A woman has revealed how a man stole her pre-booked seat on a plane because it was a better one than his own – and he was left fuming when he was asked to move
A woman was left fuming after a cheeky plane passenger tried to pinch her window seat, claiming it was better than his middle one. TikTok user Chelsea Zeferina shared the infuriating encounter where she found a man pretending to be asleep in her pre-booked spot as she boarded her late-night flight from San Francisco to New York.
Despite being caught red-handed, the man reluctantly ‘woke up’ when Chelsea confronted him but wasn’t pleased about moving. He spent the rest of the nearly six-hour journey making sure Chelsea felt uncomfortable.
In her viral video, Chelsea recounted: “As someone who primarily travels by themselves, I have a lot of stories like this. But my favourite one is when I was flying a red-eye from San Francisco to New York, and I had booked a window seat so that I could sleep.”
“I go to board the flight, it’s like 11 O’clock at night. I get to my row, and there is a man in my seat with his hoodie over his eyes, pretending to already be asleep. I tap him on the shoulder and I was like, ‘Excuse me, that’s my seat.'”, reports the Mirror. “He looks up at me not sleeping. He was not sleeping.”
“He looks up at me and he goes, ‘Oh, do you mind if I sit here? I’m supposed to be in the middle seat, but I don’t want to sit there’. “And I was like, ‘Yes, I mind. It’s 11 O’clock at night. We’re flying a red-eye to New York. I booked that seat on purpose. That’s my seat’.”
Chelsea explained how the man got all “huffy and puffy” before he grudgingly moved to his assigned middle seat. “Mad the entire flight. The audacity to just sit there, pretend that you’re sleeping, and then get mad when I asked for my seat that I booked and paid for back. People are crazy,” she vented.
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Reacting to her video, one viewer lamented: “I will never give up my seat unless it is an upgrade. If you want to travel all together as a family do your seats in advance – not my problem.” Another echoed: “I notice that single women travelling always get asked to move or their seat gets taken.”
A third added their own experience saying: “A woman told me I ruined their trip – because I wouldn’t move. REALLY! Your WHOLE trip. Ugh!” And another shared their personal rules: “I book aisle seats. I will switch an aisle for an aisle seat but I will never switch for a middle seat, which is almost always what is being asked.”
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