Lost to VA & why..... 10 years in the making

[juliusg]

Incinerate away - - but I was a potential QF Plat as of last Easter. Now I am Plat with VA solely on domestic flights. So why?

1. No confirmed upgrade internationally. UA did it for me heaps, but woah - VA still don't. Never mind, QF should, and so should VA.

2. Flipped out management. This matters to me a lot. What happens at QF is stranger than fiction. Refer Ian Verrender, today.

3. See above, and then consider staff engagement. Flew QF Perth - Syd in late winter and saw a clapped out culture. Prior, on regular flights, it was just us-against-them. And all big firms note, we The Customers know when YOU are not engaging THEM - our customer interface.

Folks, if you care for the Kangaroo, get the board booted. It may well be too late.

 

[tm.smile]

FWIW, while I may not fly as often as many others in this forum, every time I do step on a QF flight, I find that they always meet or exceed my expectations. I think that they have a very good hard product when compared with airlines around the world. As someone that self-funds their travel, I often find myself willing to pay the fare difference, as long as it is not exorbitantly much more.

Flew QF452 last night MEL-SYD and from the time I checked in, got a bite and drink to eat up at the Qantas Club, took the flight and landed in Sydney, I thought the whole experience was easy and thoroughly enjoyable. Staff were friendly, approachable and professional. Certainly there are many things that they could improve upon (we will always find something to complain about).

You post still doesn't explain why you've chosen to go over to VA though...

 

[Moopere]

QF is suffering the pain of being an old world legacy carrier. They almost need to go through a chapter 11 style reorganisation to have a hope of coming out fresh again .. a rebirth. To try and reinvent a huge legacy business (any business) is incredibly difficult as there are always entrenched interests at all levels, management and staff which will resist change to their own car in the 'gravy train'.

I find myself now rarely flying them except for Y domestic and even then, as soon as I get some decent status with VA I'll probably stop flying QF completely. I'm not petulant, I just gave away the idea of brand loyalty many years ago, to airlines, cars, home builders, insurers, banks .... decisions are now all now based upon "what are you doing for me today".

VA points burn, domestically at least is good. Their on-board J experience is not as good as QF's in general, but service delivery from bag drop to PB and beyond is reasonably consistent and decent. Full $ ticket pricing is still ridiculous as all domestic J is, but is more reasonable than QF. More humans involved, less machines (NGCI I'm looking at you!) , overall, good product that gives me satisfactory outcomes....

Internationally, QF has withdrawn from SE Asia, and some time ago, in favour of JQ - I'll never fly JQ, and there are few OW carriers working the region who's routing works well from PER. *A looms larger and larger as I give away doing inconvenient OW routing and will have less QFF points to burn as I migrate to VA anyway. Amex MR + VA partners mean that I can almost get away without any QFF points at all - the international game may change for me personally if MH does finally get themselves together and joins OW ... we're still waiting on that one though.

So, why should QF care? Well, not flying with them nearly as much, and soon probably not at all, but am migrating my FF accrual away from QFF as well. As we all know, QFF is where the real money is. If I'm alone in this QF of course won't notice at all, but if reasonable numbers of people start using VA more, and slowly moving their FF accrual over to them the impact on QF groups revenue will be substantial ... making real change even less likely as cash will be down.

 

[yo yo ma]

Flew QF Perth - Syd in late winter and saw a clapped out culture.

Have you flown coach domestic in America? You should do that if you really want to see "clapped out culture"

 

[nlagalle]

Having flown them almost every week for way too long, I can honestly say i believe the attitude of the Cabin crew in particular is on the up. the attitude politeness etc is noticeable. Personally I will still pick QF over VA as i think the onboard product is better. but that is IMHO

 

[ReLoad]

OP, I think its fair to say we certainly wouldn't flame you for making your own decision.
But why make the decision? is it based purely on poor management? did you have a bad experience? are John B's golf pants a better shade of Plaid than Alan J's?
Whatever it is none of us will judge you, but every decision like this has a reason behind it, what is yours?

I tried DJ, I tried them a lot when the Status match came around to give it a real good shake, and the concrete seats in whY (I pay for all my own travel) made my a$$ numb after an hour thus making the decision easy.

if only DJ flew a widebody from MEL-SYD............

 

[DrAndyC]

OP,
if only DJ flew a widebody from MEL-SYD............

They do / will.
Virgin Australia goes wide body on main Sydney-Mebourne run | Plane Talking

I have one booked on May 12th

 

[DrAndyC]

That said, I would not normally have flown Virgin, but have done / booked 11 sectors in the last 4.5 months in J / Y. The status matching, credit card 2 for 1, bonus points + status credits etc have all been a bonus...and their product is definitely improving +++. I do still prefer qantas most of the time... they are for me overwhelmingly consistent!

 

[pzworld]

People come, people leave, isn't that the nature course? I agree with 'Reload', anything is for a reason, i just haven't found one to leave Qantas yet.

 

[JohnK]

I would agree that Qantas is not delivering consistent service but the alternative, at least for me, is not as rosy as some people make it sound. And yes I have had first hand experience with and without status and would much rather prefer the inconsistent Qantas service.

Clearly a case of YMMV and not a case of one size fits all....