Steve vRS

I'm flying at 9pm tomorrow and pounced on the Emirates online check in at 9pm this evening on the dot. However, there were only a handful of seats available and none of these were 'good' seats.

How do you check in earlier?

Regards

Steve

nik52wrx

Maybe everyone prebooked there seats when buying their flights, i do.

Aaron1978

iTrader: (12)

Me too

scoobyster

The good seats will be reserved for those with frequent flyer gold status or similar, perhaps the expensive flexible ticket holders too.

Jaybird-UK

Airline booking, ticket pricing and seat allocation is the biggest scam ever! I bet if you polled everyone in your class of seat on a flight I bet no one paid the same price

Kieran_Burns

iTrader: (1)

Very, very carefully calculated scam though.

When I worked at British Midland I installed the LAN based system that calculated how to maximise the profit on every flight to every destination at every flight time - all based on the history of seat bookings and no-shows.

It would work out how much to overbook a flight by (all flights are over-booked) and which seat classes to allocate tickets to. Made the company a bloody fortune.

I remember when they had the Chunnel fire and the ferries were on strike at the same time - BM were the only people flying to the UK out of Europe and people were scrambling for seats. I was in reservations when the Res Supervisors were given the call to set ALL seats on ALL flights to 'S' class. No negotiations - you want to come home, you pay the maximum amount we can charge for a seat. People's £50 seats suddenly cost 6 times that.

Made a lot of money THAT day as well.

tony de wonderful

Emirates are a glorified budget airline. I've flown with them LOTS though and they are ok but to be honest give me BA or KLM etc anyday. Emirates flights tent to be RAMMED to the max from my experience.

I'll take competent pilots over the latest entertainment systems.

urban

iTrader: (1)

Why do they do that though?

I remember once flying form Belfast to London and was asked if I could take the next flight instead(With compensation) as this one was full.
I was booked etc.
I think I was given £80 with a food/drink voucher worth £20

Kieran_Burns

iTrader: (1)

because it works out more profitable to the Airline to overbook and pay compensation for the odd person asked to stay; than it does to only book the available seats and have empty ones due to no-shows.

There are always no-shows. People (mainly businessmen) will pay for the more flexible ticket and not take the flight they booked because they can always take the next one, or the next etc. People who pay the least amount HAVE to be there or not get on without paying again - the time of day of the flight defines which kind of passenger you'll get and therefore the amount of over-booking you can get away with.

The fact is: they flew a full aircraft (maximum profit) with minimal compensation and I bet you were happy with the money for a slight delay - so everyone gains.