I have had a situation several times when traveling on an AONE and there is no first class section on the plane and I have to of course travel in business class.

What I don't understand is why do they then look for "D" inventory? Seems that paying an "A" fare should warrent "J" inventory.

Any comments?

OK, let's try the math. For example, JFK-CDG prices at $3800 one-way in full-fare business. I believe, other than corporate discounts, this is the only fare that would book into J class. If you're doing, say, an AONE5 at $10,000, the revenue AA gets for that segment is likely significantly less than $3,800. Hence, it books in discounted D class.

If you're looking for a "consolation" prize of not having to deal with capacity restrictions, sorry!

Because that's what the rules say. If you don't like them then you don't have to buy the product.

Not to mention that the opposite applies. If you have a D ticket, and there is no business class, then why do you fly in first? Because that's what the rules say.

Youre getting a product at a discount. That discount comes with caveats. If you don't want to deal with those caveats then you can always just buy a full fare J or F ticket and essentially have little or no rules to deal with.

You might have picked that if having either an A or D ticket, you can still get seats from Economy Y inventory which pretty much guarantees a seat on any particular flight if booking some days in advance, like others have said, xONEs are heavily discounted tickets which still offer a lot of flexibility for a great price.

In addition to all stated above-- or really just to amplify-- a single -J- seat on certain long-haul routes can be worth a good % of the price of an entire AONE. So, if the plane is heavily booked in J, we certainly have to understand the loss the carrier would be subjected to if they had no capacity control on their business cabin and had to give the last (or next to last, etc.) premium seat to a AONE customer rather than a paying full-fare J customer.

The cascade problem is pretty bad on some routes. You book and waitlist A, waitlist D and carry confirmed Y. You get Y. I was booked in A and was happy enough with Y on a 3 hour as I needed the flight at any cabin. When my flight was delayed by 4 hours, I was rebooked by QF into the J cabin as seats were available on the new connection.

Gate agent saw that I was Y confirmed and printed, ripped up my business class boarding card and resissued me with a Y. I waved the rules, I showed her the fare basis on the receipt. "complain tomorrow to the downtown office." I was about to get on a flight from Buenos Aires to Santiago. I had already missed my meeting in Santiago with the delay. At 0700 the next day I was taking the flight from Santiago to LGW via Brazil. I did not exactly have the time, inclination or ability to pop to downtown Buenos Aires and complain.

I have done a lot of DONE equivalents and only got a single long haul sector in D. Go for 5 continents and twice a month in Y and you get tired.

The tools on this site and the experiences of others have helped me to get the seats more often now. The worst is when Y is fairly open and you don't get 3 seats together so you can sleep, even when on A