Monumental Stuff up by Qantas

[Jack_OC]

DOB and middle name aren’t needed for a booking. So saying it couldn’t be completed because of this is a furphy. Absolutely you would assume the booking has been completed from the information given over the phone and then email received reflecting as such.

Actually, DOB is sometimes required. The requirements vary by country - for example I believe DOB is now required to book any flight to/from or within the USA. There might also be specific policies imposed by certain airlines. I have no particular knowledge of the rules that might apply in the OP's case, but I just tried a dummy booking on the IB website and it states that DOB is a required field. As such, I have no trouble believing that the booking could not be completed without this information.

Anyway, I agree that most people would assume the booking had been completed if they received an email to that effect. My point was that I do not see how anyone could assume that the booking was completed in the absence of a confirmation email, especially if the only correspondence that they did receive stated that further information was required to complete the booking.

It now seems that the OP did in fact receive a confirmation email, but I wasn't aware of that until she said so last night (her initial summary of events did not mention that, and QF doesn't normally issue confirmation emails until flights are ticketed, so my previous comments were based on the understanding that no confirmation email was sent).

 

[BudgetFly]

I was left standing at a QANTAS check-in desk in Singapore with my daughter (then 9) holding a printed out QANTAS booking for onward flights back to Australia. I had booked months prior and provided a credit card which had been rejected and accordingly e-tickets were never issued. Of course I learnt my lesson big time and now triple check everything BUT if QANTAS had sent me an email or any kind of notification that my payment had failed then I would have fixed it. Can't help wondering why QANTAS don't do this? Even if an automated advice: "Your booking has been cancelled for the following reason.... please contact....".

 

[blaz]

I didn't receive an e-ticket at the time (only realised that when l looked for it after l got out of Cuba) just the booking confirmation. It didn't alert me to anything at the time as l had received other communication from them in the following days requesting that l finalise the booking which l did and to me it looked like a confirmed booking. Especially when they send an email alerting me to a time change. I probably wasn't keeping an eye on everything as I was travelling at the time and had booked 3 other award flights that day (not via Qantas). So, l registered receiving the booking confirmation and that was it. As for the 24hr ordeal at Havana airport l know that's got nothing to do with Qantas (apart from the fact that I wouldn't have been there if they'd done their job properly in the first place) but I'm needing to vent I don't expect anything in that regard but I'd like them to acknowledge the stuff up and help me to get reimbursed for the extra expense of the replacement ticket.
I'd stupidly swapped the last of my Euros earlier that day. I will definitely make sure I'm loaded with cash in the future especially in Cuba.

I log into my account with Qantas to keep an eye on "my bookings"...this alerts me to any changes in flight times etc. I suspect that if Qantas had cancelled it, it would not be seen there, and this would alert you to a possible problem.

 

[Josan55]

1. No QFF points were deducted for the flight. This had to be a red flag that something was wrong! I check my balance each month to ensure points deducted and given are as they should particularly if I have booked an award flight.
2. No credit card payment was made. This had to be a red flag that something was wrong!
3. An e-ticket was not issued. Without a ticket you cannot travel. This had to be a red flag that something was wrong.

This is a case of a naive passenger not understanding what was going on. Three red flags and it is Qantas' fault? No this was clearly the passenger fault.

Would you travel to Cuba without a return ticket?

 

[Jack_OC]

Especially if you checked on Trip It and the booking was there.

Be careful with TripIt - it doesn't check that your bookings remain active/unchanged. It simply loads up the info you provide in the first place, and then checks for changes to the relevant flights - not changes to your booking. To give an example - if you are booked on a particular flight, and the flight is delayed or cancelled, TripIt will notify you about that. However, it will not notify you if your booking is changed - for example if you are moved onto a different flight - or if your booking is cancelled altogether.

I use TripIt and find it very useful, but it's important to be aware of what it does and does not monitor for you, or you risk being lulled into a false sense of security.

