Qantas Call Centre Long Wait Times

My understanding (from unofficial sources) is that there is a pool of priority phone numbers that airport staff give to passengers which rotates every few weeks.

I will attempt to publish the currently active number(s) in this post:

1300 304 318
1300 659 161
1300 025 396
1300 659 116

1300 024 715
1300 025 390
1300 659 115
1300 659 134
1300 659 502

 

[Danger]

I just had the most amazing call with Air France - Australian office
Answering system started with "Sorry, longer wait time than usual ...." 3 min later someone answered.
I explained I wanted to select my seat, couldn't do it online.
Because their system is phone-number aware, she immediately ask me if this was for booking "xyz", I said yes. She asked to confirm it was for Mr and Mrs ChrisMars, I said yes. She then asked if it was for the HKG-CDG leg of the booking. I said yes. She asked if I wanted 3E-3F? I said yes, how do you know all that. She laugh. 30 seconds later the seats were allocated. Call duration: 6m 4s, including waiting time.

I have no status with AF.

Mirrors my experience almost to a tee (although, to be clear, I called about my reservation, not yours). I think the reason it's so much better, as least from a service perspective, is because it's a Singapore-based call centre.

 

[DC3]

… and it requires a special process …

Code, for having to correct someone’s laziness/incompetence/poor training.

 

[Wobijay]

My understanding (from unofficial sources) is that there is a pool of priority phone numbers that airport staff give to passengers which rotates every few weeks.

I will attempt to publish the currently active number(s) in this post:

1300 025 390 (confirmed to be active on 4 March 2022)
1300 024 715
1300 659 115
1300 659 134
1300 659 502
1300 304 318

The 390 number was picked up in less than 5 minutes!

 

[dylarr]

Great to see AFF querying Qantas on the disconnect issue but the response from Qantas PR is useless and frustrating. It seems like Qantas simply don't care about it and there is no intention of fixing this technical problem.

 

[paul66]

Waisted nearly a week trying to get a flight that I changed last week ticketed. Phoned every day with a long hold and then told it was now ticketed. Each time it never got ticketed. Hours of waiting, calls dropping our and was finally told by the call centre person that the change had been made incorrectly and the flight would need to be canceled and redone. She did this and all worked. Why did the the other four people I spoke to just tell me it was fixed when it was not? It seems as though they tell you the problem is fixed when they reach the point of knowing that they can't fix the problem. Also what is happening during these very long on hold times. Sometimes I was on hold for over 30 minutes. Are they waiting for help, or on another call or reading the instruction manual.

 

[BillW]

Can I add my ten cents to the litany?
Long story short, over 2 months ago booked and received QF e-Ticket for a 4 leg Rewards Points booking in U landing in SIN, CMB, DOH to DUB. But, since I made a CHANGE weeks ago, cancelling the original SIN-CMB flight and bringing it forward to an onward flight from SIN, both with Sri Lankan Air, have
1) never received an updated ticket
2) legs of the booking keep mysteriously disappearing
3) requiring countless calls to 131313
4) put on hold and the lines drop out
5) and/or am promised a call back that never happens
6) am promised my new ticket within 48 hours, resulting in my having to ring yet again because no ticket
7) bookings that were "confirmed" would still just vanish.
Today I got a well spoken young woman who, it turned out, was in South Africa, at 8.30am Sydney time. She asked me questions that no-one else had asked, like my passport, full name, place of birth, etc., saying it would be required for entry into Ireland (if I recollect). I hung on frequent times and was not cut off. Then she said the people she was trying to contact were always busy, could she ring me back? With trepidation I agreed and lo and behold she did, told me that all the flights were confirmed and my ticket was being issued. An email arrived with my new e-Ticket attached. Just like that. I fly out in 2 weeks.

 

[paul66]

Can I add my ten cents to the litany?
Long story short, over 2 months ago booked and received e-Ticket for a 4 leg Rewards Points booking in J landing in SIN, CMB, DOH to DUB. But, since I made a CHANGE, cancelling the original SIN-CMB flight and bringing it forward to an onward flight from SIN, both with Sri Lankan Air, have
1)never received an updated ticket

I have learnt through bitter experience that if you don't call back and get it ticketed (evidenced by an email) the flights will eventually cancel and you will not be told that the cancelation has happened. You may or most likely will not be able to find the reward seats again.

