Be Aware! Qantas double points Trap ["Discount Economy is 'not' Economy"]

[muppet]

Base on everyone's understanding here it means economy class/seat, while it means "economy fare type" per Qantas points earning table.

And of course there is no such product for sale when purchasing a flight to the USA. There is Sale, Saver and Flex.

 

[JimBNE]

And of course there is no such product for sale when purchasing a flight to the USA. There is Sale, Saver and Flex.

Exactly

 

[Athleticfrog]

And of course there is no such product for sale when purchasing a flight to the USA. There is Sale, Saver and Flex.

You have no idea what you get when booking through agent, especially for corporate customer which usually got rip off price, so I should feel lucky that one leg fall into "economy fare type".

 

[Athleticfrog]

This table explains the term "Economy" in the promotion email, it means "Economy" of Frequent Flyer Category, not Travel Class, very misleading.

Frequent Flyer - Points Calculators - Qantas Class Types

Booking classes

www.qantas.com

Fare Type	Travel Class	Frequent Flyer Category	Booking Class
Classic Flight Reward Economy	Economy	Classic Flight Reward Economy	X
Economy Sale	Economy	Discount Economy	E, N, O, Q
Economy Saver	Economy	Economy	G, K, L, M, S, V
Economy Flex	Economy	Flexible Economy	B, H, Y
Classic Flight Reward Premium Economy	Premium Economy	Classic Flight Reward Premium Economy	Z

 

[sxc]

Flexible economy is also not eligible based on Qantas response.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"We're sorry that it's taking a little longer than anticipated to look into your query. Upon checking on the previous promotion that you registered, please note that the Flexible Economy booking class or alpha code ( B, H and Y ) is not eligible to earn towards the Double Qantas Points for July 2019 promotion. For future promotions and for the full details of eligibility, you may refer under the "Important Information" of each promotion you wish to register."

This seriously can’t be true??

 

[SOPOOR]

Qantas cannot have it both ways;

sounds like typical qantas behavior to me

 

[SOPOOR]

Has anyone else had one of these offers and had either the same experience, or no issue? I'm honestly surprised that Qantas would intend it to not apply to sale fares. They're usually pretty clear when they're excluded.

Could they just be backing their initial mistake in this one case? It feels like someone's screwed up somewhere, whether that's IT, the people who wrote the email T&C, the call centre contacts....

Offtopic, but I had a offer about 3 years ago, it was all points earnt from the period of Jul, Aug, Sep of that year all earned qantas points will be doubled, it was a very widespread promo, max 5k per month, I earnt well above the 5k
and 3-4 months later tried to follow up on it, many people in the same boat as me

after , 6 phone calls, their excuses ranged from
- im the one of the marketing managers and ive never heard of it
- ill call you back within 2 business days
- unless you can show me the link its not valid (the promo had finished and link gone)
- a screenshot of the promotion doesnt help me at all

I went to the ACA and I cant remember the outcome to be honest,
but a few months later me and everyone involved in the promotion got 5000 points, regardless of how much they spent

I was still owed 10k, but didnt have the energy/patience to follow up on it

naturally, I have a very negative image of qantas, and that wont easily be changed,

 

[Athleticfrog]

Offtopic, but I had a offer about 3 years ago, it was all points earnt from the period of Jul, Aug, Sep of that year all earned qantas points will be doubled, it was a very widespread promo, max 5k per month, I earnt well above the 5k
and 3-4 months later tried to follow up on it, many people in the same boat as me

after , 6 phone calls, their excuses ranged from
- im the one of the marketing managers and ive never heard of it
- ill call you back within 2 business days
- unless you can show me the link its not valid (the promo had finished and link gone)
- a screenshot of the promotion doesnt help me at all

I went to the ACA and I cant remember the outcome to be honest,
but a few months later me and everyone involved in the promotion got 5000 points, regardless of how much they spent

I was still owed 10k, but didnt have the energy/patience to follow up on it

naturally, I have a very negative image of qantas, and that wont easily be changed,

I had bad experience with IHG hotel and ended up in nothing with US consumer protection involved, IHG just ignored them. I would sue them if they were in Au, for Qantas case, everything in email and it is good opportunity to experience Au consumer protection regulations/laws.

