Just booking a first class return (well, two Advance singles). When trying to select my own seat I keep getting a message saying that the seat selected is no longer available. Any reason for this? It was on three different trains. Is it because I'm on a cheapo ticket? I've booked now and hope to find an open seat on board but just wondered...
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Select your seat on East Coast
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causton
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Did the screen say "Only 1 ticket at this price"? If it is the last ticket for that price tier for some reason you cannot change the seats in my experience. I know it's frustrating
transmanche
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Did the screen say "Only 1 ticket at this price"? If it is the last ticket for that price tier for some reason you cannot change the seats in my experience. I know it's frustrating
Well it is a bug (in the sense of an unexpected system restriction) but for the reason that causton stated.
When you have booked the last ticket at any particular price band and then select to change your seat; it has to 'reserve' a new seat before 'releasing' the old seat. But as you already have the last seat available at that price band, there are no valid new seats available to be reserved.
gordonthemoron
Established Member
good grief, I've done 30 odd years in IT and this sort of gubbins still happens. Back in the day the problem with BR reservation system was double booking as two clerks could reserve the same seat at the same time as the reservation system didn't put any lock on it.
None of the systems are perfect, I recently bought some tickets with Flybe for a trip to Germany. Whilst I could flick around on the seat screen all day long changing my mind, what it wouldn't do is select the same seat for the return trip, even when that seat was free, if I wanted to sit in Seat 11 both times I had to manually select it. This isn't explained I had to work it out for myself.
And this is why old people won't use these systems, its not easy enough.
And this is why old people won't use these systems, its not easy enough.
That's a bit ageist!
Once someone had shown me how to switch my computer on, I managed it, but perhaps at 65 I'm not old enough.
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Reminds me of something similar when I was trying to book one of my many London to Hull AP tickets.
I have a favourite seat and prefer to select it. One time I noticed that getting a ticket from London to Brough and then another from Brough to Hull was cheaper than one through ticket. However, when I tried to select a specific seat a large proportion of the carriage wasn't selectable. When going for the slightly more expensive London to Hull AP ticket I was given a lot more of the carriage as selectable.
I have a favourite seat and prefer to select it. One time I noticed that getting a ticket from London to Brough and then another from Brough to Hull was cheaper than one through ticket. However, when I tried to select a specific seat a large proportion of the carriage wasn't selectable. When going for the slightly more expensive London to Hull AP ticket I was given a lot more of the carriage as selectable.
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