Originally Posted by
mfirst
ok, not specific to UA - while I can understand having buckets for various broad categories - business/first, premium, econ, award and maybe a few specialized buckets (although a little unclear why we need about a dozen different econ buckets?) ... but why do we need S, T, U, V, and W???? Why would I buy S over T (especially if there is a price difference, if UA is presenting me with what is already the least expensive seat in each class, unless I thought that one would raise my chances for an upgrade from zero to almost zero) especially when I look for tickets, I generally get the cheapest bucket for each category. Do people really intentional pay for M when it is baseline more expensive than J? Why pay for J when you can get C,D, or Z?
and with variable pricing....does it matter if you pay $1000 for a D if a few days later you can get a C for $800?
what am I missing?
enlighten me?
just random thoughts on a Saturday night....ok, I will work on getting a life now......
Airline pricing is VERY complicated. In addition to the fare buckets, there needs to be a valid fare for the trip you are making, with lots of rules behind them.
Having all those fare buckets allows airlines to have almost unlimited combinations of ways to price tickets.
Most common reason to purchase a higher fare bucket is when using PlusPoints. A fare W or higher uses less PlusPoints to upgrade then a highly discounted economy fare.