Couple loses at VCAT over Lifetime QF Club card allegedly issued in error

[VPS]

But then she will need a new account.

Why. I don’t believe they closed her account.
edit. It said she was told to cut up her card but nowhere does it say they are banned as far as I can see

 

[exmc]

And we wonder why real issues are not being resolved by QF when they are swamped by these sorts of rubbish complaints. I wonder how many of these entitled complaints QF handles per day. They should publicise it all so we can have a laugh.

 

[Matt_01]

I wonder how much of this type of stuff is just bullshit. Sure it may have been a error at the time and back in 2018 you only had to show your card to get lounge access but these days you have to scan it. I tend to side with QF on this occasion as when scanning your card it is linked back to the QF ITS (no matter how bad it is) and the system knows your status.

 

[Princess Fiona]

I wonder how much of this type of stuff is just bullshit. Sure it may have been an error at the time and back in 2018 you only had to show your card to get lounge access but these days you have to scan it. I tend to side with QF on this occasion as when scanning your card it is linked back to the QF ITS (no matter how bad it is) and the system knows your status.

The card would likely have been valid until Dec 2019.

I doubt it saw much use in 2020 as the MEL QP was shut for the majority of the time and the owner wasn’t really a Frequent Flyer to start with.
It could well have been first used after the online expiry to fly MEL-ADL in 2021 to visit the ailing father hence the surprise and upset when it was rejected.

 

[Matt_01]

And at the same time, yes Qantas could've made an error in printing out and sending the lifetime kit to the couple.

AFAIW QF only print and send LT kits when you need it. I remember getting a letter many years back informing me I had obtained LTS, nothing when reaching LTG and out of curiosity asked an agent about this. The answer I received was I am P1 and the system is not capable of producing a gold LT card due to my current status. Makes perfect sense to me as LTG is of no consequence as a P1.

However, when you have agents of Qantas confirming that they won the lifetime membership as part of a draw, that certainly changes things, I would think. Yes you could argue that they may have been dealing with a MOLA (misleading or lying agent), but they are representatives of Qantas and so whatever they say is defacto Qantas' position on the matter.

Individuals going off script in any call centre is not uncommon, I have had BS feed to me my the likes of Telcos and Banks when I was working for them at the time and putting in the IVR and was fully aware of the scripts that had been provided.

What I suspect prevented them from winning the case, IMHO was not getting a recording of that phone call (perhaps through a subpoena) to prove that the conversation took place.

If you ask for QF to check call records they can do this. Back when QF and QR seemed to be on speaking terms I requested to change ADL-xDOH-BOS from J to ADL-xSYD-xDOH-BOS to F. After the calculations were done the additional points were 13K per and around AUD17 per pax, of course I said yes. A day or 2 later I called QF as the tickets had not been issued, discussion ensued and I was informed they (QF) would listen to the recordings and call me back. Sure enough they did, acknowledged that the call recording indicated it was an error on there end and honoured the upgrade.

I think everyone on this forum, regardless of what position they take on the matter can agree that everyone makes mistakes, including businesses, and they shouldn't be forced to honour those mistakes.

From above, at the time I tried it on with QF and to be honest wasn't expecting them to come through with the goods. It was a genuine mistake by the agent as the recalculation had been made SYD-DOH in F and forgot we had flights through to BOS that had be left out. If required I would have ponied up the extra points however QF agreed to ticket the flight based on what had been quoted. I am sure status played into this outcome.

 

[Quickstatus]

If nobody could find ANY record of such a draw,

They could have just asked AFF.
No such draw existed because :
AFF members would have immediately created one or possibly several discussion threads on it if there was.

Maybe the call centre person used to work in a scam centre?. If someone on the other end of the phone tells me I've won a lottery draw, I would immediately think it is a scam.

 

[Matt_01]

They could have just asked AFF.
No such draw existed because :
AFF members would have immediately created one or possibly several discussion threads on it.

When reading your comment the QF DSC threads sprang to mind

 

[Matt_01]

The card would likely have been valid until Dec 2019.

I doubt it saw much use in 2020 as the MEL QP was shut for the majority of the time and the owner wasn’t really a Frequent Flyer to start with.
It could well have been first used after the online expiry to fly MEL-ADL in 2021 to visit the ailing father hence the surprise and upset when it was rejected.

My comment was made on the link to the story that was provided in the OT. From my initial glance the image of the card in the story does not look correct. The first reason being the type set for 'LIFETIME' in the blue box seems out of whack to the rest of the card and second is the alignment of the date joined and expiry 'Jan 2002' and 'LIFETIME' is not aligned correctly. On my most recent QF cards (and my wifes) the date printed under 'joined' and 'expiry' lines up exactly. When I eventually get my LTG card in a few years I should be able to confirm my suspicions.

