Just saw: no more POLi payments for QF

[AustraliaPoochie]

Maybe its already known on here.
Another money saving way to book QF flights now gone end of the month.

 

[Captain Halliday]

Does this mean there will no longer be a fee-free way to pay for flights?

If so, I wonder how QF will change their website and price structure to comply with the relevant laws.

From the ACCC:
If there is no way for a consumer to pay without paying a surcharge, the business must include the minimum surcharge payable in the displayed price for its products.

I’m not sure burying the surcharge in the fine print complies.

From QF’s perspective, I’m not sure it’s an ideal time to be pushing the boundaries with the ACCC.

Edit: yeah, I forgot BPay. Sorry.

 

[oz_mark]

Bpay is fee free.

 

[AIRwin]

Does this mean there will no longer be a fee-free way to pay for flights?

Gift voucher?

 

[yachty]

From QF’s perspective, I’m not sure it’s an ideal time to be pushing the boundaries with the ACCC.

Kind of moot point since (as oz_mark noted) BPAY is fee free, but I'd imagine this only came about because Auspost are killing off Poli anyway. Not sure that counts as pushing the boundaries.

Side note, this thread reminded me that you used to be able to pay by bank transfer for Jetstar flights! Maybe they should bring that back lol.

 

[33kft]

I am glad that POLi is dead. Not because it was a fee free payment option, that is just an unfortunate side effect, but because it was a security disaster and could be replaced tomorrow with something like payid payments to Qantas generated addresses as tracking IDs, which would be much simpler and more secure.

The fact it survived for almost 20 years is an indictment on how seriously people take security when dealing with online transactions. It's Wikipedia page is basically just a list of horrible ideas that the company pivoted through over the years and commentary from security professionals and banks on what a disaster it was:

POLi Payments - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Encouraging unsophisticated internet users to actively assist in a browser hijack of their internet banking session in order to automate the transfer of money out of their bank accounts is an idea that should have never seen the light of day.

 

[dylarr]

Bpay is fee free.

It can only be used for flights > 7 days out so if booking within a week from departure it would be almost impossible to buy a flight at the advertised price due to surcharges on the remaining payment methods.

You could use gift vouchers but they are limited to $2k and you can only use one per booking.

It's good that POLi is going though. I couldn't agree more with 33kft's post - it's a security disaster and I avoided it at all costs. I'm surprised it lasted so long.

 

[kpro]

Never used POLi, but its method of operation by directing you to a bank login page reminds me of some credit applications. EG when I applied for a Bank of Melbourne (Westpac) card earlier this year, they assessed proof of incoming by requesting me to log in to my internet banking as part of the application. They then downloaded transaction history from it.

Felt like there were so many ways that could be abused.

 

[encryptededdy]

Unfortunately for kiwis it seems like a New Zealand company has bought out POLi New Zealand and will continue running it for New Zealand customers.

I heard from rumors the demise of POLi in Australia was partly forced by banks, with some banks starting to hold outbound POLi payments for a few days in case of fraud.

 

[jase05]

Unfortunately for kiwis it seems like a New Zealand company has bought out POLi New Zealand and will continue running it for New Zealand customers.

I heard from rumors the demise of POLi in Australia was partly forced by banks, with some banks starting to hold outbound POLi payments for a few days in case of fraud.

Commonwealth Bank were a big factor in the decision by APG but they had been mulling over it for a while with the security concerns so no one was really surprised or upset when the announcement was made to shut it down.

 

[Himeno]

I saw poli as a payment option for some bookings, but I never had any idea what it was.

 

[kangarooflyer88]

They really need to ditch the surcharges for things here in Australia. Just build it into the price like the rest of the world. In that way people who are silly and decide to pay with cash or BPay get penalized for doing so whilst I can enjoy the many benefits of using a credit card at a slightly subsidized cost.

-RooFlyer88

 

[eminere]

You could use gift vouchers but they are limited to $2k and you can only use one per booking.

Just buy a $50 voucher and redeem it and pay the rest on your credit card - there won't be a fee charged for the component paid with a credit card this way.

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

I saw poli as a payment option for some bookings, but I never had any idea what it was.

It was a very good system to pay for QFd fares.
As I mentioned, no cc fees, and you paid it via a log in to your or the holders bank account, what some said was not ideal, was that the person had to log in, to their bank by clicking the link via payment by entering bank log in data via poli.
Of course with QF, we can still pay by bank transfer by bpay, which is also good, no cc fees either, or as Eminere said, pay by gift voucher, but for this we have to prebuy the voucher from Woolworths gift buying.
That is one downside.
Personally, I will be paying with bpay.
Have to say, its Auspost that decided to close polipay, not QFF, so it would affect a lot of other merchants too and other banks.

 

[kangarooflyer88]

Just buy a $50 voucher and redeem it and pay the rest on your credit card - there won't be a fee charged for the component paid with a credit card this way.

Did not know you could use a mixed payment to bypass the credit card fees. I'd be curious, however, if one could buy Qantas gift cards at a discount (or perhaps for some QF bonus points?)

 

[AIRwin]

perhaps for some QF bonus points?

No bonus points since Christmas 2020:

Christmas Voucher Points Offer - Back for 2020

The Xmas Qantas Voucher offer is back after a couple of years absence. A few changes this year: Points offer this year is 3 points per dollar spent (was 5 the last time it was offered) Promo period is from 9-24 December You have to register every gift voucher purchased in order to be eligible...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

 

[kpro]

They really need to ditch the surcharges for things here in Australia. Just build it into the price like the rest of the world.

Unfortunately the ACCC and RBA explicitly allow surcharging for credit cards. They only ban 'excessive' surcharging but leave the definition of reasonable to be fairly open. I see many stores which still charge a blanket 50c for transactions on all card types.

With this being the case, any business big or small doesn't have much to lose by implementing a surcharge instead of wearing it or building it into their pricing.

 

[oz_mark]

Hopefully, with the NPP there'll be some options available, like PayTo.

 

[elanshin]

They really need to ditch the surcharges for things here in Australia. Just build it into the price like the rest of the world. In that way people who are silly and decide to pay with cash or BPay get penalized for doing so whilst I can enjoy the many benefits of using a credit card at a slightly subsidized cost.

-RooFlyer88

Hint, a lot of the places that don't charge "fees" already build it into their prices. Heck it's not CC surcharge they price in, its Afterpay and its 9%+.

 

[jpp42]

Encouraging unsophisticated internet users to actively assist in a browser hijack of their internet banking session in order to automate the transfer of money out of their bank accounts is an idea that should have never seen the light of day.

Unfortunately, this kind of thing is still happening. A mortgage broker wanted me to use a tool that would login to my online banking session (through a similar technique) in order to screen-scrape all my transactions. I refused and provided the statements manually; he then ghosted me (apparently he would have had to enter all the transactions manually into some system and it was just too much work for him.)