Originally Posted by
jjmoore
I thought the entire point of the oversale is to fill the plane completely with revenue passengers. What we probably don't know is all the mathematics and predictive modeling that goes into estimation of how many seats over capacity the airlines can sell... aka predicting:
1) How many passengers mis-connect to that particular flight on average for that day of the week
2) How many passengers typically don't show for that particular flight on average for that day of the week (likely depends on whether it is holiday, business travel day, etc. etc.)
Even if the plane does over-sale on a given day, those last few tickets that were booked would have been in extremely lucrative fare classes (Y's, B's, M's), which may end up being twice or more the amount of the voucher that will be given out to a VDB.
I don't know the exact statistic, but I heard that more than half of vouchers for VDB's / IDB's go unused. If that truly is the case, the airlines win big by overselling.
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2014: UA CPU 5/8 DEN|SLC|CLE|GRR|MCI|ORD|BTV|EWR
VDBs get vouchers or whatever the passenger can negotiate.
IDBs are required to get money. They also must be reported to DOT, so carriers try to avoid this (and are normally required to ask for VDBs).
Allowing over bookings helps to keep fares lower than they would be otherwise. Since IDBs are so rare, it's hard to see how they significantly lower the customer experience except if the processing of VDBs/IDBs delays the flight. By now, airlines have lots of data and should be able to predict no shows, including missed connections, extremely well.
If JetBlue operates based on turning aircraft quickly, this could give them an incentive to avoid overbooking as this can cause delays at the gate.