In this month’s Dear Eugene, we examine one of flying’s tricker etiquette questions. If you need to use the restroom mid-flight, is it better to wake the person sitting in the aisle seat or simply climb over them? Here’s what experts suggest.
Inspired by our intrepid founder, Eugene Fodor, Dear Eugene is a monthly series in which we invite readers to ask us their top travel questions. Each month, we’ll tap travel experts to answer your questions with the hopes of demystifying the more complicated parts of travel. Send your questions to [email protected] for a chance to have them answered in a future story.
Dear Eugene, On a recent flight, I was sitting in an aisle seat, fast asleep, when I woke to the unpleasant experience of my seatmate mid-climb over my lap—I’m talking butt in my face and her one leg straddling me. I understand she needed to use the restroom and may not have wanted to wake me up, but this invasion of my physical space felt worse than interrupted sleep. This got me wondering about inflight etiquette: when it comes to flying, is it better to climb over people in the aisle row or make them move?
Ah, yes, another question related to the cramped spaces we occupy when we fly on a commercial airline.
It’s a question we can all easily relate to, for even domestic first class and some international business class seats still have a seat between them and the aisle. In most cases, we’ve found that even the most compact of passengers will need to alert the passenger sitting in the aisle seat that they’ll need to stand up in the aisle to let them out of the row.
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This is easy enough when the passenger in the aisle seat is awake, but when that passenger is asleep, it does indeed get trickier: what is the best way to get past them? Should they be woken up? Will they be woken up anyway if you try to let them sleep?
Rai, a flight attendant for Alaska Airlines, suggests it’s perfectly fine to wake up a sleeping aisle seat passenger when you need out of your seat. “The aisle seat person knows what they signed up for,” she says, “and it’s not polite to straddle a perfect stranger without asking first.”
That’s really good advice for any situation.
Humor Goes a Long Way
But what about those passengers who—for whatever reason—don’t seem to think they need to rise to the occasion from the aisle seat when their seatmates have to go?
Heather Poole, a flight attendant for a major U.S. airline and author of the memoir Cruising Attitude: Tales of Crashpads, Crew Drama & Crazy Passengers at 35,000 Feet, says she’s seen aisle seat passengers crawled over often—mostly in cases where they didn’t want to rise from their seat.
“Over the years, I’ve watched many passengers climb over other passengers. This happens after the seated passenger doesn’t make a move to get up or just barely moves their legs to the side as if that’s going to create enough space for someone to slide through.”
She adds that she’s not sure whether it amounts to poor depth perception or simply a lack of manners, but that “it’s crazy to expect someone to crawl over you instead of standing up.”
When she travels as a passenger herself, Poole says she tries to use humor to diffuse situations in advance.
Most seatmates will get up to let you out, she observes, but “The few times someone gestured for me to crawl over them, I laughed and said, ‘Oh, I’m not that skinny, but I’m glad you think I am.’ Another time, when I felt more annoyed, I said, ‘Which side do you want in your face,’ but before they could answer, I laughed and said, ‘Kidding! There’s no way I’m crawling over you.’”
Aaron Kokoruz, a Los Angeles-based senior executive for a public relations firm, is a frequent flier who is firmly in the “wake me up” camp.
“I’ve come to the conclusion it’s best to wake up the aisle person if I need to get up–it’s just the respectful thing to do, in my opinion,” he told Fodor’s. “Every time I’ve tried to sneak by quietly, I end up tripping and nearly landing in their lap. It’s way less awkward to give a little nudge and a smile than to pretend that never happened.”
All Travelers Agree
In fact, out of the travelers we spoke with, we couldn’t find anyone who preferred to be left to sleep—they all wanted to be woken up if they were in the aisle seat.
Crawling over other passengers is further frustrating on airlines that don’t have their own seatback screens, says Kokoruz, meaning passengers have more to do to untangle themselves from their seats in order to get up.
“On an American Airlines flight from L.A. to Miami last year, I dozed off watching a movie on my tablet when the guy next to me tried to climb over me. He knocked the tablet off the seatback holder–straight into a nearly full glass of red wine that ended up all over my jeans and phone,” he recounts. “So, I ended up with a broken tablet screen and a Merlot shower. A double whammy, courtesy of some very poor judgment by my window seatmate—and the fact that there were no built-in [seatback screens].”
Both flight attendants we spoke with suggested communicating with the passengers in your row immediately upon sitting down about their preferences.
“You’ve just got to use your words in these situations. If you’re a person who knows you’re going to sleep on a flight and don’t want to be woken up with someone’s tush half an inch from your face, maybe you can let the people in your row know before take-off that it’s ok to wake you if they need to get up,” says Poole.
Part of the issue is seat assignment preference. Many flights are full, and even passengers who might prefer the aisle seat (or conversely might prefer to avoid the aisle seat if getting up frequently for seatmates is an annoyance) can’t always get one. We’ve recently noticed United Airlines allows passengers to state a seat preference if they’re unable to select their preferred seat on full flights. Didn’t get that aisle seat you wanted? Add a preference to your reservation, and United will move you automatically if that seat opens up (as long as it isn’t a premium seat that requires a fee).
It’s worth noting that this entire topic is rendered moot if you need fast, close access to an onboard lavatory because of a disability. In these situations, if you’re not seated in an aisle seat close to the lavatory, airlines are required by law to accommodate you, even if that means moving other passengers with confirmed seat assignments.
Both crewmembers we spoke with ultimately noted that in their years of flying, they’ve never seen a disagreement over aisle access escalate into conflict.
“I think people are needlessly anxious about it,” says Rai. “I’ve literally never had anyone get mad about getting up to let someone out. Maybe someone will roll their eyes a bit if you need to get up a lot, but I’ve never seen anyone refuse.”
Poole agrees: “I’ve never had to get involved in a situation like this, and I’ve never seen a situation escalate, so while annoying, it’s not that big of a deal.”
