Having worked under assorted travel regimes my practice for Y-only is to suck it up for daytime/evening flights under 5 hours. Red-eyes, overnight TATLs, long hauls are booked at the highest Y fare and either bumped to the lowest cost J on my dime/points or scheduled so I have a full calendar day without work upon arrival and return. I don't mind using the points because I probably earned them flying corporately and if paying my own money will defray the cost in other inventive ways.
