Qantas Oneworld phantom rewards

[MikeG]

I have spent literally days trying to get flights added to my Oneworld (RTW) booking that are available to book online on qantas.com but the telephone, SMS and chat operators at Qantas Customer Contact centres continue to tow the party line that these are phantom seats that cannot be added to my booking, that are due to lag with the partner airline systems.



and yet for the past three days these flights have been available on the qantas.com website.


The bookings are for two adults in economy and two adults in business, which as you can see are available with limitations on the qantas website (the limitation has only been available today by the way, so this points to the fact that the data is up to date, and its just that Qantas dont want to honour the full extent of a Oneworld reward ticket.

I am now left with a partial itinerary, due to a necessary change to our travel plans, and we must now either book these reward flights separately, or pay cash for flights.

Who else is finding this sort of behaviour with Qantas?

Note: I have raised a formal complaint to have this dealt with, but I'm unsure if this will find a resolution to this problem. Also note I have no problem with the change fee of 5000 points as this is a necessary and drastic change to our itinerary. Note the date cannot be changed on the first flight, as I have booked accommodation in MSY which is not refundable. We are also meeting a flight in ORD to LHR which I would rather not change.

I can get direct flights MSY-SFO and SFO-ORD with a Qantas partner fairly cheaply, but that is not the point... At what point do we get the ACCC involved?

M

 

[Ktan89]

It's strange but there are phantom availabilities on the website. I believe if you try booking a phantom flight online, when you get to the payment page, it will give you an error.
A few months ago i saw a flight HEL - LAX for 8th April and couldn't book it. Multiple agents me they couldn't see it either and it is still available on the website today!

 

[Ktan89]

Also.. im not sure what ACCC or complaining will get you, the award redemption is always based on flight availability..

 

[DC3]

Here’s what I do. Firstly, use aa.com (their USA site) to check for Milesaaver availability for the individual flights. If it’s greyed-out on the dates, then no award availability.

Then go to the QF award booking site to book, based on that.

Also, I find EF to be good for checking availability and for setting-up alerts.

Edit: Forget the ACCC

 

[MikeG]

It's strange but there are phantom availabilities on the website. I believe if you try booking a phantom flight online, when you get to the payment page, it will give you an error.
A few months ago i saw a flight HEL - LAX for 8th April and couldn't book it. Multiple agents me they couldn't see it either and it is still available on the website today!

I successfully booked phantom flights when qantas told me they were unavailable for a small leg of the journey, and so I went in and successfully booked them with points.
The issue is that qantas are knowingly misleading customers with these phantom flights. The ACCC investigates misleading conduct by retailers. Reward points are part of the price you pay for flights hence reward flights are part of the value they propose when you spend money with qantas. Misleading the public about what reward flights are available is hence Most likely to be in violation of the relevant act.

 

[MikeG]

Here’s what I do. Firstly, use aa.com (their USA site) to check for Milesaaver availability for the individual flights. If it’s greyed-out on the dates, then no award availability.

Then go to the QF award booking site to book, based on that.

Also, I find EF to be good for checking availability and for setting-up alerts.

Edit: Forget the ACCC

What is EF?

 

[DC3]

Also, it goes without saying really, but Alaska and WestJet are out of the equation. But you would be aware of that anyway.

 

[DC3]

What is EF?

EF = ExpertFlyer. You can get several free searches, but it’s a subscription site.

Edit: I find it useful. However, be guided by what you see on aa.com

 

[DC3]

According to aa.com, with MSY-LAX-SFO, there are at least 2 seats available as milesaaver awards in both classes.





When you call QF, get them to look at MSY-LAX and then LAX-SFO separately, and not just search MSY-SFO.

There could possibly be phantom availability on aa.com, but worth a try, as above.

Edit: Images updated

 

[DC3]

And, for 8/7/20 MSY-LAX-SFO, EF is currently showing 2 x U and 7 x T seats available, and you are after 2 of each.

