PPRuNe Forums - Seat Selection Fees,

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Seat Selection Fees,

I’ve always seen these fees with all the airlines, especially when buying seat sale priced tickets. I normally fly Air Canada and have never paid the fee as I always wait to change seats in the check-in period 24 hours before flight time. Yes, the seats may be limited to choose from, however, I take the the risk and have never ended up with a truly unacceble seat. Westjet, I have learned this morning, has no such thing. If you purchase a seat sale ticket, or win comp tickets, then one probably has basic fare tickets. With these tickets you receive a seat selected by Westjet. You can change seats for a fee. There is no free seat selection. My seats this morning for both flights were in the last row middle next to the toilet (23B & 19B, 737, Q400). There were 10 rows of empty seats in front of me and then a smattering of seats available to row 5. A change fee was $28.00/seat. That meant an additional $112.00 for my fare assuming I select my seats for all the flights in my trip.

This is such a travesty. Essentially extorting passengers of more money at any cost. I don’t usually travel WJ as I truly find them the school bus of airlines. The seats are not comfortable, slippery leather that lets you slide into the seat in front of you, sometimes not as the guy in front of you is essentially in your lap anyway. I took this flight as it’s the only way to fly into Brandon MB from the west coast efficiently. I just didn’t think it would cost me almost $300 more since checking bags are another expense to deal with. Sadly, there are no seat sales, Only the illusion! Maybe I’ll get left in Brandon as WJ has not been that good at looking after their passengers either! Brandon ain’t no Cancun!

If there were empty seats in front of you, why did you just not move after the seat belt sign was turned off?
CC never tell you not to.

Quote:

Originally Posted by standbykid (Post 10357228)

If there were empty seats in front of you, why did you just not move after the seat belt sign was turned off?
CC never tell you not to.

Yup plan to, however, the seats may be full by that time, or only middle available. It just seems to me that when airlines offer low fares, then jack the cost on seat selection because they sit you and the misses apart, then you pay to get back together, is not a fare practice and amounts to no more than extortion. This is why government has to step in and regulate. Nobody wants this but airlines don't police themselves!

Pretty sure you can still select seats at check-in with WJ. I certainly did on my last 4 flights in Nov and Dec. There's a separate sub-menu you have to click on. Easy to miss. :ok:

Quote:

Originally Posted by er340790 (Post 10359079)

Pretty sure you can still select seats at check-in with WJ. I certainly did on my last 4 flights in Nov and Dec. There's a separate sub-menu you have to click on. Easy to miss. :ok:

When you check in, you can select or change your seat, however, there is still a charge. Its $16.00 at that time. coincidentally, i was speaking with two couple on the flight and they bought the low cost fares and were not seated together. They had to pay to sit together. Apparently this is a new tactic by Westjet to squeeze people for more money. They will seat couples booking apart and then you have to pay afterward to sit together by moving your seat. To avoid this, call to purchase tickets directly with WJ. On the positive side, when you are at the back of the bus, you can easily move forward to an open row once doors are closed as you can see which ones are open. If the flight is not full.

With sunk or fixed costs of operation largely unchanging no matter what the business model, a model that sells seats below their marginal cost is destined to fail eventually....
Or find ways to squeeze ancillary revenue from the customer's pocket.

The Achilles heel of the 'low fare airline' is that unit cost reductions are finite. Therefore they either grow yield, which the consistently struggle to do or simply make sure everything that was once included costs an additional am amount.

Even Emirates does this. This isn't something only done by low cost carriers.

They have recently even increased the cost for reserving a seat in the forward part of the cabin.

WestJet has truly lost the plot. It's latest 'Sales Special' had fare from Thunder Bay to Orlando which goes via Toronto and SASKATOON.

For UK folks that would be like flying from Manchester to Malta via London and Moscow.

And I thought that no one anywhere could be worse than Air Canada...