Originally Posted by
RealHJ
That's just a load of nonsense. Ask the agent where are they actually getting that from and ask them to point you to that, and/or to forward you the fare rules over e-mail if you can't see it online (as you can, though, normally) as you'd like to see it in writing. In the published award fare rules it certainly doesn't state that; there are blackout dates only for CI, AE and KE. If there are any such dates, it must be published. Here it was just a lazy agent who was ready to say anything just to get you off the phone so that they could get away with not doing your job, plain and simple. Either that, or a very incompetent agent who has not the slightest clue of what they are doing.
I also didn't believe him. He was reading a whole bunch of dates that look like blackout dates, but there is no way that China Southern would tell Delta to charge more SkyMiles on their flights on specific dates. Moreover, he told me that they cannot hold an itinerary and I have two choices - ticket an itinerary or cancel it. I chose the second.
I'll try tomorrow again, but what is consistent is their computers automatically price ticket at 195K if I add CZ for Australia award.