The MyFlights App used to be great, as it monitored for changes in bookings across many different airlines, and even picked up things like changes in seat assignments. Unfortunately, it has been discontinued.

Checkmytrip does update when changes are made, but only for bookings made via Amadeus. This is potentially highly confusing for lay people, as checkmytrip will display details of bookings made in systems other than Amadeus (just like TripIt does), but it will not update them if they are changed. This means that people can only trust that info on checkmytrip is current if they know for sure that the booking was made using Amadeus.

TripCase does a similar job to checkmytrip, but for bookings made with Sabre (e.g. VA), and the same limitation applies.

Long story short - check the booking on the website of the operating airline if at all possible.

 

[tomo69]

Yet another reason I ditched Qantas, their sheer arrogance.

 

[BudgetFly]

1. No QFF points were deducted for the flight. This had to be a red flag that something was wrong! I check my balance each month to ensure points deducted and given are as they should particularly if I have booked an award flight.
2. No credit card payment was made. This had to be a red flag that something was wrong!
3. An e-ticket was not issued. Without a ticket you cannot travel. This had to be a red flag that something was wrong.

This is a case of a naive passenger not understanding what was going on. Three red flags and it is Qantas' fault? No this was clearly the passenger fault.

Would you travel to Cuba without a return ticket?

I agree and I have learnt the hard way to be more attentive to what pieces of ticketing paper I may have particularly in a foreign country. I think it would be really helpful of QANTAS if they would notify the customer when a booking was cancelled. That would get my attention! And in a previous case of refused credit card payment I would have fixed it pronto. You would think it would be good business practice to chase prospective customers when their booking has failed in an effort to get their business. Anyways, once something like this happens it is a lesson well learned!

 

[Jack_OC]

I agree and I have learnt the hard way to be more attentive to what pieces of ticketing paper I may have particularly in a foreign country. I think it would be really helpful of QANTAS if they would notify the customer when a booking was cancelled. That would get my attention! And in a previous case of refused credit card payment I would have fixed it pronto. You would think it would be good business practice to chase prospective customers when their booking has failed in an effort to get their business. Anyways, once something like this happens it is a lesson well learned!

I totally agree with this. I have (intentionally) cancelled bookings with both QF and VA recently, but I received no confirmation of the cancellation from either of them. In both cases I requested a refund, rather than a credit voucher. I phoned up VA about it, as in that case a cancellation fee was payable, and I needed evidence of that so I could claim it on my expenses. The person I spoke to acted as if my request was a strange one, that she had never come across before. I didn't phone QF as I received a full refund so I didn't need anything else from them, but that doesn't change my view that they should have sent a confirmation.

The biggest concern here for me is that someone who has a ticket could find that their booking is cancelled by someone else, without them knowing about it. This is another reason why it's important to check your own bookings online on a regular basis, but I don't understand why QF/VA don't send out cancellation confirmations as a matter of course.

 

[Le Clair]

Terrible experience but I am left wondering if the OP "actually" knew what was going on but was hoping to get something for nothing. Sometimes it "looks" as if you have scored a freebie and you want to believe it, but at the last moment, whatever looked like a freebie, vanishes.
Last year I made a paid J booking to the USA. I also consulted a travel agent to quote on the same itinerary. The travel agent was more expensive than the online Qantas companion special.
Lo and behold an few weeks later, a "second" booking appeared in my FF account. Identical itinerary, identical flights, different booking reference. I could even assign seats to the phantom booking on both the QF and AA sectors.
I did, for a moment, consider cancelling the paid seats and getting a refund but thought better of it, even though the itinerary showed "confirmed" in the flight status.
The morning of departure, both bookings were still there, so thought that I might get two boarding passes and give one to someone who a FA deemed deserved it.
Arrived at BNE for check-in got a boarding pass for the paid booking then gave the Booking Reference for the second. "Sorry", I was told, "I can't see that booking reference in the system".
Had I have relied on the fact that the "phantom" booking looked real (except than no e-ticket had ever been issued or money taken from any source that I had) I would have been in an identical situation.
Check, check, and recheck and if in doubt call the Arline if even the slightest detail it out of order. It is EXTREMELY rare for an airline to make a mistake.

