Fare Code IT - what is it?
 

I booked this through a travel agent. Delta agent doesn't seem to know what it is or what MQD I will receive. This is receipt for 2. Cost was over $4K for the tickets.

Billing and Ticketing Information
FARE DETAILS: SEA DL X/E/ATL DL MIL M /IT DL X/E/ATL DL SEA Q MILSEA /IT M /IT IT /IT PLUS /IT END IT1.00 XFSEA4.5ATL4.5ATL4.5
Fare: IT
Taxes/Carrier-Imposed Fees: 627.50
Total: IT
Paid with American Express ending XXXX

Detailed Tax Information
AY 7.50
EX 1.40
HB 8.80
IT 22.50
MJ 1.70
US 35.00
VT 3.60
XA 5.00
XF 13.50
XY 7.00
YC 5.50
YR 516.00
Total: 627.50

Inclusive Tour - did you book as part of a package?

My guess is that you won't be earning MQDs, and that you'll be subject to this: http://www.delta.com/content/www/en_...ion-fares.html

Not part of a tour . Lesson learned. Whole Idea at this point is to meet MDQ for us. Oh well. Thanks for helping out.

You should question the travel agent before accepting the ticket/fare. They are responsible for knowing what the fare class means and the rules for your fare code. This is partly why the travel agent is paid.

Did you also buy accommodations or anything else from the travel agent? Inclusive Tour doesn't necessarily mean an actual tour.

Yep. Worldspan says IT is simply "Tour Basing", so it could have been part of any kind of vacation packaging, even if a passenger isn't booked on a tour of some sort (i.e. a trip via Funjet or XXAirline Vacations). When I dig down, I see that IT is generally part of a bulk fare ticketing, which are often used in these flight/hotel packages.

Yup, looks like consolidator fare from your travel agent. 0 MQDs and only reduced MQM/miles earning.

What fare class buckets are in your itinerary?

Thanks so much everyone. Straight airfare only. So the consolidator must be it. I didn't pay by AMEX so along the line there must be some markup.

Tickets are in T, Platinum upgrade shows requested on domestic flights.

Seating in EC without fees so I'm not worried about the ticket being legitimate. Just bummed about the lack of MQDs.

Only 25% earn on MQM and miles as well for T.

It's legitimate, just a DL Bulk T fare. I know an agent who sells through a consolidator, compares the price to a published fare, and adds a markup of either a few hundred or something that is between published and consolidator fare. It's still cheaper for the average traveler, and it makes her money. If our clients don't mention an airline loyalty program, I always ask for a preferred carrier or FF #. And most people here fly DL because it's a hub, they have a SM#, but few of them actually had status. Chances are the published fare was considerably higher for DL vs a code share or the bulk fare. I priced an itinerary last week that was $1000 cheaper for an AM coded DL flight, and for some reason, published air was a few dollars cheaper than bulk. No clue why. They were just a family on a budget, so the AM code share saved them $1000. It's possible your agent was trying to keep costs down (but I don't know if they tried to add a markup or not). Being someone wh has status, I would have at least quoted you both figures and asked what you preferred, since you might have opted to pay a bit more for full MQMs/MQDs.

If a big goal of yours in flying DL is to meet MQD, I'd suggest not taking any risks and always booking directly through DL. There's too many variations, fine print, exclusions, etc to keep track of and DL does not make it very clear.

If the TA didn't tell you that it wasn't a published fare, I think you have a case for being changed to an available published without a fee from either the TA or DL, just payment of the fare difference.

+1, if you book through a TA there is always a chance of reduced/no earnings of MQM and especially MQD. I would always book myself if these are important, and only on Delta.com.

I suppose you could risk it if you specifically talked to the TA and got in writing that it was not a bulk/consolidator/unpublished fare.

Some of our agents have gotten into hot water for lesser things, so you might have some recourse in this situation. No guarantees, but it might be worth looking into.
FWIW, I can likely see two scenarios that may have happened here. 1.) TA assumes you're the average flyer, and want a more affordable international fare (as most leisure travelers do, whether they book Y or J) and 2.) Airlines do not pay commission to agents; the only way for them to make money off of air bookings are adding a service fee, book through a vendor like Funjet (which pulls published and bulk fares) and Delta Vacations (pulls published fares), or in the case of expensive international fares they'll use a consolidator, compare the price to the published air, and add a markup that's more than the consolidator fare but still less than published airfare.

Most travel agents are not paid and work only on commission, fyi.