 

[Zanzara]

Interesting feedback about Mindpearl (who run QF overseas call centres more cheaply than they apparently can from Australia). This person is clearly a disgruntled employee but it may shed some light on the culture, employee motivation and employment rights of staff...

 

[Melburnian1]

Mattg in his otherwise excellent article said:

"...Calling customers back is also not a practical solution if the call drops out before a customer has even had a chance to speak to an operator..."

However some call centres I've dealt with, such as a share trading operator, an energy company and NSW TrainLink give a caller the option to request a callback instead of waiting. Seems to work well.

The best call centres give an estimate as to how long a callback is expected to take. This allows prospective passengers/users to undertake other tasks instead of having to have one's smartphone or landline within reach and on speakerphone for half a day.

 

[FlyingFiona]

However some call centres I've dealt with, such as a share trading operator, an energy company and NSW TrainLink give a caller the option to request a callback instead of waiting. Seems to work well.

The best call centres give an estimate as to how long a callback is expected to take. This allows prospective passengers/users to undertake other tasks instead of having to have one's smartphone or landline within reach and on speakerphone for half a day.

Qantas will do this, but in my experience only if the wait time is less than an hour.

 

[Melburnian1]

Interesting feedback about Mindpearl (who run QF overseas call centres more cheaply than they apparently can from Australia). This person is clearly a disgruntled employee but it may shed some light on the culture, employee motivation and employment rights of staff... View attachment 273355

While not a big fan of legislative remedies, and allowing for some hyperbole by the employee, how does this align with that 'Modern Slavery' corporate governance requirement for ASX-listed companies?

 

[support]

A data point from an administrator (me) who has a special number to ring when renewing Qantas Club memberships is that they even hang up on me. It has happened on a few occasions.

I have also noticed that the staff I talk to are far less knowledgeable than before COVID-19. The process often takes far longer than before.

 

[GlennT]

JAL unilaterally cancelled a partner award weeks ago, but Qantas appeared not to notice for some time, and a few days ago advised me by email of a 'schedule change' (5minutes) and gave me the option to Cancel on-line.
As this flight was now redundant I happily clicked Cancel. Got the acknowledgement it was indeed Cancelled.
Also got the "Due to the increased volume of requests....." line. This was not a rev.`` booking, and all they need to do is refund QFF points, and fees and taxes. Still waiting.
At this point it has passed being a call centre matter to a back office thing to be actioned.
It appears that lack of staff is not confined to call centres.

 

[Portsoft]

These staff members who are customer facing have some nerve to get shirty with customers. What other company requires customers to have to resort to finding alternative means of communicating with them because the first thing you hear when you call their normal number is "please don't call us"? They don't answer the phone, they don't respond on Twitter or email, so what are customers to do but try to find help on the internet? Disgraceful.

Unfortunately you still have to be nice to them because they may hang up on you and waste your opportunity to speak to an actual person, no matter how rude they may be. Thankfully nobody got shirty with me on where I got the priority number that @Scr77 gave me that's now pinned on this thread otherwise I might have lost it. And I try to be nice to customer service staff no matter how long I've waited, because it's (usually) not their fault their company's service infrastructure sucks - unless they are rude and make me feel like I'm inconveniencing them by calling.

Thankfully the guy I got after my 2nd call of the day using @Scr77 number was actually very helpful and it was obvious he cared enough to make the effort, and he promised to call me back if the call dropped out (it didn't). This was in contrast to the first guy who answered the phone which had gone to the 13 13 13 number where I waited 2 hours, ended up with someone who didn't even bother to introduce themselves and then put me on hold where I was disconnected after 20 mins >.<

Clearly they just don't care about their customer service

 

[Kezza21]

My understanding (from unofficial sources) is that there is a pool of priority phone numbers that airport staff give to passengers which rotates every few weeks.

I will attempt to publish the currently active number(s) in this post:

1300 025 390 (confirmed to be active on 4 March 2022)
1300 024 715
1300 659 115
1300 659 134
1300 659 502
1300 304 318

Also had a similar experience in waiting for 2 hours only to get through to the South African call centre. The individual did not understand my simple request and hung up on me. I did not get a call back. We then phoned again the next morning hoping to get a NZ or Australian call centre, but we sadly got the South African team again. And they hung up! Shocking lack of training and no customer service. They ask us to be respectful to their staff and they do that to their customers! We wrote and complained. Got a call back that day.

