Good post.
I suspect two big factors involved here:
1. Reduced availability means less points CAN be spent for redemptions of flight awards, or in fact people get so sick of looking and finding nothing they give up and...
2. The massive pushing of other redemption options from Hotel Stays to Toasters pushes a lot of people to think well I can't get that flight to Hawaii I wanted so yeah I'll buy a new Vacuum or gift cards at woolies.
That QF has decided to limit more premium seats to higher status holders (while skewing earning towards their own flights) shows the focus they feel works for them. Even as a benefactor (as in I've had little issue getting F seats recently) I don't always agree that it's the "right" way to run things but that's a corporate policy. In many ways, rewarding your most frequent yielders (see what I did there?
) is a win/win.. the elite punter is happy and thus ensures, or hopefully anyway, continued spend to maintain.
Think of it like two companies.
Qantas - the owner of seats
Qantas Loyalty - the buyer of seats
Qantas, the airline, has a job to sell seats at the highest yield possible.
Qantas Loyalty is a buyer of seats, and thus an internal distribution channel. Obviously, Qantas Loyalty pays rock-bottom rates for these seats, as they're seen as distressed inventory and seats the airline may otherwise never sell (thus, a perishable product which affects RASK and a host of other airline metrics).
If Qantas gave virtually free reign to Qantas Loyalty for seats - it would mean significant impacts to ticket sales revenue. Revenue management would basically view it like this: How much is Mr RichardMEL worth to us over the past 12 months? How much is he worth to us over the next 12 months? Will not giving this seat to him affect revenue? If chances of affecting revenue are under xx%, you won't get the seat no matter how hard you try. After all, you're already loyal and past behavioural patterns suggest that you will likely continue to spend regardless of the outcome of receiving a J/F seat at classic award prices.
2. The massive pushing of other redemption options from Hotel Stays to Toasters pushes a lot of people to think well I can't get that flight to Hawaii I wanted so yeah I'll buy a new Vacuum or gift cards at woolies.
Qantas Loyalty need more non-air redemptions to cater towards the ever-growing points balances. Remember that QF Loyalty is under IFRS15 accounting standards, and only the marketing portion of a point value can be recognised immediately (which can be negative in many cases) - with the remainder of the point value deferred until the redemption has been completed. For this reason alone - we will continue to see more options to use points on and increases in the cost of points required for awards. It's the only way to keep the current model sustainable without changing the core underlying FFP proposition or re-inventing the currency entirely.
As for the topic at hand - Qantas members likely are being penalised by other OW airlines because of commercial issues (eg: QF/EK protectionism against QR, increasingly more codeshares with non-alliance members etc). As a frequent flyer member it's obvious that QF biz/first inventory is highly limited, and even then it goes to QFF members.
Airlines are complex to run.
Airline Loyalty programs are just as complex.
Personally, I think QF members get screwed every day, but mainly because they screw themselves by not looking at alternatives.