politely asked to pay for the upgrade or get out! He moved out of the completely vacant exit row.

Charming! Is this any way to treat a 'guest'? And I bet it'll be quite a while before the said gentleman ventures onto a VA aircraft again.

Exit rows don't have to be occupied. The regulations only cover the type of person that must sit in them, if they are occupied.

To answer your question: Who operates the exit....? The first person to get to it!

Emergency exits where operated by pax (eg 738's o'wing etc) do require exit row to be occupied - refer Operator manual
AT

Few years back we didn’t have enough pax onboard for the exits (A320). Return was full so they asked some ground staff to go along to fill the seats to avoid cancellation.

So rather than have someone who has been briefed on the operation of the emergency exit the airline would prefer someone who hasn't been briefed.
Interesting.

And sadly not surprising. On a VA flight over the Christmas holidays an elderly passenger seated behind me started to become ill and requested a blanket - apparently Virgin are "trialling" having customers pay for blankets, and on this occasion they had sold out. The apologetic cabin crew instead said they would turn up the temperature in the cabin by a few degrees (no fault on theirs, at least they tried to assist) which helped the poor lady, but made for a rather uncomfortable flight for many of the rest of us... I was already annoyed at this lack of regard for passenger health and comfort, but reading about the exit row charges and potential safety implications, I too will think twice about booking with VA again any time soon.

Qlink Dash 8 last week. They asked for volunteers to fill in the last seat in the exit row. ... I got a bit more legroom (-:

Hmm you had less than 4 able adults on the outbound leg? Seems quite the edge case...

And what happened to said ground crew on the fully booked return leg?

Iirc we needed 2 at each overwing IE. 8 per flight on the 738. It's been a while tho

I'll call "dodgy" on that too, Atakacs!

We did have a rule that below XX pax, there was no requirement for pax in Exit rows. Now, if there are any pax on board, the exit rows get filled in order. If you don't have the number of pax to fill all the exit row seats, we certainly don't cancel the flight!

Poppa, come on, out with the True News!! :=

If under a certain number of pax, exit rows do not need to be filled in line with CASA requirements.

Only ABP’s may be seated in the exit row and must be briefed so you can’t just have anyone moving in there without a briefing (CASA requirement).

On top of that, these are sold as extra revenue seats (economy x). Letting just anyone sit there would be akin to letting anyone into J class just because the seat/row was free.

Just to be clear, if no one has purchased exit row seats and number of pax now requires exit row to be filled, they will be filled by pax. Ground crew will in this case issue seat changes to meet the requirements.

So... If the numbers required an exit seat being filled and if a Non ABP bought the exit seat would they be told to move and the seat given to an ABP?

Correct, you have to be an ABP to be seated in overwing exit row. Ground crew will assess in the first instance and then cabin crew also have power to move non-ABP out. Affected pax will then be refunded the amount paid for said row. Mind you, when you select exit row online, system makes you check a box ensuring you know the requirements to be seated in exit row.

I have been offered an exit seat by Virgin gate staff when it became apparent they didn't have enough.

Unfortunately was the case. My previous employer was under the close watch of the regulator at one stage, who at one point was given a over and above set of rules to follow in order to operate.

I assume you are referring to the Tiger grounding and the million restrictions CASA slapped on them in order to operate right after.. I assume these were all lifted so would be a one off

QF don't refund EROW charges unless ineligible pax call at least 24 hours prior departure

Fwiw I remember flying a pretty empty AirBerlin 321 with passengers only at the extreme ends of the cabin. The emergency rows all remained empty.
When I enquired to cabin crew about this they explained it was for weight and balance.

There should be some commonsense applied. If there's only twenty pax on board with at least 3 FAs, why on earth do all the overwing exit seats have to be full of ABPs?

They could all get out of one of the main doors in a few seconds, without needing to use the OWs.