 

[Daver6]

Interesting feedback about Mindpearl (who run QF overseas call centres more cheaply than they apparently can from Australia). This person is clearly a disgruntled employee but it may shed some light on the culture, employee motivation and employment rights of staff... View attachment 273355

What strikes me in this is the comment that agents are expected to handle about 60 calls per day. If that's a KPI then it certainly explains why they would hang up on people. If the operator suspects that the call might take a bit of time to resolve, it would be in their interest to just hang up and move on to the next call in order to hit the KPI.

 

[RichieMann]

My understanding (from unofficial sources) is that there is a pool of priority phone numbers that airport staff give to passengers which rotates every few weeks.

I will attempt to publish the currently active number(s) in this post:

1300 025 390 (confirmed to be active on 4 March 2022)
1300 024 715
1300 659 115
1300 659 134
1300 659 502
1300 304 318

I have been calling the international toll free number every day for two weeks, I hold normally 2 hours then cut off, I got through on Saturday 1.hour 22 minute wait, spoke to agent to link my booking number wife my wife's, I sked agent to select seats together I have her seat numbers after 25 minutes she told me all sorted, I am now at Jakarta airport enroute to Sydney via Singapore , booking reservation not linked and we are not sitting together on Singapore - Sydney flight, I'm pissed off, I'll get to Singapore and try and sort this out, I'm lifetime gold member after this recent experience Qantas have lost my trust just been a nightmare

 

[exLXCXFF]

May I ask for some advice please?

I have a cash booking via Qantas (on QF flight#) on Emirates. We have 3 people on this ticket.

1) We need to change the date for going back (incl a stop over now iN DXB);
2) One passenger will fly out of SYD at a different date now than the other two.

Given feedback above, would you agree that:
a) I cancel the old ticket for 3 pax completely; and
b) make two separate new bookings; and
c) don’t bother to go through the call centre to try to get these changes done?

Also, if I get a credit voucher for the overall booking, can I use that voucher for the two separate new bookings? Neither of them will be more expensive than the old booking but actually less of course. Is that a problem?

 

[samh004]

I have been calling the international toll free number every day for two weeks, I hold normally 2 hours then cut off, I got through on Saturday 1.hour 22 minute wait, spoke to agent to link my booking number wife my wife's, I sked agent to select seats together I have her seat numbers after 25 minutes she told me all sorted, I am now at Jakarta airport enroute to Sydney via Singapore , booking reservation not linked and we are not sitting together on Singapore - Sydney flight, I'm pissed off, I'll get to Singapore and try and sort this out, I'm lifetime gold member after this recent experience Qantas have lost my trust just been a nightmare

Might not yield a satisfactory response, but I'd write an email to [email protected] and CC [email protected]. If your email is clear, concise and – granted, hard right now – not full of emotion and rude words, you're more likely to get a response that might appease you somewhat, but I wouldn't expect the response to be that they're going to bring all call centres back to Australia, for example.

 

[Rhode]

Just got off the phone after 2hours 30mins exactly to make changes on 1 PNR. The person I was talking to had no clue what she was doing and kept putting me on hold but surprisingly she never hanged up the phone. She kept saying she couldn't see the seats available but I was 100% certain it's not a phantom award. After 2 hours, she agrees to put her team leader on and this team leader was RUDE A F. Anyway, they were able to find the seats and she said she requested it and submitted it to ticketing.. I don't even think she did it. I tried to ask her to push the ticketing through but she said no. She asked if there was anything else they can do for me which I replied yes, I have to make another change on another PNR. She straight away replied, telling me that I have to call the reservations line again. I told her what, I have never heard of this before. She goes "yup, because you want to make another change on a different PNR you have to call back. Thank you, good bye" and hangs up on me. But she didnt hang up and put me on hold instead for another 5mins, then I hear noises and then the line disconnects.
This is complete rubbish from the Qantas Centre, they really need to monitor their staff and this is coming from a Team Leader...

Same happened to me - call disconnected .. I was trying to book a first class ticket to London. Gave up on them and used a different airline.