Great Western Coffee Shop

I am interested to find out exactly how the online seat reservation system works. I booked an Advance Single from Hereford to Paddington when tickets for today were first available - so must have been one of the first reservations to be allocated. During the booking procedure, when asked for seat reservation preference, my choice was for an airline style, window seat facing the direction of travel in the quiet coach.

It turns out that the seat that was allocated for me was D26 - an aisle seat at a table with my back to the direction of travel; and coach D certainly isn't the quiet coach!

As it turned out, the 12:13 today was very lightly loaded and relatively few seats were reserved - so I was able to find a seat satisfying my preferences without too much difficulty.

Does the seat allocation system actually take your preferences into consideration or is it just a case of 'start at the centre and work outwards'?

Online seat reservations are pretty random I find, regardless of the options you select. Excepting those TOCs whose own booking engines allow you to specify a seat. CrossCountry have this facility and East Coast did prior to the handover to Virgin. I'm not sure that Virgin Trains East Coast have such a facility any more as they've switched booking engine providers.

FGW don't have a 'select a seat' option online, but maybe that's something we'll see when the Class 800/801s enter service.

The best way to get the seat you want is to book at a station where the clerk can interrogate the central reservations system in an attempt to find what you are after. Even then it's not always possible, even at the earliest opportunity.

And of course, booking at a station means you miss out on any online discounts, loyalty schemes or cashback.

From the ticket conditions on the FGW booking site:


This appears to have become a bit of a technicality as far as the reserved seat element is concerned ... so just sayin' ...

When booking on line if I find if I don't like the seat that's been reserved I can go back a couple of steps and try again....although to be honest it doesn't overly bother me.

Twice, in the last eight years, I've been actually asked to sit in the seat allocated to me - and both times on fairly empty trains. Normally, the TM's view has been 'as long as you are on the right train and in the correct class of accommodation....'

Most of the time, I am not really that bothered, but yesterday, my journey from Hereford to Paddington was the first time I had been on that line and I wanted to enjoy it properly without too many other distractions.