Narrative:

During the beginning of the boarding process a woman and a very large man walked towards the back of the cabin. They were looking at seat abx and asked if the armrest came up. I informed them that it did not; but that the one on aby did. They were happy because they were able to switch seats making me realize that they were ticketed for seats abxy and the man was unable to get into the seat without the armrest coming up. I located the button and lifted the armrest. Afterwards I immediately called another attendant to inform her that we very likely had a passenger that qualified under the company's new rule about passengers of size. She was the attendant greeting passengers and she would be the first one to have contact with a customer service agent to inform them of the problem. The flight was booked oversold by 12. Therefore we pretty much knew the flight would be full when addressing the passenger of size issue. The customer service agents came down to the plane later in the boarding process to check carry-on bags. As soon as I could get through the aisle I spoke to one of them about the passenger of size. Instead of taking care of the problem themselves they immediately called for a supervisor to handle it. During this time there were two customer service agents at the plane but none of them would approach the passenger until a supervisor finally showed up. One of the agents did eventually go speak to the passenger about having to take a later flight. She returned to the boarding door to tell us that the passenger did not want to take a later flight. They were then going to remove two non-revenue space available passengers who were sitting together towards the front of the plane. They were going to move the passenger of size to the two seats. Again the agent went back to tell the passenger and again she returned this time saying that the passenger did not want to switch seats. She then added that if he did not want to change seats we could not force him to do so. This directly contradicts the company's passenger of size policy. The purser made me feel guilty when they tried to remove the non-revenue space available passengers from the flight. I also felt guilty since my intention was not to have anyone unrelated to the situation removed from the flight. However this was both a policy and safety issue. Multiple people (employees) asked if any of the passengers near the passenger of size had complained which they had not. The response that I got was that I was creating the problem and that if no one complained it was not even an issue. Again this is contradictory to the passenger of size policy. The criteria are not based on whether anyone complains. It is based on safety issues. The customer service agents did not seem to want to do anything about it and I was being made to feel that I was creating a problem and why was I doing that? I finally gave in and dropped the issue. They shut the door and all of the passengers remained in their original seats. As a result of this passenger's size and the seat that he was in (that he refused to move from) the aisle armrest was up for the entire flight including for taxi; take-off and landing. This was very frustrating. The company has a policy in place to prevent this. Instead of following it I was made to feel as if I had created a problem by almost everyone involved from the customer service agents to the customer service supervisor and even by one of my flying partners. Also as part of the policy both the customer service agents and flight attendants are supposed to be proactive. In this case it was an oversold flight. It is almost impossible that the customer service agents did not notice his size during boarding. It makes me wonder why they did not look into the issue at that point. During the flight half of the passenger's body was out in the aisle. I tripped over him (he was genuinely apologetic). At another point during the flight there was a traffic jam of passengers in the aisle because they could not get by this passenger. The thought that came to mind was that if there was a medical emergency I was not sure if we would be able to quickly get down the aisle because half of this person's body was in the aisle. If policy was followed this situation never would have occurred. Instead I was made to feel guilty and treated as if I was creating a problem because I wanted to follow safety and policy.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Flight Attendant reports she received no support when she attempted to invoke the airline's policy regarding passengers of size.

Narrative: During the beginning of the boarding process a woman and a very large man walked towards the back of the cabin. They were looking at seat ABX and asked if the armrest came up. I informed them that it did not; but that the one on ABY did. They were happy because they were able to switch seats making me realize that they were ticketed for seats ABXY and the man was unable to get into the seat without the armrest coming up. I located the button and lifted the armrest. Afterwards I immediately called another attendant to inform her that we very likely had a passenger that qualified under the company's new rule about passengers of size. She was the attendant greeting passengers and she would be the first one to have contact with a customer service agent to inform them of the problem. The flight was booked oversold by 12. Therefore we pretty much knew the flight would be full when addressing the passenger of size issue. The customer service agents came down to the plane later in the boarding process to check carry-on bags. As soon as I could get through the aisle I spoke to one of them about the passenger of size. Instead of taking care of the problem themselves they immediately called for a supervisor to handle it. During this time there were two customer service agents at the plane but none of them would approach the passenger until a supervisor finally showed up. One of the agents did eventually go speak to the passenger about having to take a later flight. She returned to the boarding door to tell us that the passenger did not want to take a later flight. They were then going to remove two non-revenue space available passengers who were sitting together towards the front of the plane. They were going to move the passenger of size to the two seats. Again the agent went back to tell the passenger and again she returned this time saying that the passenger did not want to switch seats. She then added that if he did not want to change seats we could not force him to do so. This directly contradicts the company's passenger of size policy. The purser made me feel guilty when they tried to remove the non-revenue space available passengers from the flight. I also felt guilty since my intention was not to have anyone unrelated to the situation removed from the flight. However this was both a policy and safety issue. Multiple people (employees) asked if any of the passengers near the passenger of size had complained which they had not. The response that I got was that I was creating the problem and that if no one complained it was not even an issue. Again this is contradictory to the passenger of size policy. The criteria are not based on whether anyone complains. It is based on safety issues. The customer service agents did not seem to want to do anything about it and I was being made to feel that I was creating a problem and why was I doing that? I finally gave in and dropped the issue. They shut the door and all of the passengers remained in their original seats. As a result of this passenger's size and the seat that he was in (that he refused to move from) the aisle armrest was up for the entire flight including for taxi; take-off and landing. This was very frustrating. The company has a policy in place to prevent this. Instead of following it I was made to feel as if I had created a problem by almost everyone involved from the customer service agents to the customer service supervisor and even by one of my flying partners. Also as part of the policy both the customer service agents and flight attendants are supposed to be proactive. In this case it was an oversold flight. It is almost impossible that the customer service agents did not notice his size during boarding. It makes me wonder why they did not look into the issue at that point. During the flight half of the passenger's body was out in the aisle. I tripped over him (he was genuinely apologetic). At another point during the flight there was a traffic jam of passengers in the aisle because they could not get by this passenger. The thought that came to mind was that if there was a medical emergency I was not sure if we would be able to quickly get down the aisle because half of this person's body was in the aisle. If policy was followed this situation never would have occurred. Instead I was made to feel guilty and treated as if I was creating a problem because I wanted to follow safety and policy.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.