 

[bPeteb]

Terrible experience but I am left wondering if the OP "actually" knew what was going on but was hoping to get something for nothing. Sometimes it "looks" as if you have scored a freebie and you want to believe it, but at the last moment, whatever looked like a freebie, vanishes.

What a strange question and post after seven pages of fairly detailed discussion and explanation. Something for nothing? A freebie? Wow.

 

[Flying mermaid]

DOB and middle name aren’t needed for a booking. So saying it couldn’t be completed because of this is a furphy. Absolutely you would assume the booking has been completed from the information given over the phone and then email received reflecting as such.

I have had two cases where Qantas couldn’t ticket until it had this info. Both times it was for USA flights and I was told it was a requirement from the USA. You wouldn’t have thought that would apply to Cuba but who knows.

Huge sympathy for OP - unfortunately it is a learning curve. I never assume the booking is complete until I have an actual ticket. When I booked award flights for Ms FM’s honeymoon, I needed to add on the MEl-CBR leg after the original booking. It took 8 months and numerous phonecalls before it was reticketed, but I didn’t feel safe until it happened. They kept promising it would be done but it wasn’t.

Definitely sloppy on Qantas’ part, but it’s pretty much what I expect from all airlines, so I check things repetitively.

 

[Jack_OC]

The morning of departure, both bookings were still there, so thought that I might get two boarding passes and give one to someone who a FA deemed deserved it

Seriously? You thought they might give out two boarding passes - both in your name - and that some random person might be allowed to fly to the USA (in J, no less), using a boarding pass that has your name on it?

Arrived at BNE for check-in got a boarding pass for the paid booking then gave the Booking Reference for the second. "Sorry", I was told, "I can't see that booking reference in the system".

If you really did attempt to check in for the phantom booking immediately after checking in for the real one, I'm genuinely surprised that didn't open a whole can of worms, leading to some fairly direct questioning about what exactly you were up to.

 

[RealRick]

Hi All,

I'm needing some advice and moral support in dealing with a monumental stuff up by Qantas. It's a long story but I'll keep it as brief as possible (but will be venting a bit as well).

- 18th Sept 2017 :l made a call to Qantas FF Customer Support to make an award booking using QFF points. I already had the itinerary and availability found for me by QFF Flyer Solutions. The call lasted 1hr 15mins and resulted in an award booking in J from HAV - MAD - LIS flying Iberia.

- 24th Sept 2017: l receive an email asking me to provide more information via a link to complete my booking.
I go to the link and provide the required info.

- 4th Jan 2018: l receive an email from Qantas quoting my booking number telling me that there is a 25min time change to the above-mentioned award flight.

- 1st May 2018: I arrive at the Havana airport for my above-mentioned flight to be told that I have no booking. After talking with supervisors etc they offer me a J seat for US$5,200 which was WAAAAY above the ticket price. A Y seat was US$2,400 (more than a normal J ticket). It didn't matter anyway as, after trying everything possible, they couldn't process the payment on my CC.

