We were boarding a flight from Tokyo to Taipei. We'd booked our seats in advance. At just over two meters tall, I prefer to have the emergency exit seats. But when we reached our seats, something was wrong. The ones we got assigned were regular economy class seats, not at an emergency exit.
We sat down to let other people pass and reached out to the staff, a young man. We explained the situation and he was friendly, telling us he would have to see if the exit seats remain empty. Then another flight attendant came by asking us whether we had confirmation for our booking, in a much less friendly tone. We explained the situation to her as well after which she just walked away.
She eventually came back, told us that she had proof that we booked the seats that we got assigned and that we would have to remain on those. There was no way to change it now. Then she went away, leaving us confused as the seats on the exit were visibly still empty. My partner and I were getting angry. Not because we didn't get the seats we wanted but because of the way she talked to us.
Her proof was her phone showing our names with the seat numbers we were assigned. That only told us what we already knew, that we got assigned the seats we were currently squeezed into.
Once all passengers were on board, the friendly flight attendant returned and let us move to the emergency exit seats. We ended up having a great flight, but the earlier interaction stuck with me.
Perhaps the woman was simply having a bad day. She was probably right and we booked the wrong seats but proving that was never the point.
Even if the flight had been fully booked, a bit of friendliness would have gone a long way. The young flight attendant hadn't promised us anything either. He'd simply offered to see what he could do, and that was enough.
As a software engineer, I also tend to focus on correctness but human interactions are a bit more nuanced. Often, being right isn't what matters when solving a problem. It certainly doesn't win arguments or make people happy.
I started to wonder how often I've done this myself, trying to convince someone that I was right rather than helping to solve a problem.