Premium Seats - allocation

Iain I've just realised that after looking at seat guru, looks like it seats 15 A&B or closest to it lol, my luck I,ll probably end up in seats 50 y&z :D

Same kind of area we'll be looking to book in rows 15-20 seats A and B or F and G

We went on the same cruise from UK to Barbados, we had the same problem as you, we managed to book seats going out, which we all sat together, coming back was a problem, because people who had been on a fortnight cruise who were returning with people who were only cruising for a week had already pre booked their return seats, so we were split up.

To be fair, I would suggest you cancel your cruise if possible, we have cruised for the past 30 years, and I can honestly say that this

Was the worst cruise ever. The Thomson Dream should be called the Thomson Nightmare,

I paid £10,000 pounds for what they called a platinum cruise, the ship is a rust bucket, we paid for a balcony, if you wanted to look out you had to stand up,they put a large bath towel at the back of the bath to stop the bathroom flooding if you used the shower.

The food was atrocious, if you wanted steak you had to pay an additional £9.95p, this was just like a piece of cardboard.

I could fill a page with all the problems, I must point out I am not a moaner and put up with most things.

Thomson's have never offered any compensation and take 2-3 months to answer mail

If you have an email address I will forward a copy of my letter to Thomson

SO IF YOU CAN CANCEL THIS CRUISE, the. Problems with aeroplane seating. Will be the last of your worries

Having travelled on Thomson Cruises on a few occassions i would say your experience is the exception rather than the rule , i'm not saying you didn't have issues but the vast majority of people who travel with them don't have the experience that you have described , that said if i had £10,000 to spend on a holiday i wouldn't spend it on a Thomson cruise ....

thomson nightmare...oh dear

chins up cruisers....cruisin is what you make it :cool:....sometimes dream can be (a bit) hard work (sometimes) ;)...but I love the (quirky) dream...wouldnt pay 10k for it tho? :confused: (unless I could keep it) :)

I've only ever tried thomson, been on celebration, spirit, even the island escape, and so far I've had no problems, but like the others say, £10,000 , I'd not even pay that amount of money for the QE2 , I have honestly loved every meal onboard all of these ships, and never went to bed sober, unless it was my choice to have a quiet night, I've found some rooms I've had a little dated, but hey, your only sleeping, changing and ****ting in it. I don't think id like to spend a full night in my room watching TV, I'd rather just sit with a pint and watch the world go by, sorry you had a bad experience , but if we do have problems like you had, I WILL get it dealt with while I'm on board.

Alex

I was wondering! If you pre-book Premium Seats for long haul flights say for Jamaica or Barbados cruises do you have to go on the Thomson site and reserve specific seats 90 days before the return flight?

 

Or, are you just allocated randomly to passengers. It seems a lot of money to invest and end up sitting on different rows (one in front of the other).

 

Can anyone help?

 

Len

Thomson do class seats behind each other as together. However, if you'd paid extra for the premium club cabin, they (at least used to) let you select your seats for free, and don't charge a supplement like they do for the main cabin.

I dont know why they cant allocate/choose seats at the point of booking?...you can do this with most other airlines (it only costs about £4 per seat on easyjet)

 

tbh select your seat isnt set in stone either...they can (and do) change the aircraft at the last minute..... you can suddenly find your seat doesnt exist anymore?!

Not sticking up for Thomson, but it's a bit easier for easyJet as they only have two types of plane (Airbus A319/320) and they're all pretty much clones of each other, so if a plane is taken out of service, they can replace it with an identical one, which won't affect the seating plan. Thomson currently have 7 different aircraft types (including different seating in similar planes) and they often move them around depending on demand etc. and as a result, only fully confirm their flight schedules about 7-8 weeks in advance.

yep..its a tricky one this isnt it?...I wouldnt like to see someones young child sat on their own (next to garry glitter) miles away from their parents...I wouldnt want to see a mother sitting on her own with baby and a screaming toddler while dad/elder siblings are seated elsewhere

 

but then i wouldnt want to give my (pre selected) seat up either? especially to people who hadnt paid the fee to sit together

 

yes...i agree this does penalise families and thomsons are supposed to be family friendly?

