Originally Posted by
Globaliser
One of the results is that we keep coming back to BA. It must therefore be a really dumb policy. Obvs.Do you remember how it was in the previous iteration of the policy? Those who now have to pay a fee couldn't select a seat at all before OLCI opened. And yet the CW cabins were often almost completely pre-allocated by the time that OLCI opened.
That is how many seats BA would have to save for full-fare and higher-tier frequent flyers. The net result is that those who can now pay to select almost all CW seats would be restricted to choosing from only a small proportion of the seats in the CW cabin. And once they were gone, they'd be gone; they'd be waiting until OLCI.And that's before you ask the question why the complaining passenger booked BA to begin with, when they're clearly not even a moderately-regular BA or OW passenger.
I think that the last time we had this discussion, the complaining passenger was very frank. Normally he'd book UA. But this time, UA was much more expensive than BA. So he booked BA and saved a shedload of money. And then complained about BA's seating fee.
I think that in those circumstances, you'd have to regard "free seat pre-allocation is a must in business class" as something akin to a tenet of faith. There are plenty of us who like it - and we are the ones who are the regular customers.
They would not need to block that many. The point is to block the attractive seats so they are selected mainly by the high value flyers, and not scooped up by leisure flyers on I booking class booking almost a year in advance.
The super attractive seats are maybe 5% or less of the cabin, the attractive seats maybe another 10% and then maybe 20% to 30% worth prioritising to high value flyers. The rest are pretty much same same. Once enough high value flyers has taken the attractivegood seats, and by your example that will happen before check in on a lot of flights, there is no need to have a block on the rest as they are mostly same same.
As someone pointed out, what I see as attractive is not necessarily what another flyer see as attractive, so despite being Emerald I may not even select one of the blocked seats.
By any model, if I book two days in advance the likelihood of getting a really good seat is very slim. But by allowing the I flyers to pay they way to it rather than blocking until OLCI,, BA may actually make it even slimmer.
Don't get me wrong, I am all for optimising the likelihood for high value flyers to get the better seats. I am just saying that it can be achieved equally well without the charge. Or mayve even better as the the leisure flyer booking a year in advance do not get the option to select the best seats, which they do on BA if they are willing to pay.