Aer Lingus business class seats showing up as economy on United website?

A-ha, so now I’m finally getting to it: the crux of all my recent Aer Lingus posts.

I noticed that when selecting Aer Lingus business class seats on the United website, they are showing up as being in the U fare bucket – which is economy class.

I was perturbed about paying for business class seats (with Avios) only to see that I’d maybe been booked in the wrong fare class.

However, I called British Airways and Aer Lingus to verify that I am indeed in a business class seat. But then I went to look again on the United website to make sure it wasn’t just a glitch.

For this dummy booking, I selected economy class to Dublin and business back from Dublin.

Aer Lingus fare buckets on United

Aer Lingus fare buckets on United

It looks like economy is being booked into the T bucket and business is being booked into U – but U is economy.

I plugged in the record locator into the Royal Jordanian website, and sure enough, their system displayed the same information.

EI booking on RJ site

EI booking on RJ site

But, it still says business on the BA website.

Aer Lingus booking on BA website - business, confirmed

Aer Lingus booking on BA website – business, confirmed

Bottom line

Just in case anyone else got in (or wants to get in – space is still very open) on the lucrative amount of award space on the Aer Lingus BOS-DUB route and had the same questions I did…

Of course, I’ll be pretty miffed if it does actually end up being economy, but 6 hours over the pond isn’t so bad. I’ve done it before and I’ll do it again if I have to. I’d be a tyrant to get my Avios back, though.

But that’s worst case scenario stuff. I’m gonna let this be a trust fall with British Airways and assume they’ll catch me (there is a good joke and punchline in here somewhere…).

Has anyone else noticed this mislabeling on the United website? Even better, has anyone flown the flights and can confirm they are indeed in business class? 

Either way, I will have Aer Lingus trip reports soon enough. Looking forward to it, and to visiting Ireland, so very much.

Stay scrappy out there!

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About Harlan

Just a dude living in Memphis, traveling, and working toward financial independence.

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Comments

  1. You can call their call center: 1 (516) 622-4022 and select seats. I did that with all 3 of my BA Aer Lingus bookings and they are all in the business class cabin.

  2. i recently booked EI award using UA miles … still show as “Economy(U)” on UA’s site, but it’s definitely booked in business … i called up EI to get the proper seat assignment

    • Awesome, thank you for the info! It’s so weird to select “business” and then “economy” right when you’re checking out.

      Enjoy your trip and thanks again, Patricia!

    • I also second-guessed it until I figured out the fare buckets. Lots of space still open, hope you can snag your seats. Be sure to call Aer Lingus for seat assignments – that should pretty well lock it in.

    • Correct. You gotta call IE to select seats. I’d check the seats for the aircraft online and have it pulled up when making the call.

  3. Curious what happened in the end. I am dealing with this right now regarding Aer Lingus and United. Booked biz, ticket says U class economy. AL says we are in business with seats 4H and 4K but I cannot enter the record locator and confirm for myself.

    • I certainly was in Biz! I ended up calling and confirming – I wanted to know for myself, too. You should be able to call them to confirm.

  4. Having the same issue! Booked with Qatar for the EI flight?m, showing business D class on my QR ticket but I emailed Aer Lingus and they said it’s an economy and they placed in in the middle of the plane…. I’ll have to ring QR tomorrow

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