American Airlines Tells Flight Attendants: Crack Down On Passengers Moving To Extra Legroom Seats

It used to be that when the doors of the aircraft closed, passengers could re-arrange themselves freely. If there were empty seats, you’d see passengers spread out for more room. That made sense.

Extra legroom seats are not free and airlines now charge for seats. A window can cost more than an aisle seat. The cost of a seat in the front of the cabin could go up.

United Airlines flight attendants have been policing this for a long time. Five years ago, American Airlines didn't have a real policy, and passengers were free to move as long as a flight attendant told them not to.

Passengers in American's extra legroom coach seats can get free alcohol.

Adding the ability to change seats took on more significance. The policy still allowed customers to move.

Flight attendants are being told by American to police passengers moving from regular coach to extra legroom seats, as shared by JonNYC. Some flight attendants might enforce this.

It’s not unusual for Main Cabin (MC) customers to ask to change seats after they’ve boarded the aircraft – to sit next to a family member or get out of a middle seat, for instance. However, customers may not be familiar with our seat change policy; particularly when it comes to Main Cabin Extra (MCE) seats. While you may allow a customer to move to an available Main Cabin seat after boarding is complete, they’re not permitted to move into an MCE seat unless they are booked in that class. So, if a customer asks to move to a seat in a different seat classification (i.e., MC ot MCE, MCE to First, etc.) politely decline their request unless there is a customer srevice or regulatory conflict present. If a customer asks to change seats before the boarding door closes, work with the gate agent to accommodate the request. As always, please remain on the aircraft to avoid a minimum crew violation while assisting the customer.

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— 🇺🇦 JonNYC 🇺🇦 (@xJonNYC) November 11, 2022

It strikes me that American customers talking about Main Cabin Extra as a class and not simply as different coach seats, with different attributes, means they should be paying a higher UK Air Passenger Duty for those seats on London transatlantic departures. Delta has been treating its similar product as a separate cabin and doesn't charge higher taxes than the economy, so they seem to have figured this out.

I wonder if flight attendants would send customers off the plane to pay for Main Cabin Extra seats. It seems like a recipe for risk with single agent boarding.

If you have a regular coach seat assignment on American Airlines, don't stretch out into empty extra legroom seats because the airline wants cabin crew to serve as revenue protection staff.