Originally Posted by Transpacificflyer

I agree with the AC policy change and understand why it had to be done. The benefit was offered when flights were not at full capacity and there were always a few empty seats. Today, many routes are flying with 100% load factors. I was surprised by my AC 65 flight the other day to see the long waitlist for Y. They were asking for volunteers to give up their seats too. (Half the J cabin was upgrades). If the airline bumps a generic Y class pax to place the elite flyer, there is a compensation amount of between $900 and $2400 to be paid. I expect that most of the bumps will occur on the popular longhauls, so the $2400 is incurred. The cost adds up. Despite the airline saying the option was used infrequently, I expect that is in respect to the total amount of transactions. However, if people were bumped 100X or more that's $2,400,000.+ I expect this frill was costing the airline $1 million or more. (Of course that's me speculating, and in the absence of the actual data, I can't offer a definitive value, but the point is that the frill was costing the airline without much benefit to it in return.) People in Y have a reasonable expectation of flying and they should not be subject to such an arbitrary and unfair practice.