Really bad news, as a 1k based in Europe I really appreciated the paper certificates

This is effectively a way to kill the paper GPU option, especially if they do not fedex the certificates outside US as previous posters have said (I never tried requesting them from the UK yet).

Fare class restrictions (V or above for sardinen-class and C or above) are such that for the LH pricing policy it is semi-flexible travel in both classes. This usually means short notice booking, so no way of getting the certificate delivered outside US, or fully refundable booked in advance with a chance of changing plans (so certificate potentially useless). It does not make any sense to book V two months in advance paying as much as double the price over L/K for a chance of using the certificate...

My feeling is that LH might have pushed to kill this opportunity. Look at how stingy they are with the upgrades for their senators... All of those that qualified for senator based on mostly LH Y class travel were until now much better off to go for UA 1k and get 6 paper SWUs instead.