Originally Posted by
Steph3n
As for me I buy a ticket and don't change it, I keep my plans pretty concrete, I realize some can't/don't/won't have such ability.
The point is not the plans changing, but flights opening up and such.
Clearly the $150 fee demonstrates that CO does not understand what it's like to book reward travel these days.
It's not uncommon to lock in a trip with some suboptimal, worst-case scenario flights, then switch as flights open up. These things are not worth $150 to change.
As an example, I recently booked SFO-DTW-ATL-STT. Clearly I don't want to fly that. Don't get me wrong, I do want to go to STT, the date works out fine for me. The route is just a bit too long. I'll hope that DL opens space SFO-ATL to connect up wtih my ATL-STT, or CO opens space SFO-IAH-STT to make that more efficient. While it is still a change, by charging such a punitive fee, CO seems to be missing the fact that people change tickets because of tight availability, not because they want to. The OP's idea of charging more for a redeposit, but a more reasonable amount for a change seems to make sense.
Even UA and AA allow date/time changes along the same route. That way if a better flight opens up, you can switch to that at no charge.