A man who was approached on a plane and asked to swap seats has said he was nearly ‘tricked’ into moving to a worse position – until a flight attendant stepped in
Swapping seats on a plane is a controversial but rather common occurrence. If you and your travel partner haven’t been lucky enough to get seats together, you might consider asking someone to swap with you, and while some are willing to be kind, others will want to keep their seat – and they’re well within their rights to do so.
The fairest seat swaps will be like-for-like, meaning if you’re sitting in a window seat next to a stranger, their companion might ask to swap with you so you take another window seat somewhere else on the plane. But one man said he was almost tricked into taking a worse seat after a family lied to him about their circumstances.
In a post on Reddit, the man said he was sitting in an aisle seat when a couple with a young child boarded the plane. The mum and her child took the middle and window seats beside him, and the dad looked around “distraught” before asking the man if he would be willing to swap seats so he could “sit with his family”.
The man asked the dad where his seat is and was surprised to learn he actually had a business class seat.
But when the man agreed to switch and take the free upgrade, the dad had a bizarre response. He claimed his wife would be taking the business class seat, leaving the man to sit in the middle seat instead – completely going against his earlier desire to sit with his family.
WARNING: The below Reddit post contains strong language.
He wrote: “I started to get up and grab my luggage, but once I stood up, he was like, ‘Wait, my wife actually wanted to go sit up there, can you take her seat instead?’ I said, ‘No, I’m not switching to the middle row and being blocked into a middle seat by a screaming toddler… and you said you wanted to sit with your family’.
“The dad got all defensive and switched up (holding up traffic during this entire interaction), raising his voice, going on about how I said I could switch seats with them and how it’s not fair to his wife, who had planned on taking his seat up in business class.”
But the man got the last laugh when a flight attendant came over to see what the fuss was about, and fellow passengers sat nearby backed up his side of the story – as she escorted him to the business class seat.
He continued: “At this point, a flight attendant had finally squeezed her way up to us and asked why we weren’t taking our seats. Before I could say anything, this man had the AUDACITY to say that I had offered to take his wife’s seat and now I wasn’t cooperating.
“I called bulls**t, and thankfully, the passenger sitting behind me backed me up, and the flight attendant was not in the mood to play. She asked to see his ticket, told me to grab my luggage and escorted me up to his seat.
“Needless to say, I had a very nice flight after that.”
Commenters on the post were furious on the man’s behalf at the family’s “audacity,” but they praised the flight attendant for handling the situation.
One person said: “The audacity of trying to downgrade someone to a middle seat for 8 hours is insane. I’m glad the flight attendant wasn’t having it. The fact that he doubled down and lied to the flight attendant makes it even worse.
“Glad karma was instant with you in business class. Entitled people always expose themselves. If he’d just been honest and polite, maybe he could’ve worked something out with someone else.”
Another added: “I love the outcome. He tried to con you out of your aisle seat, and lost his business class seat instead.”