If you want an aisle or window seat on a flight, please pay for it

• In the last 12 months, 47% respondents to a LocalCircles survey have said that in the past 12 months they didn't have an option to secure a free seat.
• Majority of the respondents believe that only 20% seats in a flight should be in the paid category.
• Families and groups travelling together have had to face the paid seat dilemma even more to ensure sitting together.

When was the last time you booked a flight ticket and got a free aisle or window seat? Chances are that it's been a while. The cash-strapped industry has been steadily looking at ways to increase revenues from seat bookings and other allied sources. A survey proves that it is no accident that you never get a seat of your choice without paying for it. A survey done by LocalCicles shows that 47% respondents said they had to pay for a seat of their choice.

A majority of the fliers surveyed (51% to be precise) have said they did not even get an option to secure a seat without additional charges when they last booked their flight tickets. This stood at approximately 35% around the same time last year.

Consumers have been raising this issue on social media platforms like X (earlier known as Twitter) for a while now but the availability of free seats seems to be decreasing with time passing.

So, how many ended up paying for their flight tickets in the past year? Out of the 34,000 responses from airline fliers located in 308 districts of India, as per LocalCircles, approximately half (47% to be precise) ended up paying for their seats.

Many fliers have sought capping such paid seat allocations. When the question was asked in the survey, it found 48% of the fliers were of the opinion that only 20% of the seats on an aeroplane should be permitted for levying a seat allocation fee.

The survey also points out that one of the most affected are people travelling as a group, especially families. The challenge cited with this by many family and group travellers is that unless they pay this seat allocation fee they simply cannot expect to be seated together in the flight making it inconvenient for families with young children.

What do the DGCA rules say?

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is looking at framing regulations to cap the number of preferential seats airlines can offer in a flight, as per a Business Standard report in May this year.

Since the aviation regulator allowed airlines to charge extra for seat allocation, analysts say that low-cost carriers are earning anything between ₹60,000-70,000 per flight, as per a Mint report.

A quick check shows that the charge for window and aisle seats is between ₹150-400 for low-cost airlines like Indigo and middle seats often fall in the lower bracket. Moreover, special and emergency seats with extra legroom are charged between ₹800-1,500.