 

its relatively easy to seat couples together as long they dont mind where they are seated no need for them to pay the fee imo

 

but

 

if i am travelling with family (6 of us) i stump up the cash to guarantee that we all sit together...mainly because i wouldnt want to inflict my children (or grandma) on other people trying to have a peaceful flight, 6 x £30 on long haul is a lot of cash considering we could just stroll into checkin late and get the best block of seats right at the front/back for nothing!:rolleyes:

 

the whole select your seat issue on thomsons is not just very expensive (compared to other no frills lines) the system is completely broken?

 

they make you wait until 90 days before your return flight (with no exceptions whatever the reason) but then they allow people who have booked for 1 week to get first dibs on the best seats on the return flight a full week before those that have booked 2 weeks! :(

 

they hold back blocks of seats (at the front and back near the doors)...the seats a lot of people might want and might be happy to pay to reserve but dont find out that they cant until some considerable time after they have actually paid the fee!:mad:

Fully agree with you there. There was a discussion on FB recently regarding this, and while I wouldn't want a family to be split up, I'd be a bit begrudged to give up my pre-paid seat to a family who wouldn't pay the fee. It's not an easy one, but like you say, with Thomson being a family-friendly holiday airline, this issue shouldn't be a problem in the first place as there shouldn't be such a petty charge. Fair enough on a proper budget airline, but not a package holiday company.

There are inconsistencies which don't seem fair - I think I've told the tale before of our friends who never pay to book plane seats. We had paid to sit together on the basis of it being a long flight to the Caribbean. Anyway we got our chosen seats and then my friend came up to us and said - you'll never guess...... we've been put in Premium complete with free drinks etc!!!!!!!

 

As others have described, there was a mis-match - not all the Premium seats had been sold so they were allocated presumably at check-in to those who hadn't booked anything! I felt it unfair - surely at least someone who had paid something, albeit much less than the cost of Premium, should have been offered those seats before someone who'd paid nothing! If we, or presumably anyone else, who had paid to book seats were asked at check-in if they would like an upgrade then I guess they would have happily accepted thus releasing their seats to be allocated to anyone who had not booked.

But this is Thomson we're talking about ;) Common sense doesn't come into it!

It's the unfairness, randomness and inconsistencies which get me annoyed.

Exactly, we booked the TA again for this year, back at the end of May. Just 3 weeks later not only are they offering the same cruise quite a few hundred pounds cheaper, but they're also offering a free upgrade to an outside plus cabin.

They then had the cheek to offer me the same upgrade to an OP cabin for several hundred pounds on top of what we'd already paid. Yes, they're entitled to do that, but it left a bad taste in our mouths, and means it highly unlikely we'll return to Thomson again.

It's no wonder they're having to sell their Caribbean itineraries to the Canadians, if only they treated their UK customers consistently and properly, they'd keep returning!

Not sticking up for Thomson, but it's a bit easier for easyJet as they only have two types of plane (Airbus A319/320) and they're all pretty much clones of each other, so if a plane is taken out of service, they can replace it with an identical one, which won't affect the seating plan. Thomson currently have 7 different aircraft types (including different seating in similar planes) and they often move them around depending on demand etc. and as a result, only fully confirm their flight schedules about 7-8 weeks in advance.

Yes that's true and also Jet2 aren't in the business of trying to coordinate 1-week, 2-week, Cruise & Stay, hotel packages and independent travellers either. They are simply carriers. But as you say, if Thomson just let you choose your seat at no cost when they are released - job done!

We went on the same cruise from UK to Barbados, we had the same problem as you, we managed to book seats going out, which we all sat together, coming back was a problem, because people who had been on a fortnight cruise who were returning with people who were only cruising for a week had already pre booked their return seats, so we were split up.

