Originally Posted by
channa
Is it?
Hotel room = CASH
it comes with food vouchers = CASH
First Class seat = an upgrade for another (presumably better) customer
VDB voucher = funny money, a percentage of which is lost, forfeited, etc., so it doesn't cost the company nearly its face value.
I've seen other airlines try to solicit locals who don't need hotels, because that is great dealing. That saves the company money. If they have to up the voucher to avoid paying for a hotel, that's smart business, because the voucher isn't worth much, but the hotel is.
Further, a voucher is a driver for repeat business. For example, if you're taking a trip, and the lowest fare is $500, but CO is $600, but you have a $200 voucher, well, you may take CO because it's net cheaper after your voucher is applied. So CO gets $400 when it would have otherwise received $0. Had this customer had a $100 voucher, it wouldn't make sense to use a voucher and pay what you can otherwise pay on a competitor without burning the voucher.
Finally, throwing a first class seat at some college student just to save another $100 in voucher is probably net more costly to the company. The upgrade situation out of SFO is particularly tight, so giving away such a seat in order to save a few bucks in voucher (which probably isn't worth even $50 in cash) at the expense of the customer experience of a frequent flyer who spends thousands of dollars flying 75,000 miles a year or more, is very short-sighted.
If First Class were wide open, it'd be a different story. If the bumped pax is Elite, sure. If F were all that were available, fine. But out of all stations, for SFO to be giving away what limited F capacity it has for such a trivial savings in voucher, is likely more costly for the company in the end.
As for the FC seat in sfo's post they were talking about that offer to someone on the red-eye. I assumed they put the person onto the 1st flight the next day or 1 in the morn, No Elite would have known they missed an Up due to a VDB the previous night. Chances for a walk-up fare in FC for the 1st flight in the morn, Id say from most stations not too likely. Then again it might get that Plat or Gold who didnt get the UP cleared to buy an FC seat outright the next time, they fly instead of rolling the dice.
Im sure CO does as they do at EWR and its a HO-JOs or a Ramada, which they pay very little for, yet I agree its $$$ out of pocket. Meal vouchers will be for breakfast only and again maybe at $8-10.
I fully understand using the CO Monopoly $$ instead, but either way the person will probably feel if they scored it once they will again the next time tehy fly, so most likely they will be back for another round.
Im not saying you dont have Valid pts , You do. Its just I wouldnt use Shameful as the word to describe what CO or its GAs do.
Would you say its Shameful for CO not to sell you a SFO-EWR tkt at the airport for a non-stop flight that is less then 50% full for $100? Or an Intl flight in BF where they want $5000 1 way, isnt my $1000 better then nothing and coach is say $400. No way are they spending anything near the extra $600 in servicing me in that BF seat over the coach seat.