My experience booking four round the world OneWorld reward flights with Qantas Reservations

[LA10]

Qantas really needs to train their staff that its not ok to hang up on customers.

Exactly what just happened to me. I waited to speak to someone for 90+ mins, then within 2 mins, she hung up on me...

 

[MikeG]

Exactly what just happened to me. I waited to speak to someone for 90+ mins, then within 2 mins, she hung up on me...

Welcome to the club. Persevere.

 

[LA10]

Sure am, 11:35pm at the moment...

 

[p--and--t]

Exactly what just happened to me. I waited to speak to someone for 90+ mins, then within 2 mins, she hung up on me...

Ah! That sounds familiar - I'm beginning to think some of the QF phone links are not configured properly.

Some phone networks have a timeout feature that if a certain signal is not received by the calling exchange within around 90 seconds from the receiving exchange answering the call, the call is automatically terminated. Was a common problem a few years back - called "drop out on answer" or something similar.

Maybe there is a phone network incompatibility problem with some of their overseas call centres?

 

[LA10]

And my perseverance paid off.

 

[MikeG]

After complaining via email to Qantas about the exclusion of flights, and having rules for the Oneworld Explorer ticket (not what I booked) thrown at me, I got a call from Qantas from some arrogant woman who said if I agreed to the booking, then it doesn't matter if Qantas made an error.

This woman made me furious with her "thats just bad luck for you" attitude, and its clear they never want me to pay for a Qantas flight ever again. This lady had an Australian accent, so is probably one of the Australian Customer Service people I'm guessing. She made alot of generalisations and assumptions without listening to the calls, and I'm glad I had the forethought to lodge an ACA complaint last week, to get this sorted out once and for all.

I spend in excess of 100,000 extra points to book the excluded flights on the qantas website the day after the initial booking was "completed" and she said because I didn't handle this over the phone, then there would be no refund for those flights.

If Qantas had come back to me, hat in hand and said it was a terrible mistake, and offered a token refund I would have jumped for it, but given they have no idea what they are doing and are hell bent on being a thorn in my side now, I will take this to the limit with the ombudsman, and I'll also consider contacting Virgin Australia with an offer to speak out about the poor customer service experienced with Qantas. Well done Qantas.

M