That policy works for me. Speaking as a non-executive professional who travels on business, I think that even if you're not closing million dollar deals, if you're important enough to send to a client site you should be important enough to arrive fresh and rested and able represent your employer in the best light.

I worked for a company that always flew us overseas in J -- with the understanding that you jumped off the plane and went directly to work, do not pass go, do not collect hotel room key. As I sleep only fitfully on planes I would have preferred your deal.

Not always the case as explained in post #43.

I'm a scientist, working in academia. Furthermore I'm in Australia, so fifteen hours of flying to get somewhere is considered "not that far".

I've resigned myself to the fact that even freaking Nobel Laureates (of which i am not one) have to fly economy. I'm not happy with it, but I can't exactly see myself going off to work for some bank or management consultancy either.

The compensation is, I suppose, that I get to choose my own travel.

I wouldn't be so resigned to it. I know first-hand that there are U.S. research universities paying for premium travel to fly in visiting scholars. The upper tier of American universities are flush with money..

10 hours Y is barely OK, but 15 hours is definitely cruel! For business, I would reconsider the purpose of such a trip. For leasure, there are even more crazy things people do (for example MR :D or sleeping outside a new opening store for +15 hours to get a 100$ discount...

I couldn't care less what the company policy is I will not do 15 hours in Y for business. End of.

Agreed. You need to get invited rather than just going somewhere. Before I left academia I got asked to give a talk at a medium sized conference. I wasn't too fussed about going so I asked for a J ticket in India. To my surprise they agreed with no fuss.

Cruel is when a director turns up after a 28 hr journey and boasted how his J was upgraded to F and he showered onboard when his staff had all flown C on a crappy airline which didn't even have IFE. And everyone was so shocked they said nothing.

I set the travel policy for my firm - and my rule is simple - as long as you can get it under certain budget, I don't care whether it's Y/J or F.

i.e. You need to fly to JFK to SYD and want to fly J and it costs $10k? How cute :) I will give you a budget of $4k - you can do whatever you want. => most go with either PE on Qantas/ Virgin Australia or J on Fiji or China Southern

i.e. 2 You need to fly to JFK to London. I will give you $3k budget to play with. => most go with Air Europa J at around 2.3k

You can get your miles on whatever airline you want and whichever schedule you want. Just keep it under budget.

How do you determine budget?

I tend to agree. It is a long haul and if the company does not value it's staff enough to send on a 15 hour journey for important work or meetings, then you could:

a) make a suggestion to the CEO politely and ask for him/her to consider your suggestion

b) just suck it up and live with it but rack up the miles and points baby! And then upgrade yourself with the points/miles you rack up?

All of these cases can probably be easily explained by the differences between high and low margin businesses. Or between front or back office roles in which the employee's worth to the company is easy or hard to measure.

With the occasional outlier of the CEO having a frugal mentality despite being in a lucrative business. Or government/non-profits where the perception of luxury is unacceptable.

I wonder how often the person in charge of travel actually looks at a map or time zones.

We recently had a US associate fly from the Midwest to Denver to LA to Sydney. All in Y.

My response when I saw the flights, ... Denver? Hello, its January - they get snow, flight delays and maybe his luggage will arrive.

And yep, delay in Denver so an overnight there then missed connection in LA so an overnight there and original project start in of Monday was pushed back to Thursday so we had a team of US & UK & AUST staff having to change their plans/extend their stay for the delay.

Im guessing the person who booked the connections, thought they were saving the company money but I knew it was going to go balls up and it did.

This is why I request permission to book my own travel arrangements. I usually achieve it to max my comfort and not spend any more of the company money.

The word "cruel" sure does get thrown around a lot like it's meaningless, doesn't it. I just can't seriously even entertain the idea of some person being "forced" to fly Y as cruel.

However, I will admit it is uncomfortable and not as enjoyable as J or F!

A cramped Y seat usually isn't the best thing for productivity, and I typically won't bother pecking away at my keyboard if I'm jammed into a Y seat for a 15-hour flight (I'll take advantage of the free beer, enjoy the IFE, and pass out). Nor is it the best for getting rest, especially on those TATL flights where arriving well-rested makes a huge difference.

Survived many long int'l flights in Y, no problem. So have many others. But I would pick a company with better travel policies if I were offered a position from two similar companies. Travel policies matter, especially to those who spend a great deal of time in the air and in hotels.