Originally Posted by
jackal
Likely because AS would have to pay the other carrier for two seats, yet they'd only collect revenue for one. When it costs AS some "funny money" in the form of a possibly-otherwise-unoccupied seat, they're happy to let you use it, but when it costs AS real cold, hard cash paid out to another carrier, they ain't so happy.
thats kind of what I meant by it screws something up with the money. Just phony numbers here so dont take them as real. Lets say AS pays AA $300 a seat to Cancun. When it was AS metal lets say each seat was $300. The companion paid $99 so if AS didnt book the flight full and had empty seats they gained $201 as opposed to buying an AA seat for a $300 guaranteed loss