Is Turkish the latest to start blocking J seats? They used to be wide open last year, and I've been searching 2 x YYZ-IST and I can't find a thing in June, July, or August.

First SQ then , LH & LX, and the list goes on.

Soon all we'll be left with is MS and UA.

I just booked 2 J seats YYZ-IST for mid-July. There were actually 3 seats available for redemption on my date.

The return is a different history. No availability IST-YYZ during the dates I wanted, but plenty of Y availability on the new AC non-stop. Thanks, but no thanks.

These are not easy to get...people have caught on.
BTW LH and LX don't block J availability (SQ only blocks access to their premium planes)

last week, I had booked two seats on TK in J bom-ist-yyz for next December which changed yesterday to LX. It does not seem that they block seats and likely just availability on your dates.!!

I flew the YYZ-IST flight on TK I think 3 times last year. I never had any problems trying to get it.

This year I started checking in January, couldn't find anything until October.

They may not be blocking it but I think they reduced availability severely. I had to switch to LOT and now.... 787 fiasco.

I booked PVG-IST-IAD in J on TK yesterday for early June.

LX is now blocking F though I believe.

Never was a problem finding LX as long as you wanted to look 7-10 months ahead.

Now, it's gone.

As we have come to understand in the air travel business, they do not roll out anything new or beneficial. Every year is just finding the low hanging fruit so they can cut it off.

Today's F blocking and J availability reduction is tomorrow's cuts.

It's easy to envision when we have no F availability or the fees go up to 75% of the purchased ticket prices, and J is impossible to book on anything but the "native" carrier's seats.

I don't quite understand how these carriers can operate in an alliance where everyone gets to pick their own rules in terms of what's available to redeem and get points on. Seems to be only a gesture towards an alliance, just basically code sharing and a mutual agreement to ignore the priority tags on luggage.

I think the simple answer is : June, July, August. A very busy time. Just booked TK reward travel in April, and came across several available dates.

That has been the case for *A partners for more than a year now, except for two months last summer when LifeMiles was mistakenly given a back door to M&M inventory.
LX F seats are still available on many flights to M&M members, if you have those miles.

Yes, I am kind of implying that. Each one of these airlines seems more inclined to circle the wagons around their own members and restrict availability at this point.

So I'm starting to question the utility of the alliance for top tier redemption. It's the cutting edge of the bleeding. Today they block F and cut back on J. Tomorrow they block J and cut back on PE (after introducing PE). After that, block PE and make E available. After that... just basically we will check your luggage through.

Lounge use? 75k and up. 100k and up.

Priority checkin / boarding has gone the other direction where they gave it out to so many people that half of the plane boards during "priority", so they'll keep dishing it out until everyone is boarding at the same time. Then of course, the introduction of "Super Priority".

It's a treadmill.

My last F on LX was in November, and I booked that one about 8 months beforehand. That I guess is my last F experience on LX.

I'm trying to wring out every last drop while I can. It's clear where all this stuff is going though, and there is no turning back.

I don't necessarily agree that it is becoming more difficult to redeem F seats. It's just that the rules have changed and one needs to be flexible. Yes, LX is gone but LH is still available if you don't mind waiting until T-14 to change your UA to LH. I just booked JFK-NRT in NH First on UA.com. EK First is now available thru AS. SQ First and SQ Suites are now available using KF miles with an Amex/SPG transfers... recently book 4 Suites tickets. On OW, CX First is routinely available using BA/AA, and BA First is available if you book well in advance.

So... one entire carrier is gone. But it's not more difficult to book F?

The carrier that left is the one that has no scamcharges. But it's not more difficult (costly) to book F?

LH is available if you want to book UA and then institute a switch. But it's not more difficult to book F?

So... by definition there, you pointed out three ways in which F availability is going downward but you maintain that F booking is not more difficult? It sounds like cheerleading to me.

As for oneworld/KF/BA etc., I don't see the point of talking about them on an Aeroplan forum. I'll talk about those in those forums, if I had any of their points. Which I don't. And I don't have enough SPG points to make a difference with any of them. Nor do most people posting in the Aeroplan forum.

If that's how you read it, so be it. But there are still lots of ways to get First award seats on the dates when you want to travel.
I can't help it if you are unwilling to expand your horizons beyond Aeroplan. In the end, you can always buy an F ticket.

I booked a seat last week for YYZ-IST-BKK on TK in J for January 2014 using Aeroplan miles (the return IST-YYZ is on AC) I believe there was only one seat though as when I was looking at alternatives flight later just to pass time I noticed there was no availability on TK for the dates I had purchased.

Not so easy to get UA in Canada... and also no transfers to SQ from AMEX CA.
Oh, and you need a heck of a lot of miles for AS on ek.