Prospero

The pricing mechanism exists largely to manage demand. I suspect the prices were carefully positioned at just a cat's whisker below the max price point customers are willing to pay. This effectively ensures there are preferential seats available to last minute full fare ticket holders and on balance suits the majority of customers. I would say families and couples who just want to sit together and other than that don't have a strong seating preference are the ones disadvantaged by the policy and they certainly have my sympathy.

The ability to pay using Avios is a useful alternative and unlike cash payments the Avios levels are fixed amounts although I understand these levels may move to a dynamic pricing system after the facility has bedded in.

I imagine that demand management is terribly complex as the strength of seat preferences will vary substantially depending on the aircraft. For example, when it comes to the 747 and 777 I have a very strong preference - window please, upper deck if available. However on the A380 i'm pretty agnostic on the main deck verses upper deck but do have a marginal preference towards window seats but aisle is fine. I do avoid main deck middle seats though. On the 787, i'll happily accept any CW seat.

On other airlines I use (mainly AA and CX) I am far less concerned about my seat allocation - the cabins are pretty homogenous. I do try to avoid AA's mini cabin on their 773 - just a tad too noisy for my liking.