Thanks, jason and pananna. And pananna, I can't tell you how helpful it is to have a CO person here to give the "other" side of things. I always try to stay as nice as possible on the phone (and especially in person when irregularities pop up at the airport), since it's obviously not the airline rep's fault that the website mismatched the fare and fare class (or that the rate desk is refusing to let them sell me what I thought I bought). I felt that my conversation this evening was perfetly cordial and ended with a genuine (no trace of sarcasm) "thank you," despite my frustration. Hopefully the rep felt the same way. I'll try even harder on the next go-around.

Jason, Pananna, and Xyzzy: would your advice be to buy the T/I fare and hope they can adjust the class to V before the flight? Or to buy the V fare and hope they refund me the difference?

I'm somewhat inclined to go with the T/I fare, mainly because right now I think I'd rather have $255 in my pocket than 6700 EQMs in my fiancee's account in case I'm unable to work things out. But that's a tough choice for folks like us who are trying to squeeze as many trips as possible to see each other out of our budget. If I had reason to believe there was a greater likelihood of resolving it from one approach versus the other, I might be inclined to choose the better route strategically rather than just the cheapest route.

Will the Powers That Be care less since we are really NW FFers and not CO's problem? If she was crediting miles to OP, this wouldn't be an issue, since the ticket was purchased online and would earn 100%. But she's already got over 7k 2005 EQMs in her NW account (all earned on CO metal, actually), and will be flying NW on cheap fares this summer. So those NW EQMs are important.

This is one of those times I almost wish I was ignorant to the whole world of frequent flyer nonsense. Then I remember how much enjoyment I've gotten out of my flyertalk nerddom, and I go back to trying to maximize the value of all those dollars I spend with SkyTeam.

I'm going to sleep on it, talk to my fiancee in the morning, and call CO again and see if I can get a new rep more willing to work a creative solution.

Meanwhile, jason, if you wouldn't mind PMing me the contact info for that "someone in corporate who really turned things around," I would greatly appreciate it. I'm not sure that my little EQM issue really deserves the attention of the CEO, but a more direct escalation to the same folks who helped you might not be totally inappropriate if I run into another brick wall tomorrow.

Thanks, all!

Woke up this morning to a confirmation e-mail saying it was ticketed overnight as T/I. So I guess the negotiations now commence.

After getting bounced around the phone system for a few minutes, I finally got an agent from the Electronic Services desk who dug into the problem. I got to listen to many loops of "Does checking in online 24 hours in advance sound convenient? It is!" as she put me on hold again and again, but I stayed friendly and appreciative and she saw the problem through.

We now have the ticket properly issued at $854 in V class as promised on the website.

Moral of the story (as others have said): be persistent, and be nice, and good things will happen.

Good to hear they did what they should have. While it sucks having to sit on hold to correct this, I don't have any sympathy for the cost/time required on the CO side to correct these things. It's completely their fault with poor website programming -- this issue has been going on for years. Further, they started this EQM nonsense; in the old days you wouldn't have cared less what fare class you were in, they all credited the same.

A somewhat related story, I had booked a V fare that was impacted by a schedule change. The schedule change necessitated a reroute, and the agent booked it in the lowest available class at the time (Q and X, I believe), then reissued the ticket.

When I noticed this, I called the support desk to upgrade my segments to V, and he didn't understand why I wanted to do this. "Sir, you still get your 100% since you booked online." I explained that with how competitive upgrades have become lately, it's important that my fare class not be downgraded. A few rounds of back and forth, then he reluctantly rebooked and reissued my segments in V.

I never thought much of this until I caught this thread tonight. Co.com has wronged me twice in the last two months.

1) Flying EWR-IAH-YVR with my girlfriend. I had purchased what CO.com said was a 'fully refundable ticket' and had a PDF printout of the site to prove it. She cancels on me last minute, so I go to the customer service desk at EWR before I board to process the refund. They say its non-refundable, and call somebody else to confirm. I get on the plane, call the elite desk and nicely plead my case. Instant refund. ($450 or so).

2) Flying EWR-IAH-YYC, this time with girlfriend. End of year and I'm somewhere between Gold/Plat, so EQMs don't matter much (xmas flights). I note on Co.com that the fare class on the return earns 150% EQMs due to the fare class. Sure enough, check in the fare class was downgraded (V to K or X I think ??) and it showed 100% EQMs. Didn't call CO on this one as it didn't make a difference (although may have on the EUA but I was 4/4 and she was 3/4).

Even though this thread started 8 months ago I can vouch that Co.com still has problems. I've learned my lesson - print out every screen and email and file them away for when you need them in the future.