So begins the nightmare. I spent the next 6 hours with no money (was down to my last 10CUC - I was leaving the country, why would I hang on to currency that is totally useless elsewhere and can't be exchanged outside of Cuba), no food, no water, no Wi-Fi, no phone, no communication with friends and family, language barrier, no where to stay and no-one with enough English to really understand the situation.
I queued 3 times (approx 20 mins each time) to try different cards in the ATM at the airport and got no cash each time (2 were cards with no affiliation with the US - they don't accept US cash or cards in Cuba). Money changers didn't want to know me. Taxi drivers hounded me until they found out I had no money then ignored me. In my dealings with the Iberian/Cuban government airline staff (who were as helpful as they could be seeing as it was no fault of theirs) I had to visit 3 different levels of the airport several times. Not one elevator or escalator in the entire airport was working. The reason I go to great lengths to fly business class in the first place is due to a back injury, spinal fusion and the inability to sit for any length of time without extreme pain and discomfort. Lugging my suitcase up and down the stationary escalators just killed my back.
The whole time it was dawning on me that I was going to be sleeping in the Havana airport hungry and thirsty, knowing that the next day would still bring the same problems : no money, no food, no water, no communication and no flight out.
Cutting it short again, one of the Iberian check-in staff took me to her elderly neighbours house at 2am where I stayed until the next morning. The airline checkin staff then came and got me and took me to her house. Then later took me to a remote park where you could get wifi. I called my sister in Melbourne in the middle of the night and asked if she could book me a flight from there. It took her all night (and she easily spoke to 30 people in Madrid) before she could lock in a flight. But, they couldn't accept payment from an Australian credit card (it didn't stop them putting a hold on her cc for TWO tickets that wasn't removed for 2 weeks but that's another story). At 7am she woke up a travel agent friend in NSW and got her on the case. Long story short she got me a ticket and was able to pay for it 2hrs before the flight (24hrs after my original flight).

I ended up paying $2,250.00 for Y seat. That is more than the price for a J seat on that same flight normally. So, after 24 traumatic hours in Havana airport I paid out a business class price to sit for 9 hours in economy (on the 1st leg of the flight) with FOUR crying babies who managed to set each other off constantly the whole way. I was in agony with my back and didn't get a wink of sleep on the overnight flight. I know Qantas doesn't give a flying rats about any of this and I do apologise for going on and on but this is a major stuff up and I need to vent.

Anyway, I have contacted Qantas several times in the last month via email and got the standard responses. I was overseas until 4 days ago and the 30min wait time any time I tried to call them from o/s was too long so I let it go until I got back. So, today, I finally spoke to them and their side of the story is:

1. When I booked online I neglected to give them important details (my middle name and DOB). I told them I didn't book online but booked on the phone in a 1hr 15min phone call. They said the info should've been taken by the person making the award booking. It wasn't. Not my fault.

2. They said when they realised that they hadn't asked me for the important information they sent me an email asking for it. They did send me an email and I followed the link and updated the info. They say it didn't get up dated on the website. Not my fault. A glitch in their system.

3. They say they sent several emails and made phone calls over the following couple of months requesting the information. I received none of them. I am happy for them to check with my internet server. Not my fault. A glitch in their system.

4. They said that when they hadn't heard from me by the end of October/November (not exactly sure when) 2017 they cancelled my booking. I asked them why they sent me an update to my flight time in January 2018. They said that it was an automated email. Wouldn't you only get an automated email like that if it was connected to a LIVE booking??? A glitch in their system.
PS - Iberia said they had never even received a booking from Qantas in the first place.

5. Qantas Customer Care say that on their end they have done everything possible. (Apart from neglect to tell me that I didn't have a booked flight out of Havana).

6. I have checked since and the points were not deducted from my FF account. I didn't notice at the time of booking as I was travelling and had booked several award flights that day from different accounts and didn't bother keeping up with points etc. I just assumed that if you had booked a flight on the phone and someone told you it was all booked that it was all booked.

7. At the moment they are putting it to someone higher up and there is a possibility that they will provide me with a letter so can claim the cost of the replacement ticket from my travel insurance. What I have to say here will probably stop my post from being posted so I won't say it.

It will take a few days for this discussion to happen and I know already that I'm going to be majorly gob-smacked at the pathetic-ness of their final resolution.

This has gone on longer than I expected so thank you to anyone who has made it down to here.

So, any suggestions, ideas would be greatly appreciated. Has anyone had something similar?

Is going to the ACA an option?

