After Aircraft Swap, 4-Year-Old Was Seated Alone…But United Airlines Blamed Parents

Aircraft swaps are an operational reality and often create a musical chairs scenario. But one family of four found out the hard way on United Airlines that remaining seated together required herculean effort. It should have never been this hard.

Aircraft Swaps Leaves 4-Year-Old By Himself On United Airlines Transatlantic Flight

Let’s review the story and I’ll interject my commentary along the way.

We were flying from Geneva to Newark (UA957)—my wife and I, our four-year-old, and our 18-month-old. We checked in the day before and were all seated in the same row. Shortly after, we received a text from United saying the aircraft had changed, and so had our seats. In the new configuration, my wife and our 18-month-old were seated together, I was four rows ahead, and our four-year-old was seated diagonally behind my wife, across the aisle and one row back. Alone.

This is a common occurrence: when there is an aircraft swap, say from a 767-400 to a 767-300, the system auto re-assigns seats and it is not quite advanced enough to ensure that families remain together, even when there are young children traveling.

We immediately reached out to United to fix the situation and asked to be seated as two pairs. After an hour chatting with a rep, they were able to move my seat to the row directly in front of my wife and younger son. But my four-year-old was still alone, and we were told, “It’s out of our control.” They advised us to speak to the gate agent.

This is a common answer and to some extent it is true. Most reservation agents cannot just move people from their pre-assigned seats (and this is a GOOD thing generally, lest we’d see more shenanigans). It is possible, however, for supervisors to move seats. You might consider asking for a service director in order to get this done on the phone…even then, you may need to wait until you are at the airport.

Once the gate opened, I explained the situation to the agent. She took our boarding passes and said she’d call us back when they had a solution. About 20 minutes later, I was called up again—but it was a different agent, and he had no idea what was going on (still not sure what prompted the call, honestly). As I walked back to wait, I overheard another family going through the exact same issue—kids aged 6 and 10.

Communication is key. Gate agents should be communicating with one another and I’d hope that gate agents would be aware if an aircraft swap messed up seating the previous day.

Pre-boarding started, and we still had no solution or updated boarding passes. I returned to the desk and saw them negotiating with a man in his mid-thirties. He said, “If I’m not compensated, I’m not moving.” I get it—nobody wants to move without a reason—but ultimately, he refused and boarded.

I understand the selfish behavior of this man…as a father, I tend to be more sensitive to these issues now, but I’d still not move from an aisle or window seat to a middle seat for a transatlantic flight without generous compensation and remember, it was United that swapped aircraft at the last minute.

Now I’m starting to get anxious. I asked the agents if they could split up a large group of retirees, assuming some were seated together. The agent replied, “They’re Premier members. We can’t do that.” So I asked why so many people seemed to be getting options and votes in this situation when my four-year-old clearly hadn’t. No response.

Well, I appreciate that agents tried to avoid moving MileagePlus Premier members…that sort of loyalty is noted and appreciated. Even so, it doesn’t excuse not helping the family. I just find it hard to imagine the entire aircraft was filled by passengers with elite status.

Finally, they said they had a solution. Relief. We were handed four boarding passes. We went to scan them, but one was rejected. The agent tried again—still red. Flustered, she told us to “just go.” We walked onto the plane and to our seats—only to see the same guy from earlier, the one who had refused to move, sitting in one of our seats.

I looked down. Sure enough, one of the boarding passes they printed had his name on it.

Oops. That’s not only a careless error, but a security issue since this man boarded without his boarding pass being scanned.

It wasn’t over. I spoke to the flight attendant, explained the situation, and she asked for my passport and boarding pass so she could go back to the gate. I started walking with her, but before she exited the plane, she suddenly turned to me and said, “Oh, sir, you have to stay on the plane.” I ignored her—I wasn’t about to let the flight take off with my passport and boarding pass somewhere else. I had zero confidence in their ability to fix anything, and at that point, I technically wasn’t even checked into the flight.

This part does not concern me a bit…the whole “I ignored her” thing. I understand his point and his rationale for disobeying the order, but it strikes me as unnecessarily combative. You really think you’re going to shut up and don’t protest if you don’t get your passport back before the aircraft door closes?

At the gate, I noticed two first-class tickets on the screen that hadn’t been claimed. I said, “Let’s make this easy—just swap us into those two and we’re out of your hair.” The agent replied, “Sir, I can’t do that. It’s too expensive.”

Clever…not.

I said, “You’re about to seat a four-year-old alone. This is a safety issue.”

He said, “You’re diagonal from him—one aisle, one row. Isn’t that okay?”

I asked, “How am I supposed to help him put on an oxygen mask in an emergency? And why am I explaining this to you?”

That’s a fair response…and can you imagine the stranger who finds himself or herself next to a 4-year-old? It’s not appropriate by any means, even for a (relatively) mature child.

Finally—finally—with boarding almost complete, he found a solution. We had two pairs. Boarding passes in hand, I walked down the jetway, trying to calm myself. I told myself, “All’s well that ends well.”

But nope.

As soon as I stepped onto the plane, the same flight attendant I had ignored earlier pulled me aside and said, “Sir, I need to let you know we have to file an FAA report because you deboarded the plane.” I replied, “Great—make sure to mention that you let someone on without a boarding pass.”

I like his comeback (I can’t help but wonder if he was that quick on his feet or that is what he wanted to say as he reflected on what happened).

The rest of the flight was uneventful—except for the petty comments and lack of service from that same flight attendant. But that’s another story…

In the end, this experience was almost too absurd to believe. The number of times I heard, “I’m sorry, but it’s out of our control,” combined with the obvious safety issue (a four-year-old seated alone) and the security breach (someone boarding without a valid pass), makes me honestly afraid to ever fly United again.

Ok, that’s a stretch…the “I’ll never fly United again…” stuff is cringe-worthy.

But the point is well-taken that United did not handle this well.

United has done a fabulous job of improving its technology over the last five years. I hope United will take anecdotes like this and work a (relatively) fail-safe solution for keeping families seated together…this kind of airport wrangling is stressful for all parties. The “system” should be able to fix this when there is an airport swap.

That’s a big part of “Good leads the way.” Families should not have to fight to have their 4-year-old seated next to them…