Bucket seats and packed planes will return to US airlines

American airlines (AAL), the world’s largest airline, revealed on Friday that “customers may notice that flights are booked at capacity beginning July 1.” This change occurs even as the number of Covid-19 cases increases in many states.

United (UAL) has been willing to sell as many seats as possible during the pandemic. Both said they would notify passengers when a flight has more than 70% of their seats reserved, and allow them to switch to a less crowded flight. But that won’t necessarily allow passengers with limited flexibility to avoid crowded flights.

The empty seats had been the result of low demand for air travel combined with the airline’s policy designed to encourage people to feel safe when flying. But on Sunday there were 634,000 people passing through TSA checkpoints at U.S. airports, which was 24% of traffic the same day last summer. That is the highest total since the end of March and is seven times as many people as the lowest examined in mid-April.

Delta CEO Ed Bastian told shareholders at the annual meeting two weeks ago that he could lift that limitation in the fall.

“Whether 60% [of seats being sold] or a slightly higher number, I don’t know, but yes, absolutely “we will maintain some limits on the percentage of seats sold in the place,” he said.

So far, Southwest has not offered similar guarantees on September 30.

It is unclear whether airlines will lose reluctant passengers by deciding to sell the center seat, said Philip Baggaley, chief airline credit analyst at Standard & Poor’s.

“Right now, most people don’t want to get on a plane anyway,” he said. “Those who have made the determination that they have to fly, or feel safe flying. I’m not sure how large a group would be deterred by a full plane.”

“But if the recovery on the flight continues, there is an increased risk of scaring a larger number of passengers by selling intermediate seats,” he added.

Airlines in other parts of the world have not implemented policies that have left seats empty, said John Grant, an aviation analyst with the OAG tracking service. He said the only broad limit is a rule established by the Chinese authorities that international flights to and from that country cannot sell more than 75% of their seats.

The problem for airlines is that during normal times they need to sell between 60% and 73% of seats just to break even, Grant said, depending on their cost structure. American and European airlines typically have the highest breakeven point.

Grant says that given the width of the seats, leaving the center seat open leaves less than two feet between passengers, which is not enough for those who want to stay six feet away.

“Keeping the seat open might reassure some passengers, but there is no scientific evidence that it increases the chance of infection by a factor of Y% by using the middle seat,” he said. “I think there is less chance of scaring people because you sell the middle seats than if you charge 30% more to keep the seat empty.”

But others say airlines risk chasing away customers who were close to flying.

“People didn’t like intermediate seats before and now they like it even less,” said Stephen Beck, managing partner at cg42, a management consultant who has advised airlines. “While this will allow them to fill a few more flights to capacity, but will it be worth filling the inevitable negative public relations seats? I would question that.”

– CNN’s Gregory Wallace contributed to this report.