Thanks in advance

Qantas did the same think to me with a Perth to Aba Dhabi flight on Qatar. I was lucky and decided to cancel the fligh. When I called was informed that the fight had been cancelled shortly after booking. Their excuses was a new phone operator in a new, New Zealand booking room. I pursued the matter and asked what would have happened if we had arrived at the airport with no booking at the beginning of a 5 week holiday.
At first they didn’t want to know but I kept asking it to be escalated and finally they gave me 20000 points.
Cold comfort if I was in your position.
All the best

 

[DrAndyC]

Reminds me of the time I was 24 hours before my qantas award flight, BA business Toronto-London, and it hadn't been ticketed despite points removed from my account 11 months earlier. I spent about well over 40 minutes trying to get through (on their platinum line) from North America to sort it out. The qantas agent was surprised the booking actually had been held despite non-ticketing and that it wasnt in fact cancelled.

 

[Le Clair]

Seriously? You thought they might give out two boarding passes - both in your name - and that some random person might be allowed to fly to the USA (in J, no less), using a boarding pass that has your name on it?



If you really did attempt to check in for the phantom booking immediately after checking in for the real one, I'm genuinely surprised that didn't open a whole can of worms, leading to some fairly direct questioning about what exactly you were up to.

Sorry, not what I meant at all!
I had zero expectation of the phantom booking being real, which is why I retained the paid seat. I was demonstrating that strange bookings that are not real, can appear as bookings in your account. The OP who started this thread, may have seen a booking from HAV to MAD which wasn't real as I saw what looked like a booking from BNE to LAX which looked real right up to the point of check-in, which is where the OP got into trouble. Just like the OP, I also received schedule changes from Qantas for the booking that didn't exist.
No e-ticket + no payment (points or cash) = no boarding pass even if the booking is showing as confirmed in the Qantas website.
While odd, there is nothing preventing anyone from booking two seats on the same flight.
I wasn't suggesting that any "random person" might be allowed to fly, I was suggesting that had the phantom booking been, in fact, real, that I would have offered it to the FA's to upgrade someone who was already seated in Y or PY, of their choosing, to J as I would have had no use for it. Nothing more than a thought about what I would have done in that situation.

 

[agentgerko]

As a TA I am continually surprised by how many people book something weeks or months before travel but then don't check anything until they're walking out their front door, or in this case until they're actually at their destination. I don't mean to sound superior, but I travel with wads of copied emails and confirmations as proof of everything I've booked and/or paid for. I carry at least two credit cards and one debit card to have access to some money if I get stuck. I have an annual comprehensive travel insurance policy. And I double or triple check everything every couple of weeks from the date I began booking to the date I arrive back in Oz. And this is just on domestic travel or to simple places like Singapore or Hong Kong. I don't know how someone could not notice they'd been charged no points and no dollars on a trip of that importance and over a period of nearly a year. I wouldn't dream of visiting somewhere like Cuba with as few safeguards as this traveller. You might call it cough. I call it cautious.

 

[BorisWood]

While I have a lot of sympathy for the traveler, I agree with many of the above posts that they should have checked all flights before travelling.

As soon as I have made a booking I go to the Manage my Booking section on the Qantas (or other airline) website to check the details and to select my seats if available. After that, I log on at least monthly to check for any changes. Over the years there have been changes to flight times, cancelled flights and changes to aircraft which meant my carefully selected seats were no longer valid. Often these were not advised by the airline.

Also, it is often a requirement to have e-ticket copies to show to check-in staff and customs and immigration as proof of onward or return flights.

Even with all that, we had a bad experience with Jetstar when we turned up to check in to go from Sydney to Osaka only to be told the flight was cancelled. They had our contact details but didn't advise us. To their credit that paid for a night in Sydney and meals and got us on the same flight next day.

 

[N860CR]

I dare say 99% of the traveling public wouldn't know what "ticketing" means. They've made the booking (on the phone no less), handed over their credit card details, been given a reservation number, been sent a reservation confirmation and even sent schedule changes months later.

