Originally Posted by
ohiosux
I thought it was always that way.
United only started phasing out F a year or two ago. Their new Polaris product planes have no F. UA phasing out the 747 has a big effect on *A F seats to Europe and folks who used to book UA F are now turning to LH (to Europe). Swiss has F but you have to be an LX elite to book it as an award. To Asia there is more F competition.
Using GPU's to waitlist on LH came in a couple of years ago but I suspect more people learned about it and how successful it was as time went by and the folks who use GPU's for UA F to Europe are finding with the reduction in UA F seats it is very difficult to clear them on UA but they have good success on clearing with LH.
These factors are contributing to the reduced availability of LH F award seats.