 

[DC3]

It may be worth calling QF now, and trying again. Award availability seems to have been updated:

 

[Danger]

Here’s what I do. Firstly, use aa.com (their USA site) to check for Milesaaver availability for the individual flights. If it’s greyed-out on the dates, then no award availability.

Then go to the QF award booking site to book, based on that.

Also, I find EF to be good for checking availability and for setting-up alerts.

Edit: Forget the ACCC

EF = ExpertFlyer. You can get several free searches, but it’s a subscription site.

Edit: I find it useful. However, be guided by what you see on aa.com

Although it's unlikely to be the case here given AA flights are the ones in question, the AA website is notorious for displaying phantom availability, especially for QF and now even for CX.

And, for 8/7/20 MSY-LAX-SFO, EF is currently showing 2 x U and 7 x T seats available, and you are after 2 of each.

View attachment 190884

Remember, though, that award seats are no uniform across carriers. Viewing available seats on EF is a start, but it does not mean those seats will be available to members of another carrier's program.

 

[MikeG]

I just booked (online) MSY-LAX-SFO on 8 July 2020 as described above for 4xeconomy - 72000 points and about US$22 taxes. Proving that Qantas lied to me (again).

I'm going to go after them for compensation, and I really think they should be taken to task over lying to their customers. Surely this is somehow illegal to bait customers with proimise of points and availability, and then to switch to whatever they want to tell you with the excuse that they are "phantom fares".

I really would love a reason to rethink my switch away from Qantas for all future paid flights. But Qantas continue to give bad service and dodgy practices.

M

 

[DC3]

I just booked (online) MSY-LAX-SFO on 8 July 2020 as described above for 4xeconomy - 72000 points and about US$22 taxes. Proving that Qantas lied to me (again).

I'm going to go after them for compensation, and I really think they should be taken to task over lying to their customers. Surely this is somehow illegal to bait customers with proimise of points and availability, and then to switch to whatever they want to tell you with the excuse that they are "phantom fares".

I really would love a reason to rethink my switch away from Qantas for all future paid flights. But Qantas continue to give bad service and dodgy practices.

M

Very frustrating for you, although airlines do not necessarily allocate all their award seats equally across other carriers.

Did you call QF, today, regarding adding those seats to your OneWorld Award or had you had enough?

 

[MikeG]

Yes. I spent 12 hours on phone+chat yesterday and an hour thismorning over SMS. (the screenshot above from SMSes thismorning)

Maybe Qantas are banking on people valuing their time higher than the cost of tickets.

 

[MikeG]

Also.. im not sure what ACCC or complaining will get you, the award redemption is always based on flight availability..

The point is that Qantas consultants are either consistently & identically incompetent, or once a reward flight gets to a certain size, they are instructed to feign phantom flights to reduce exposure/cost to Qantas. In this case I have proven that what Qantas consistently told me about these flights being phantom is bollux (either that or I've just booked and paid taxes on phantom flights).

M

 

[levelnine]

I'm going to go after them for compensation

Please continue to update this thread on your progress. I'm always interested to hear how people go when seeking compensation for QF. My belief is that it is like extracting blood from a stone, but happy to hear tales to the contrary!

 

[mrsterryn]

Only cause I don't get it , why is Qantas at fault for not letting you book an AA rewards ?
Is AA not the likely carrier with the issue ?

Again this is a genuine question.

 

[MikeG]

Only cause I don't get it , why is Qantas at fault for not letting you book an AA rewards ?
Is AA not the likely carrier with the issue ?

Again this is a genuine question.

This issue is that they are advertised as available. And they are a selling point of the QFF programme which most of us buy into, spending our hard-earned $$$.

Its misleading conduct, which is usually frowned upon behaviour most retailers. Yes, even in the airline industry / rewards programme industry.

M

 

[mrsterryn]

This issue is that they are advertised as available. And they are a selling point of the QFF programme which most of us buy into, spending our hard-earned $$$.

Its misleading conduct, which is usually frowned upon behaviour most retailers. Yes, even in the airline industry / rewards programme industry.

M

But if AA says they are there and transmitting that to it's One World partners isn't it AA's issue or possible the over arching One World system for reward seats ?