Originally Posted by christep

My gut feeling is that it is an attempt at yield maximisation. I think what they are trying to do is force awards to be used only for "let's go away next weekend, but we're not too fussy about where" type breaks where they can fill seats which they know won't be taken by revenue tickets. But they are in danger of this becoming yet another nail in the coffin of the Marco Polo Club, which is one of the less attractive schemes anyway if you live outside HK (and only attractive here for the lounge access and guaranteed availability on lowest published fare). I wouldn't be surprised in that last benefit was withdrawn soon in the name of "yield maximisation" either