Have the capability of doing something is Wrong?!

[IrisL418]

Grammartically, I have a hard time to believe that the idiom "have the capability of doing something" or "have the ability of doing sth" are stated as wrong accroding to the Manhatan "Sentence Correction" book (p. 153).
https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries. ... capability

Can any of you help explain why Manhattan or Gmac agree on this?

[Sage Pearce-Higgins]

First of all, be clear that we're not saying that "have the capability of doing something" is always wrong (you can see that that idiom is not listed in the Appendix). Simply, in this context the phrase "can" offers a simpler, more concise alternative in this case. Remember that on GMAT problems you're simply asked to 'choose the best alternative'. Further, in the examples from the Oxford Dictionary, the word 'capability' is used in different contexts, such as 'lost the capability'. If I merely said 'X has the capability of doing Y', in most contexts it would be simpler just to say 'X can do Y'.

We've gone through official GMAT problems pretty carefully, and picked the idioms that crop up as errors according to GMAT. I believe this idiom is used in a problem from the 2015 Official Guide. Also, you should be aware that GMAT tends to be conservative and stick to slightly old-fashioned idioms. Not all the idioms listed in the dictionary will be considered acceptable by GMAT.