Does Qantas domestic scheduling have issues?

[NM]

Bill, all my bookings for the next few months are in the meeting thread.

Ahh, there's the problem. You are telling Mr Murphy at Qantas Scheduling just which flights from which airports should be affected on which days. He now has plenty of notice to come up with that 1002nd new excuse.

 

[docjames]

Bill, all my bookings for the next few months are in the meeting thread. I would take it a little further to the point where people do not travel on the same day as me and definitely stay away from the airport I am flying from on a particular day. I feel sorry for what docjames had to endure last Friday at BNE airport.

I was quite ok with my experience - I prob would have used my QC "freebie" if i'd known you were going to get stuck JohnK, but glass half full i can now use it another time, and it was fun confused seeing everyone get all antsy at the QF staff who were doing their best! Plus they moved me to a flight that was going to leave @ the same time as my booked flight so really no complaints from me at all. You got my dose of the Friday-itis at BNE D. What surprised me was the lack of checkin staff as you report at the J desks. It seems the "bottleneck" is now bag drop/checkin rather than security (which it was for a while).

 

[JohnK]

What surprised me was the lack of checkin staff as you report at the J desks. It seems the "bottleneck" is now bag drop/checkin rather than security (which it was for a while).

II think someone is playing games at BNE domestic but I am not sure what they are trying to achieve.

The business check in was again un-manned (closed) yesterday. So last Friday was not a once off. There was only a dedicated Qantas Club bag drop and a Qantas Club check-in taking alternate passengers from the business class and Qantas club queues.

Unlike the last few weeks security lines were almost non existant but they did make almost every person go through at least 2-3 times. The setting is too sensitive and I am sure there is really no need for belts and shoes to come off. But anyway that is my pet gripe and not much more one can do about it other than to take it on the chin.

 

[straitman]

Bill, all my bookings for the next few months are in the meeting thread. I would take it a little further to the point where people do not travel on the same day as me and definitely stay away from the airport I am flying from on a particular day. I feel sorry for what docjames had to endure last Friday at BNE airport.

Thanks JohnK.

 

[JohnK]

I am convinced that I am doomed to have bad luck all my life. I hope no one on AFF is flying to/from SYD/BNE today.

I was rushing to get to SYD airport and got there at 5:15pm for a 6:05pm departure. No one in the queue and I am called up to the business class counter straight away. Put my bag on the belt and hand over my Platinum card mentioning that I am flying to BNE. Oh sir, it appears you have been upgraded. Really? :shock: But your flight is (at least) 40 minutes late (and now in the lounge announced at least 50 minutes late). I knew there was a catch to the upgrade.

I am given a boarding pass for 1B on a 763 and she said I can be put on an earlier flight if I wanted, see they can offer earlier whenever it suits them. No thank you ma'am I will take the business class seat and get there a little later. All of this on a cheap red e-deal ticket. If I happen to miss the airtrtain there is always coachtrans and as it so happens I am always one of the first to be dropped in Spring Hill....

 

[Mal]

I am convinced that I am doomed to have bad luck all my life. I hope no one on AFF is flying to/from SYD/BNE today.

Pros:
You get a J seat.
Extra time in the QP to do various things (including a fully stocked free bar!)
Even if you miss the last Airtrain, there is still CoachTrans for a few more hours.
Your apartment will be there waiting for you.

Cons:
You're a little later than you plan to be.
You might end up on a domestic (or ex-BA) 767.

I don't see that the cons exceed the benefits in this case.

 

[JohnK]

I don't see that the cons exceed the benefits in this case.

You are absolutely right. In my view 1B is 1B even on an ex-BA 767. I wouldn't even mind if flight was cancelled and I was offered taxi fare back home and a flight out early in the morning. I am more concerned when I get back late to SYD on Friday nights.

I should really start a spread sheet with all the on time statistics from my various flights. I reckon my flights are sitting on about 25% on-time performance at the moment....

 

[serfty]

Info re VH-OGI* operating QF544 SYD-BNE yesterday:

• Inbound flight from MEL landed 18:17 -22 minutes late.
• Actual departure for BNE was 19:50 - 107 minutes late.
• Actual arrival into BNE was 20:17 - 102 minutes late.
• It then departed for PER, 100 minutes late.

* This is/was the one with "Picocell".

 

[JohnK]

A couple of unfortunate incidents added to the delay.

The first was after everybody boarded an unaccompanied minor (teenager) reported that he was not feeling well. I saw him outside before boarding with his family and he looked OK. Who knows? Anyway he was escorted off the aircraft and the doors were closed.

