Originally Posted by
fastair
If an airline believes in overselling a plane (i.e. the money generated outweighs the ill well cost when things go wrong) even a 50 seat RJ, and that same airline has a 50 seat business cabin, it would stand to logic that they would oversell the business cabin. Either the costs outweigh the risks, or they don't. Be it on a $200 ticket or a $3000 ticketm the exact same economics go into play, and a larger scale per passenger on the business class side. The advatages ate 15x greater than Y, and the risks are equally 15x greater.
But the risks may be less than 15x greater in the example cited. If the Business cabin has largely sold full fare tickets, UA will know that the percentage of no-shows on those tickets is far greater than on discounted, non-refundable tickets. They might also know, for example, that an individual has multiple reservations on different flights and will simply show for one of them.
Some years ago, I worked for a company which sent many people to LHR from JFK. There would usually be a morning meeting in London before departure but it was unclear when people would get away. The strategy was simple: make reservations from about 2pm right through to the last flight at 8pm. People would simply arrive at the airport and pick up the first flight they could. Of course, these reservations were spread out amongst various airlines so as not to cause trouble, but switched to the preferred airline, if possible, while in the cab to the airport. Airlines know this happens and they would be mad to assume that there will be only a few no-shows.