To be fair, I would suggest you cancel your cruise if possible, we have cruised for the past 30 years, and I can honestly say that this

Was the worst cruise ever. The Thomson Dream should be called the Thomson Nightmare,

I paid £10,000 pounds for what they called a platinum cruise, the ship is a rust bucket, we paid for a balcony, if you wanted to look out you had to stand up,they put a large bath towel at the back of the bath to stop the bathroom flooding if you used the shower.

The food was atrocious, if you wanted steak you had to pay an additional £9.95p, this was just like a piece of cardboard.

I could fill a page with all the problems, I must point out I am not a moaner and put up with most things.

Thomson's have never offered any compensation and take 2-3 months to answer mail

If you have an email address I will forward a copy of my letter to Thomson

SO IF YOU CAN CANCEL THIS CRUISE, the. Problems with aeroplane seating. Will be the last of your worries

The problem is the only balcony cabins on the Dream are Grand Suites, and if i was just looking for a balcony cabin in the Caribbean, a P&O cruise would be a much better option as they have standard balcony cabins at a fraction of the cost. "Platinum" is just a marketing word that Thomson use, that basically means new carpets and a kettle in the cabin, I personally think that's a joke and it doesn't fool anyone (or it shouldn't).

We're returning to the Dream in December for our third Caribbean cruise on it in as many years, but it'll probably be the last time, as other lines are coming up just as good, if not better, value, and we've only paid a fraction of what you did for 3 of us for 18 nights.

Yes that's true and also Jet2 aren't in the business of trying to coordinate 1-week, 2-week, Cruise & Stay, hotel packages and independent travellers either. They are simply carriers. But as you say, if Thomson just let you choose your seat at no cost when they are released - job done!

Exactly! easyJet, Ryanair and Jet2 are mainly just carriers, although easyJet and Jet2 also sell holidays, they're effectively a seperate flight and hotel bundled together and sold as a 'package' and not a package holiday as Thomson offer.

They work on the basis of basically having one or two types of planes to make seating arrangement and maintenance very easy, which helps keep their costs down. Ryanair only operate Boeing 737's, so if one goes out of service, another one comes along that's identical and keeps everything running smooth(ish).

Thomson have a different business model though, offering both long and short haul, and like you say, lots of different packages (1wk, 2 wks, cruises, cruise and stays etc.) but don't really seem to excel at either long or short haul IMHO. Their short haul product is effectively like a low-cost carrier, cramped seats, pay for near enough everything, but not neccesarily cheap prices to match (although admittedly easyJet and Ryanair aren't always cheap!), and when it comes to their long haul product, whilst it's being improved with free drinks from next month, isn't anywhere near a shceduled airline's offering, and yet some of the flight only prices I've seen to Jamacia over the winter, are just as expensive for their economy cabin as Virgin Atlantic are charging for their Upper Class (Business) offering!

And wandering back on to the original point, I'm sure Thomson have had the phrase "no cost" removed from the all the dictionaries in their offices ;)

My god baggerscruising, you can talk or should I say type, your fingers must be bleeding lol

Haha, I kept replying to one before I'd read the next post, so ended up posting a few times!

Thomson do class seats behind each other as together. However, if you'd paid extra for the premium club cabin, they (at least used to) let you select your seats for free, and don't charge a supplement like they do for the main cabin.

Hi, flying Thomsons to Barbados ex Glasgow on 2 January in Premium and to select seats - the ones we wanted 1a and 1b - cost a total of £110 return! 1a was £15 and 1b was £40! Looking forward to finding out the difference! It is a 767 by the way and not a Dreamliner which we would have loved to try!

We go for 2 weeks on 20 Jan and I have been checking daily for the seat booking to open since Monday, and I have booked my seats today.

We are just ordinary seats, and most of the available ones were in the rear, but there were still plenty together.