Originally Posted by
eponymous_coward
If that's true, then if anything, LH should be blocking longhaul C from *A award redemption, not just longhaul F. I find it hard to believe that the catering expenses from F are more than a modest upcharge from C and there's lots of reports of people finding 4 C on LH flight awards- the revenue lost from 4 C seats could easily beat the revenue lost from 1 F seat (especially if it's much more likely you'd sell C than F- even one of those C seats being sold, three empty should pay off better than giving 4 away).
I think that the theory is that LH wants to sell F for real cash, and that they can do this by providing a superior product. Part of the superior product that they think they are providing is exclusivity. For the customer that they are targeting, I guess they believe that losing some revenue from mile redeemers will increase exclusivity for paying customers, and thus increase paying customers.
Or they just think that they can fill enough of the seats (only 8) through cash buyers that they don't need to give any out.
sillypainter: you mention making the change to LH F at 1 or 2 days notice. Are you booking a routing that has both a UA and LH flight, booking the UA seat, and then getting the discounted $75 change fee? Also, I thought that the tickets were unmodifiable after departure, so how can you change the return?