 

[CaptJCool]

Post 11 and following posts On this recent thread shows how to see the fare bucket. Even before you actually pay.....

Changed Qantas Booking, didn't get what I'd been advised I'd paid for

I recently had to re-book a Qantas flight. The original flight was "Discount Economy" CNS-BNE + BNE-MEL, I needed to re-book as just BNE-MEL - via the Qantas chat I was told that the new flight would cost $73 more, when I asked why it was more expensive to travel less distance, they said they...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

I knew it was somewhere

 

[Athleticfrog]

Got call from Fair Trading, Qantas posted points and will advise its marketing team, case closed.

 

[sxc]

I don’t believe it is marketing team that needs to be advised...it’s the call centre!

 

[Athleticfrog]

I agree

I don’t believe it is marketing team that needs to be advised...it’s the call centre!

 

[Danger]

Got call from Fair Trading, Qantas posted points and will advise its marketing team, case closed.

So, just to be clear, you got nowhere with QF, lodged a complaint with Fair Trading, Fair Trading got in touch with Qantas and Qantas (presumably through gritted teeth) award you the points you were rightly owed?

 

[opusman]

I doubt it was gritted teeth, I'd say whoever the FTA liaison is took one look at it and banged some heads together.

 

[bcworld]

I doubt it was gritted teeth, I'd say whoever the FTA liaison is took one look at it and banged some heads together.

Well I'd like to know, did they fix this for everyone who was affected...or just the ones who went to FTA!? I'm going to assume the former.

 

[eastwest101]

Well I'd like to know, did they fix this for everyone who was affected...or just the ones who went to FTA!? I'm going to assume the former.

Unfortunately I'm going to assume the latter. Without knowing all the details - if we assume that a state Fair Trading body/regulator did approach Qantas then whether by "banging the table" or Qantas voluntarily backing down or whatever else is plausible and telling the fair trading body that the OP will get their double SC's is all a mystery.

Its not really clear if its a systematic, or an intentional, or an unintentional problem, but it just seems like its easier to award the points, tell the regulator you have fixed things up with that particular customer, very sorry etc and the regulator can say "case closed" and go straight back to sleep without any further investigation into what happened.

Its just this sort of "not my job" regulatory response that ended up with us having to have a Royal Commission into Banking - which found that not only were the banks doing the wrong thing, but the regulators were totally ineffective/complicit in it as well. And we are still waiting for the government to implement some consequences/punishment/reforms to improve things now. As a matter of fact they are probably just doing similar things right now, what are the government going to do about it? Have another royal commission?

 

[Athleticfrog]

With the help of AFF editor who also contacted Qantas and they believe it is likely caused by travel date, then looked up the promotion email again and my travel plan, there was one day difference for the one I didn't get points, Qantas promotion was very accurate and only provide 7 days windows for travel, I didn't notice that when I argued with them and was mislead by their customer service again and again, it is just 4900 points which I don't really care however I was just annoyed by their response and started everything.

I don't know how they dealt it with Fair Trading while there is no much I can correct on my end, I guess they just did what fair trading told them which also requested by me initially.

 

[cwd]

Hang on...so there was never an issue with discount economy? You'd actually booked a flight outside the relevant period, but the call centre gave you an incorrect reason as to why you had (correctly) not received the extra points?

To be fair, it's unacceptable that call centre staff give out incorrect information, but in this case, the promotion was correctly applied. Can I suggest the thread title be updated to reflect this?

 

[Athleticfrog]

I still don't get confirm for that part from Qantas, they didn't contact me again, I think it is a coincidence (one leg on discount economy and the other one on economy) with un-professional customer service.

Thanks everyone's attention and sorry for the misleading topic.

Hang on...so there was never an issue with discount economy? You'd actually booked a flight outside the relevant period, but the call centre gave you an incorrect reason as to why you had (correctly) not received the extra points?

To be fair, it's unacceptable that call centre staff give out incorrect information, but in this case, the promotion was correctly applied. Can I suggest the thread title be updated to reflect this?

 

[bcworld]

Unfortunately I'm going to assume the latter.

That's what I meant to say! Although I now see the whole thing was moot!