Which airlines split children under 12 from their responsible adult

[munmun]

I have been reading a lot of discussion about paying or not paying for seats. I am interested in dibbers experiences of children being spilt from an adult they are travelling with.

This happened on a flight I was on with Easyjet when a mother and small (probably 3 years) were split. Mother behind child (so not split in CAA terms). I moved seat so the child could sit next to mum.

But, does this actually happen that often?

[daytonababe]

Personally never happened to us and I don’t pay for seats

But I’ve seen it happen on Jet2 a couple of years ago , American Airlines last year and it happened to a friend on VA last year .

[marypoppins38]

Ive seen it happen on an internal flight in the US with Delta. Mum travelling with two young children, I would say about 5 and 3. Mum was sat separated and several rows away from the children. Mum was incredibly anxious, as you would be. We moved so that they could sit in a row of 3. It was only a short flight so it made no difference to us but mum was so grateful dn couldn't stop thanking us.

[Floridatilly]

This is my worst fear! We always pay to pre book seats because she just can’t risk it.
It happened to one of the mums at school who flew with virgin

[OLS]

I've read about it happening a lot on TUI but I know Jet2 do it as they did it to my husbands little sister when we were all flying to Cyprus (she wasn't on our booking, we had pre-paid for seats for our lot ) - she was 10 at the time traveling with 2 Adults and they split the 3 of them up totally all over the plane - not even remotely close. Tried to sort it at check in and cited the "she's only 10 so you are breaking the CAA guidlines etc" but they wouldn't have it and shrugged "plane is full so can't change" - she was crying her eyes out, but we managed a lot of seat juggling and managed to ger her sat in the row in front of on of her adults so it worked out but I always pre-pay seats with Jet2 now for that reason!

[paw]

I’ve seen in on BA to San Diego when a family with 4 young children hadn’t booked seats and were scattered all over the plane. Once everyone was on the plane the family stood at the front while the FA tried to sort something out. An announcement didn’t work. We had paid and the FA didn’t come near us but they spent about an hour asking people who hadn’t pre booked to shuffle around to make a block of seats for them. The plane was nearly an hour late taking off.

Also saw it on Jet 2. The plane went tech and they had to bring in another. This was in the days that they had a premium section. A family with twins about 3 and another set about 5 were prebooked in the last two rows of premium which didn’t exist on the new plane. They were in single seats all over the plane. People did move so parents could sit near 2 children but it took a while and the father was so aggressive they threatened to deplane them.

[Hmr89]

Saw it happened with Easyjet when the plane was changed a few days before to a smaller one. Myself and OH volunteered to move to accommodate a family with 4 young kids. The Mum told me that their seats no longer existed after the plane change and they'd been allocated what was left which was 6 single seats across the length of the plane. She immediately rang Easyjet and was told it would be sorted out at the airport, the groundstaff told them it would sorted out on board and then the cabin crew had to spend half an hour pleading with people to move seats.

On a separate note, Ryanair are absolutely awful for allocating kids aged 12-15 years to emergency exit rows. The last 3 flights I've been on I've watched cabin crew asking kids how old they are and then having to find people to swap places.

[daytonababe]

Originally Posted by Floridatilly

This is my worst fear! We always pay to pre book seats because she just can’t risk it.
It happened to one of the mums at school who flew with virgin

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They can still move you even if you pay for seats though

[DisneySarah]

I was split up from my (then) just turned 2 year old on Easyjet. I haven’t looked at the guidelines so I don’t know if it was following them or not, but I think I was supposed to be in the row behind. Regardless, she was at the age where she knew how to open her seatbelt but didn’t understand that she had to stay sitting down during takeoff and landing. The flight attendants did move us though, and it hasn’t happened before or since.

[planecrazi3778]

The regulations are any child under 8 should be seated next to an adult (this could be accross the aisle) between 8-11 years old, they coiod be seated 1 row behind or in front of the adult and also accross the aise, so for example, the adult could be sat in 2a and the child in 3f. Any child over 12 can be sat anywhere according to the regulations.