You guys are right, there is nothing wrong (and it can help) to actually know the policy, but I posted what I did because generally travelers focus too much on policy when a lot of things depend on the whim of the gate agent, and to a degree whether you present yourself in such a way that they like or empathize with you. A gate agent, officially or not, has the power in the computer system (with any carrier) to pretty much do whatever with a ticket or reservation.

Its interesting the degree people are risk averse or not.

It can be more difficult if you have a nonstop flight booked and you want to standby for a connecting flight because they must issue additional paper or e-ticket flight coupons so that you will have enough flight coupons to take the connecting flight. For instance once I think I was ticketed SFO BOS nonstop, but I wanted to standby SFO IAD BOS. It took the agent about 20 minutes to do whatever they had to do to generate a new flight coupon to use from IAD to BOS since originally I just had one SFO BOS flight coupon. At another station, before SFO, the agent refused to do this and they very well may have been right but when I got to SFO I was lucky enough to find someone to do it. Conversely if you are booked on a connection and want to standby nonstop I think thats childs play since they already have more than enough flight coupons.

Regardless of the situation and what policy says, if you are making a reasonable request you can just say you believe it is reasonable, and you want to do whatever it is, and you think it is allowed. You could also say that you have done this in the past.

Nothing wrong with knowing the policy, but in the 101 class I would tech the traveler this fundamental lesson I don't think most people get that it is just the whim of the gate agent and whether you find the right person, and then whether that person wants to help you. The 201 class can then go over policies .