Airline policies on seating for plus sized customers- your thoughts?

My H is a pretty savvy traveler and can usually snag a seat with good legroom, but when we went to Vietnam he was too old to sit in an exit row. I was, too! At sixty plus, the Vietnamese airlines deemed us too old to handle that emergency door.

Was it an older type exit door that you need to pick up and either lay on the seats or throw out of the door opening?

Those supposedly weigh 40 pounds, but there are older people who can throw that and younger people who cannot.

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I was on a Frontier flight and when we got on, there were 2 very tiny older people in the exit row, with their son, a FA, and in the row across were 3 other flight attendants all laughing and whooping it up. The ladyā€™s legs didnā€™t even touch the floor and looked like a 10 year old. When they starting giving the safety instructions, she spoke up and said she couldnā€™t handle the door and they all shushed her and told her not to worry about it.

I wrote a letter to frontier complaining about their crews, both the ones working the flight and the others. They basically said it was no big deal. I said I was writing to the FAA. They offered me $50. I told them to keep it because I was never flying Frontier again. And I havenā€™t.

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I did not pay attention. Maybe. H is very fit and youthfulā€”he should offer to pass a test next time! Seriously, I can see having age limits on this, but this one surprised us. Are we old now?

Lol, you were probably in better shape than more than half the people on the plane!!! They must not realize that age is just a number!

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Seated on the plane. The gentleman seated between us is of average size but is doing the manspread thing. Fortunately I am small so itā€™s not a big deal, though I like to cross my legs and I can probably only do it in direction . Just a tad uncomfortable. My DH is, as usual, already asleep leaned up against the window. We are now finally taxi-ing from the gate.

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Middle seat mate has been on his computer for a good part of the flight, and he keeps poking me with his elbows. I am trying to keep my arms close to my body and I have sorta turned sideways in my seat (my back is in the right hand corner of the seat against the right side/aisle armrest) but I keep getting elbowed. One would think he might be aware that he is elbowing me and maybe try not to splay his elbows so much, but apparently not.

Apparently yes! My neighbor was turned down when she tried to adopt a dog from a rescue - sheā€™s too old at 63!

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Can you say something to him?

When that happens to me, I cross my legs and rest my shoe on their knee. That always gets a quick retraction of the offending leg.

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Letā€™s face it people. Airplane seating in most cases is not roomy. And people come in all shapes and sizes and with varied personalities. There are ways to speak up if something is a real inconvenience to you in a non-threatening way. If your seat mate doesnā€™t adapt to your comments, play some games on your phone, listen to a podcast, read a book , take a nap - do your best to get through the flight. Judging and getting riled up doesnā€™t change the situation.

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We have one hour left at this point. Itā€™s not like he isnā€™t aware he is poking me. He is sitting up straighter at the moment so the manspread is currently less problematic. Maybe I should take the bad with the good :woman_shrugging:

This is me. I donā€™t fly often and when I do itā€™s usually the cheapest flight I can find. I go in expecting it to be a bad experience . If itā€™s not, Iā€™m pleasantly surprised.

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Not sure if that is a general comment or
Is in response to my description , but thank heavens the airline now offers free Wi-Fi. The tv monitor is on, I have my noise cancelling headphones, the newspaper and am reading cc and my emails. Tried sleeping but the poking/elbowing made that impossible. No judging. Not riled up. Just describing the experience today.

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Regarding the title of this thread, how many people have encountered:

  1. An actual customer of size situation.
  2. An adjacent customer who, while not a customer of size, goes past the lowered armrest with some body part (legs, torso, abdomen, elbows)?

Seems like there are more #2 than #1 stories.

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Have you done the magazine crossword puzzle?

They havenā€™t had magazines on the airlines since covid. And I am left- handed. If there was a soduku (I used to do those too) I might have to do mild contortions to be able to writeā€¦ā€¦ or I might be poking him. :slight_smile:

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oh, duh, I had forgotten that.

I highly recommend row 6 seats on Alaska 737s. The armrests are not movable. They are like solid barriers between the seats, like in first class, but the seats are smaller. A person who needs 1 1/2 seats will not be able to get in theirs.

I have sadly seen a lady who couldnā€™t easily get into her first class seat on Alaska. She shimmied and squeezed and finally sat down. I felt sorry for the person sitting by the window next to herā€¦ no trips to the bathroom for the entire 5 hr flight. Had there been an emergency, the giant lady would have been in trouble.

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Sudoku app on your phone is possible.