agreed; irksome
I agree--I don't understand why Air NZ won't let me pick a somewhat higher economy fare to get my status miles on AC. My recent options were:
1.) call a travel agent
2.) call NZ reservations
NZ res agents are very good. Travel agents? Very few left with strong technical skills of the sort required to drill into fare rules in systems like SABRE.
I'm travelling for a client to Auckland and went back and forth with their agent for a week (via email; they're in NZ) because she claimed she "had no access" to fare rules in SABRE. Utter crap.
Years ago I was a travel agent and my ability to leverage SABRE was one of the main reasons I did well. Back in the day that was exceptional; today it seems but a memory (all alone in the moooonliiiiiiight)....