 

[Ade]

I've won a lottery draw, I would immediately think it is a scam.

Now, if you could kindly open your Windows computer, go to Internet Explorer and enter this URL please. Please follow my steps carefully. I'm going to put the money into your bank account <<<background noises in some regional/local language asking what's for lunch>>>

 

[Ade]

I think the offer of 4 years was pretty darn generous given this was a pretty obvious error. Should've taken that and run.

That's true ... for whatever reason QF was happy to give 4 years Club membership. Take it and enjoy ... The couple didn't have a case .. I mean, they did, QF incorrectly sent them a "lifetime" card ... but later clarified that it was a mistake. I'd have taken the fact that QF admitted to the error, which we all do, and take the generous offer and call it a day ...

 

[Princess Fiona]

My comment was made on the link to the story that was provided in the OT. From my initial glance the image of the card in the story does not look correct. The first reason being the type set for 'LIFETIME' in the blue box seems out of whack to the rest of the card and second is the alignment of the date joined and expiry 'Jan 2002' and 'LIFETIME' is not aligned correctly. On my most recent QF cards (and my wifes) the date printed under 'joined' and 'expiry' lines up exactly. When I eventually get my LTG card in a few years I should be able to confirm my suspicions.

This is Shrek’s LTG card

EDIT: Allowing for resolution etc I think it looks very similar.

 

[dairyfloss]

I think what we might have here, is the rare and unfortunate meeting of a bubbly Aussie Qantas call centre agent who makes a joke about a caller having ‘won a competition’ (full sarcasm on display) to receive club access for life after a printing mistake was highlighted… and the oblivious, gullible and entitled caller who has read too many stories from the US about successfully suing companies for oddball reasons.

Cheers,
Matt.

 

[kangarooflyer88]

The couple should consider themselves fortunate that VCAT concluded that QF was in the right here. They can and do have the power to levy penalties, one of which could very well have been lifetime access to the HBA QF lounge!

 

[half-hour]

I think what we might have here, is the rare and unfortunate meeting of a bubbly Aussie Qantas call centre agent who makes a joke about a caller having ‘won a competition’ (full sarcasm on display) to receive club access for life after a printing mistake was highlighted…

Whilst there's no way of us knowing exactly how the call went, I can certainly imagine the kind of scenario where the call centre agent says something jovial along the lines of :

"I can't see a record on the system of why you've received a lifetime membership card... Seems you got lucky, you must have one a prize draw, ha ha ha"

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I think the couple were right to take this matter to VCAT, despite the obviously unfavourable ruling. Yes, if we look at the agreement the party consented to when they signed up for the Qantas Club annual plan it's quite clear that the membership is only valid for the term they selected (i.e. 1 year). And at the same time, yes Qantas could've made an error in printing out and sending the lifetime kit to the couple. However, when you have agents of Qantas confirming that they won the lifetime membership as part of a draw, that certainly changes things, I would think. Yes you could argue that they may have been dealing with a MOLA (misleading or lying agent), but they are representatives of Qantas and so whatever they say is defacto Qantas' position on the matter. What I suspect prevented them from winning the case, IMHO was not getting a recording of that phone call (perhaps through a subpoena) to prove that the conversation took place. I think everyone on this forum, regardless of what position they take on the matter can agree that everyone makes mistakes, including businesses, and they shouldn't be forced to honour those mistakes. However, the moment a representative of Qantas indicates that this wasn't a mistake and in fact was the result of a draw, then that certainly changes matters.


They won't fly them ever again until Qantas publishes a fare they like!

Completely agree, no one has a right to premium services be it lounges or front cabin just because they are going through a distressing situation. Some folks need to exit this belief of entitlement.

-RooFlyer88

I don’t see how the customers were right to bring a case here.

A one minute call to a lawyer would have confirmed their case was unlikely to be successful.

The only way I can see it might have had a chance would be if they had failed to take up some social offer for a club membership, because they thought they already had it. For example, if qantas had run a promotion for a four year membership for $100, or whatever, but the customers passed in that because they thought they had ‘won’ lifetime membership.

In that case they could have claimed the value of their loss - whatever the promotion would have given them.

But that’s not the case here. The four-year membership and points was generous by QF.

 

[Quickstatus]

you must have one a prize draw

Yes, the agent might have said, "wow that does not happen very often, looks like you won the lottery" and later something happened and their memory of the conversation down the track, not being fresh caused then to misconstrue the actual meaning of the agent's comment.

 

[Rich]

For some reason I read the 100+ comments on The Age and the vast majority sided with the couple. So I came here expecting some more reasoned comments and was not disappointed.
One comment of note was from someone saying they had worked at Qantas at the time and that up to 80000 cards had been printed in error and the had to "deal with it ASAP". Perhaps some were missed.