The second was after pushing back and going through the safety demonstration and then getting ready to taxi to runway the gear warning light came on. Back to gate for engineers to have a look at problem. Then a second attempt at push back and had to go through the safety demonstration a second time.

One feels sorry for the crew as they were going to have a long night going to PER. The crew were working the SYD-BNE-PER legs and the delays in SYD would not have helped. I went to the BNE Qantas lounge after the flight and they announced early boarding for flight QF767 BNE-PER.

My bad luck with domestic flights continues but it was made easier having seat 1A/B all to myself....

 

[JohnK]

More fun in BNE tonight. If you are travelling to SYD, MEL and PER there are lengthy delays.

On another note I have been at BNE airport 3 out of the last 4 Fridays and the business class check in counter was left unattended again for the thirsd time! What is happening? The person at the Qantas Club check in counter had no idea how to handle the alternate queues and I had to wait for 6 people from the Qantas Club queue to check in before a kind person in the Qantas Club queue asked me to go to check-in counter in front of him. There were 6 people waiting behind me in the business class queue.

Again this is not really good enough customer service Qantas but you have such a captive audience who have no idea what they are doing you can almost get away with anything. I have written more feedback to Qantas for them to ignore....

 

[Platy]

More fun in BNE tonight. If you are travelling to SYD, MEL and PER there are lengthy delays.

On another note I have been at BNE airport 3 out of the last 4 Fridays and the business class check in counter was left unattended again for the thirsd time! What is happening? The person at the Qantas Club check in counter had no idea how to handle the alternate queues and I had to wait for 6 people from the Qantas Club queue to check in before a kind person in the Qantas Club queue asked me to go to check-in counter in front of him. There were 6 people waiting behind me in the business class queue.

Again this is not really good enough customer service Qantas but you have such a captive audience who have no idea what they are doing you can almost get away with anything. I have written more feedback to Qantas for them to ignore....

Failing to staff business check ins is inexcusable. A BNE-CNS is now over $1,000 one way in J.

That said, I was in BNE DOM yesterday about 1330 and the counters were staffed - one desk for J and one for QP.

The QP check in person gave me priority since I was in the J queue. She was delightful...

 

[JohnK]

A few months down the track and the business class check-in is still not being manned on a regular basis. I have sent a few feedback requests to Qantas and they have responded to one with an standard reply but ignored the others.

I have almost given up using the premium check-in lines. When I got to the airport today at ~4:30pm there was 4-5 people in the Premium check-in queue, 5-6 people in the Qantas Club check-in queue and there was only 2 people serving these 2 queues.

On the other hand the Qantas Club bag drop had 1 person in line and 2 people serving this queue. As I had already checked-in online I went to the bag drop queue. I did not have a boarding pass printed and I played dumb, quite easy for me to do, when I heard an employee mention a number of times anyone without a boarding in the bag drop queue to go to the check-in queue. Anyway it was my turn next and the lady at bag drop was more than happy to assist. There were still a number of people waiting in the premium lane to check-in after I had checked-in.

Next time I will print a boarding pass at work and decide which line I will use when I get to the airport. If I use the premium check-in I will get cardboard boarding pass other I can use the bag drop and switch to cardboard boarding pass in Qantas Lounge.

 

[JohnK]

Don't think I will a response from Qantas on this feedback.

______

Hi,

I must be jinxed otherwise I have run out of excuses.

I have been travelling SYD-BNE almost every week for the past 9 months and I would be surprised if the on-time performance for my flights was more than 20%. This is totally unacceptable.

Almost every Friday afternoon/evning my BNE-SYD flights are usually delayed by at least half an hour and sometimes up to an hour. No different on Sunday afternoon flights SYD-BNE. A couple of weeks ago the SYD-BNE flight was delayed by over an hour which caused me to miss the airtrain and I had to get a taxi into the city which cost almost as much as the flight from SYD.

I had a 2:45pm departure BNE-SYD today and left work early to make my way out to the airport. When I got to Central I got an sms advising that my flight is now scheduled for 3:50pm. Surely this is not serious and I am in fact in a nightmare and I will wake up soon?

A person can only take so much. I pay for these flights out of my own pocket and I purchase the cheapest airfares possible so I can visit my family in Sydney on weekends. I plan things and schedule things and they are constantly disrupted because Qantas could not care less about departing/arriving on time.

Why am I inconvenienced so much? I can't change to an earlier flight as this is not allowed on the ticket rules but constant delays are allowed and are acceptable on the ticket rules. Everything always favours the airline.

Best Regards,
John