Seems to me NZ should have waived the fee for a journey already started if the rule change was so quick. It seems fairly unreasonable that if the OP was on x segments just days/weeks before and a new rule comes in that they should pay since there was no reasonable way they could have known of the change (if, on the other hand, the journey was just starting, that's another issue as the pax could possibly have been alerted by their t/a or booking airline regarding the change). Anyway if the ticket has a baggage limit listed on it, shouldn't that apply since that's what they bought with their hard earned (just looking at the last e-ticket I have it has 32K on it)?

just a thought