 

[RichardMEL]

Really it comes down to the couple being able to prove this draw "win" IMO - which of course they couldn't. See if one could prove they had the honest and sincere belief that the service they were claiming for (ie: lifetime QC) had been obtained fairly from the provider (ie: via a promotion) then they MIGHT have had some sort of a case because then (or so me as an amateur lawyer) QF would have to prove that no it was not true. Now how you could prove it, apart from an alleged phone conversation is beyond me of course (I mean anyone can photoshop up an email or letter saying Cobgratulations you've won the Perry Joyce Lettuce Leaf Competition!" and it means squat). Their argument of entitlement to service is based on a very flimsy premise - and even per the article they claim well they had bought an annual membership(or renewal in this case) and so they had no right to expect anything more than what they'd paid for and couldn't provide any proof that they were entitled to the lifetime membership issued clearly in error.

I was thinking about this and was taken back a long time in history to a much younger and pimply teenager in the mid 80's I had a small bank account at the time with maybe $100 in it (which for a 15 year old was a fair sum in them there days of yore!). Anyway I went to an ATM to get twenty out (back when $20 actually had real value!!) and when the balance receipt came out I nearly lost my mind. Yep - the actual ATM issued receipt (wish I still had it!) had a balance of something like $1,109,100 on it. ie basically somehow I had over $11m deposited into my account). Now you can imagine where my 15 year old brain went with this.. BUT luckily my common sense kicked in before I did anything stupid and I realised that it was an obvious screw up. How did it happen? who knows. I don't strictly recall, but I'm pretty sure that I did go into the bank and well.. there's moron in his school uniform waving a balance of $1.1m about asking about it. The Teller clearly would know this is pretty unlikely. So they looked and said well it appears to be an error and will probably be reversed - and gave the very correct and wise advice to not spend any of it (which I'd kind of figured out after the initial excitement wore off). Sure enough a few days later the balance was back to the expected $80 or so. And no, I don't think I even got any of the interest on that fake balance. Damn bank!!! lol

Anyway true story. fun times. Now imagine that teller told me something else at the time like.. "yeah kid.. go crazy" (as a joke) well who knows right/ Of course we all know that had I spent any of that balance that wasn't mine (I have no idea if the funds were actually cleared or not at the time, this is near 40 years ago lol) then I would have been liable for that money.

In that case I actually had "proof" (the ATM receipt) and the bank teller did confirm that from what they could see yeah that was a coughload of money in my account on that day. I wonder how I would have gone with the VCAT of the day on that one. Probably about the same as these guys - obvious error by the bank which they corrected. Yet I wonder if I could have argued that I had a official receipt showing a balance of money in my account. it might have been interesting I suppose. But I was a goody goody and knew it wasn't mine to spend ... as tempting as it might have been!

Anyway yeah they tried it on with whatever level of reasonable belief one might want to ascribe to them and lost. too bad. so sad.

now if you'll excuse me I'm off to phone a certain bank about the last 38 years of interest I'm owed on a $1m balance....

 

[blackcat20]

Just to go against the grain. They clearly don't fly often if they don't have status. It would have cost QF almost nothing to honour it, but earns a lot of goodwill and the customer continues to spend whatever travel budget they have with the airline.

 

[RichardMEL]

For some reason I read the 100+ comments on The Age and the vast majority sided with the couple. So I came here expecting some more reasoned comments and was not disappointed.
One comment of note was from someone saying they had worked at Qantas at the time and that up to 80000 cards had been printed in error and the had to "deal with it ASAP". Perhaps some were missed.

Interesting. If so then surely QF would have internal records of this as a known issue (which they could then submit as proof that yeah it was an honest error on their belhalf - as much as they would not want this in the public record I'm sure). That would make more sense and then the case is even more clear cut. errors happen.

As for Joe Public supporting the couple - doesn't surprise me. I reckon there's part "little guy over the big nasty corporation" and part "bash QF because QF" and whatever in there - plus taking things on face value (the "you won a draw" bit) rather than thinking it through with any reasonable basis. I get it.

I had a workmate send me the link last night and he didn't like my comments and just blamed greedy Joyce and whatever. So you know that's how some people are going to feel no matter what. (this same person loves to send me any QF delay or diversion story that he finds... I think he's had a vendetta since JQ once diverted him to ADL on a MCY-MEL flight and he can't get over it).

Post automatically merged: Jan 8, 2023

Just to go against the grain. They clearly don't fly often if they don't have status. It would have cost QF almost nothing to honour it, but earns a lot of goodwill and the customer continues to spend whatever travel budget they have with the airline.

maybe.. but then it sets some sort of precedence.

And QF *did* offer to settle with a generous offer of extended membership. Is that not goodwill enough?