Hi Butterchickengirl,
I personally am fit and able bodied its just that I have seen pax sitting in manned seats who are not,the thing I note is when booking at a Thomson Holiday Shop they have never explained that to sit in these seats you have to conform to a criteria,I would be very upset if I had payed for the seats in good will and was told I could not use them at checkin and they were given free of charge to another passenger???

The argument would be that you have only paid to specify which seats you want, but its not 100 percent guaranteed as sadly, people do lie about how able bodied they are, and if check in dont catch them, the crew will. We dont need people to sit at an exit manned by the crew, just at self help exits. For example, at TCX we now sell the exits rows onboard too (unless they r super tall, then I just move them anyways), so if the aircraft has empty exit rows (NOT self help exits) we advertise them for a price, and move them after take off, if we find people sitting in them during the flight, we ask them to pay....this is fairer for those passengers that have already pre booked them. If we have empty seats at a self help exit, then the CAA states we need someone at each one, if other passengers who have paid to sit there, complain, well then, theres nothing we can do... theyve paid for the peace of mind of getting the seat they want... not to tell the crew or other passengers where others should sit.

Hi Butterchickengirl,
Not on Thomson Airways you pay a premium I think its 50pounds per person maybe more on Long Haul as these are sold as "Extra Legroom Seats" you then have to pay again if you want to request a seat number??? hence my post of not being informed in the Thomson Holiday Shop of the criteria to be able to sit on these seats.

Yes thats the same with us Qatarman, but what I was trying to say was even though you have paid for extra legroom, its just youve paid to guarantee those extra legroom seats, then if you wanted to sit together or on an extra legroom on a specific row, then you pay a little more.

Yes, we booked "Extra legroom seats" with Thomson when we flew to Egypt in August at a cost of £50 per person plus £6 to book the specific seat numbers. Also, we were able to book these seats for our son who was 14 at the time, as they reduced the age to use these seats from 16 to 14 in Nov 98.

Wish Thomas Cooks would do the same!

Pat

Are you saying they let a 14 year old sit on an Emergency Exit row or was it a genuine extra legroom row?

But for anyone booking Thomson "Extra Legroom seats" on long haul you have be between the age of 20 and 65.

Its in their http://www.thomson.co.uk/editorial/faqs/flights/seats.html

Angie.

Hi Steve8482 and Angie34,

Sorry, first of all my above post should have read "Nov 08"

We booked with a Thomson shop back in Feb this year. The shop at the time were insistant that the age was 16 years. I had already checked on Thomson website prior to booking the flight with them but didn't want to argue the toss with them until I double checked their site again. It did indeed state 14 years. I also phoned the airline direct to double check, and they confirmed to me that the age was reduced from 16 to 14 back in Nov 08.

To cut a long story short, the shop would still not accept this, and the airline contacted them direct on my behalf. It turned out that the shop were unable to gain access on their system to book my request (obviously, had not been updated??)

Re: Emergency Exit Row/Extra Legroom Seats - We had the option of choosing either. We opted for seat numbers 32A, B and C which are located towards the rear of the cabin behind the bulkhead, and house the emergency chutes. The legroom was great (about 40"!!) somuchso that the cabin crew were seated facing us for take off and landing.

Just to add we were on a 757 (3x3)

If you look on the Thomson website it clearly states the age for these seats are from 14 years upwards.

Regards,
Pat

Pat,

Re my post above yours on the Thomson website it does clearly states that for short haul flights the age is 14 years.Its a shame you did not take a print out from the website to show them in the shop. They would'nt have been able to question what you had told them. Anyway getting the seats you did were certainly a bonus with that much legroom.

Angie.

Hi Angie,

Yes, couldn't believe the amount of legroom we had with these seats ... would definately book them again.

To be quite honest, I don't have much faith in the high street shops (TC included) We had quite a big problem with our holiday last year, and it was only resolved by me contacting TC Directors Office, as the shop was in total denial that there was a problem.

On the other hand, I only book with the shops, solely for the reason that if something does go belly up with my holiday (especially in the current climate) I have somebody to speak to face to face.

Best wishes,
Pat

We flew back from Crete last year with TC and I was gobsmacked at the crew letting a clearly "unfit" passenger sit in an emergency exit seat. The man accompanied by two elbow crutches and an equally "unfit" wife/partner with her own walking stick shuffled down the aisle and took their seats next to us at the window and middle seat. Now, being a nosey sort, I watched closely what would happen when the crew clocked this - low and behold, they did nothing. As soon as the man was seated, out came an assortment of pills - as I said being a nosey sort, and a nurse, I noted the names on the bottles/boxes. Ok, this man was an insulin dependant diabetic, with high blood pressure, depression, some kind of anxiety disorder and asthma. Obviously, I was not subtle enough in my espionage activity as he spied me looking and then promptly announced - " Oh I know, its a right old mixture, but that holiday has done me the world of good after having my knee replaced" I asked how long ago that was and he said about a month
What can I say - well, my OH would not let me say anything, sensible bloke, but I did find this unbelievable. When we landed, I pulled one of the crew aside and pointed out what I had seen, saying that it posed a risk to everyone in the event of an emergency having someone like that seated in an emergency exit seat. His response "Yeah, suppose so, safe trip home"
Unbelieveable!!!!!!!

What aircraft was this on? And what seat row did this passenger occupy?