Agreed. But, then again, these are the airlines and they specialize in making things needlessly complex. Just try to figure out the international upgrade rules on Continental...

"U" used to be BF Easypass bucket. It seems like with "F" moving and "R" already being invisible that it will be increasingly harder to know what's going on with capacity-management of the OnePass side of the house... whether it be award redemption, or EUA.

I think what they are trying to do eventually is give you point to point mileage or segment points based on your origin or destination regardless of the number of stops you made.... So for example, a EWR - SFO N fare might mean a non-stop and a EWR-SFO U fare may mean connecting.

So in other words if you purchase a EWR-SFO ticket and the point to point mileage is 2500 miles each way - you will only get 2500 miles each way regardless of whether you travel non-stop or direct... It may be CO's way of reducing mileage runs.

Just my hunch.... we'll have to wait for the NEXT announcement...

Does CO really concern itself with mileage runs?

My thinking is that, if this comes to fruition, the purpose would be to mess with people like me, who - having equally convenient access to both EWR and PHL - will fly, for example, PHL-IAH-MSY-IAH-PHL as opposed to EWR-MSY-EWR in order to save perhaps over $1,000.00 in airfare (the same would hold true for a Manhattan resident who opts to fly a connecting route out of LGA versus going nonstop from EWR).

Well, I guess that will be the only incentive - take stops for cheaper fares (not more miles).... Looking from this article, it seems Delta already does something similiar to what I was suggesting although not in the same way... atleast not yet:

http://www.smarterliving.com/columns...id=i5666c2p122

Th e article is correct, this is an industry-standard practice. CO does the same thing. Where it is slightly incorrect is that some airlines have a change of plane without a change of flight number and that, too, is considered a direct flight with only the nonstop mileage being awarded.

NW are the kings in "direct" flights, either on the same metal or changing metal - but get credited for one flight.

Hmmm...jetBlue makes a profit with 6 fare classes. I can see why CO thinks that going from 14 to 19 is a move in the right direction!

More complexity, less transparency. That is EXACTLY what the consumer is looking for!

Most consumers (except for a few crazy flyertalkers http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif ) don't even know what a fare class is!