If you're not a regular Qantas customer, you wouldn't know that the reservation confirmation sent by the airline isn't a ticket. And you wouldn't know that you will receive another email with a ticket attached. Unless I'm mistaken, at no point on the Qantas manage my booking page does it tell you if your booking has been ticketed (and doesn't show a ticket number). I could be wrong here?

When I was flying Qantas regularly, I'd often have 10-15 Qantas purchases on my credit card monthly. My points balance would also fluctuate a lot. I dare say I'd have missed the fact that the points weren't taken, and that the charge hadn't been processed.

I've had this drama with Qantas before in regards to Qatar bookings. I've had to push and push and push to get the ticket issued ASAP and the staff seemingly have no idea about the issues with ticketing delays on QR bookings. In this day and age, it's not really acceptable for a booking to not ticket at the time of purchase. This would mean the operator would have picked up on their error at the time of the ticket sale.

Dealing with Qantas customer service is a nightmare. I really don't envy you right now!

 

[justin23]

The kindness of the locals lady and the check in girl was overwhelming. I was very lucky otherwise it could've been a very ugly night for a young (57yo) girl like me.
It's the first time I've redeemed a flight with QFF and I'll be triple checking everything next time. I never want to end up in that situation again.
Apart from that I'd had an amazing 4 weeks travelling around Cuba.

I went to Cuba in 2016 and all I worried about was having enough money. So much so, I found an ATM in Havana that would dispense cash on one of my cards and noted the location. I figured worst case scenario a taxi would take me there and I could get cash. I also made sure I hade euros left over as I could easily change them back at home or use them on my next trip.

Of course rechecking flights is also something I do and you should be able to see all the one world bookings when you log onto your frequent flyer account.

Anyway I'd argue that Qantas probably stuffed up to some degree, but it was avoidable also. That said I'm very well travelled and I always take precautions, even as I write this from Riga in Latvia, a fairly easy place to get around, I have about 100 Euros in cash I'm trying to not use, just in case. However, I've met other intrepid travellers who feel everything will work out eventually and ing it far too much for my liking! I'm sure you were, however, thinking everything was fine and planned.

I was detained in China once and I know you don't think straight and just take whatever option it is to get out of there, but you probably could have flown to Panama city cheaper and then looked at onward flights to Madrid perhaps.

I'm not sure you'll get much out of Qantas, because it should have been clear to you there was no ticket issued. Anyway, I hope over time you'll look back at the whole situation as an experience and maybe even laugh about it. I know I do with some of my more horrific experiences over the years. Now I better get going I'm off to the bus station to go to Tallinn and worried my online ticket purchase may have issues as I can't print it out!

 

[Kremmen]

As a TA I am continually surprised by how many people book something weeks or months before travel but then don't check anything until they're walking out their front door, or in this case until they're actually at their destination.

I don't find it surprising at all. It's not what I would do, but it doesn't surprise me. Airlines have been telling customers ever since the advent of e-tickets that we don't need to reconfirm anything.

I disagree, I think it makes all the difference. Why on earth would any airline send anyone a schedule change notification for a flight they're not on? To the layperson (or even an experienced traveller), it makes perfect sense to receive information related to a booking you have made.

This, to me, is the biggest issue. I'm used to checking bookings every few months, because I'm used to airlines changing schedules and equipment every quarter. (... or more frequently -- looking at you, TG!) The most common issue is that airlines don't bother to tell you if there's a cancellation or change. However, if an airline does send a schedule change notification, it's entirely reasonable that the recipient would then not check the web site.

It also makes me very dubious of Qantas' whole position. If the schedule change notification went through fine, how did the "several emails" requesting the information (that they should have asked on the phone if they needed it) happen to all go missing? Maybe they were never sent? (I'd be asking for the dates/times/headers of the emails. Maybe someone used the wrong email address?) And for Qantas to say they cancelled the booking at some unknown date without notification, yet still provided schedule change notification? That's just inviting disaster and should never happen.