First time this has happened with EBCI

[BellaBaby]

We had a similar situation this past Christmas heading to Orlando. My wife and I were traveling with our 11-year-old daughter. We booked the tickets the day the flights opened up and bought the EBCI at the same time. I ended up receiving A60 while my wife and daughter received B1 and B2. We asked the gate agent about this and our only options were to board separately or wait to board at the beginning of the B group. Family boarding was not an option due to the age of our daughter.

I waited until the start of the B group so I could board with them. There was a very large number of families doing the family boarding. By the time we boarded there were no rows with 3 seats together and only the very last row had 2 seats together. They took the last row while I was a few rows ahead of them.

So despite paying for EBCI we came very close to having our 11-year-old daughter sit by herself. We were lucky though since someone who boarded after us had a 7-year-old child and the flight attendants were desperately trying to get someone to switch so they could sit together.

On future trips to Orlando, especially around the holidays, we are probably going to go with an airline that will allow us to pre-book our seats. Southwest boarding has become way too stressful at times.

JMO but that doesn't seem fair. I wonder how often that happens. When my kids were little, I always paid for EB because I wanted to make sure we sat with our kids, I didn't want to chance it. And here the opposite happened.

 

[LadybugsMum]

We had a similar situation this past Christmas heading to Orlando. My wife and I were traveling with our 11-year-old daughter. We booked the tickets the day the flights opened up and bought the EBCI at the same time. I ended up receiving A60 while my wife and daughter received B1 and B2. We asked the gate agent about this and our only options were to board separately or wait to board at the beginning of the B group. Family boarding was not an option due to the age of our daughter.

I waited until the start of the B group so I could board with them. There was a very large number of families doing the family boarding. By the time we boarded there were no rows with 3 seats together and only the very last row had 2 seats together. They took the last row while I was a few rows ahead of them.

So despite paying for EBCI we came very close to having our 11-year-old daughter sit by herself. We were lucky though since someone who boarded after us had a 7-year-old child and the flight attendants were desperately trying to get someone to switch so they could sit together.

On future trips to Orlando, especially around the holidays, we are probably going to go with an airline that will allow us to pre-book our seats. Southwest boarding has become way too stressful at times.

I will only get the WGA+ fares with EBCI from now on if I use SW. Mid Nov, that got us in the latter A30s. I’m a solo parent and my twins are too old for family boarding but too young for sitting by themselves. But I’ve been flying Delta more down to MCO and back since I can often pay less for assigned seats with Main Cabin.

 

[MinnieMSue]

We were once split daughter (teenager) B1 and I was A 30. We decided to swap boarding passes (probably shouldn’t have but we did) and she went on first and I was able to get the middle seat beside her after the massive family boarding. She has always sat on the aisle because of frequent bathroom trips so I always had to take middle seat anyway. Now we both sit on aisle across from each other and let couples sit next to us. We have never had a B boarding assignment before or after this time with early bird. I am thinking it might happen on spring break. I was working and forgot about flights opening up for a few hours and I bought wanna get away instead of plus without thinking because the price was so high. With business class sold out and only a few anytime seats left our positions probably won’t be good. But we are two adults so unless we have to sit in middle seats (unlikely) it will be fine.