Qantas Promises to Fix Ongoing Reward Flight Ticketing Failures

[encryptededdy]

That really is quite shocking at the Platinum level! I guess they are more interested in paying their CEO's millions of dollars than keeping their customers happy even those who are truly frequent flyers like yourself!

Before they made this change the wait time was about ~15-20 minutes, so I reckon someone got a KPI or something based on average time to answer call, not realising (or more likely not caring) that the experience for customers is significantly worse with the outsourced call centres.

 

[dgoody2]

It seems fair to say, 18 months later, Qantas's promise never eventuated.

The problem is the way they have implemented the “fix”. It’s very manual and relies on complex understanding of the GDS, different partner airline policies and ticketing time limits etc. Unsurprisingly when Qantas outsourced its contact centres and moved the International ticketing team from BNE to the Phillipines all this knowledge was lost…and now we have a ticketing mess.

 

[dgoody2]

Ha this is very apt as I'm currently on hold for the third time trying to sort through my added infant not being ticketed (whilst showing in the app). If it wasn't for seeing the issue through this forum I would have had 3 International Flights in the last 12 months screwed because of Qantas' ticketing team not doing their one job of processing tickets.

Had the exact same problem flying on a CR Qantas issued ticket. Each of JAL, Finnair and British Airways had the issue. The status in Amadeus was not set to “OK” meaning boarding passes could not be issued. It took each of the check in agents off those airlines significant time on the phone to the Oneworld helpdesk to get Qantas to correctly ticket…so poor

 

[tuck]

@AFF Editor
Your article is quite timely. I was about to reach out to you with a horror story which Qantas has been quite dismal at even acknowledging any issues. In short, I spent over 30 hours on the phone with Qantas making a One World business class redemption booking (which is almost a Unicorn these days) and had my flights cancelled multiple times by Malaysian Airlines, Japan Airlines and Sri Lankan Airways. I had Qantas staff call me a liar, I had incorrect details provided to me by staff (one staff member, and a supervisor, insisted tickets were only valid from 12 months from date of initial ticket issue, which is incorrect given it is actually 12 months from first date of departure).

Given I had a similar experience with my last 2 bookings, this time I recorded dates, times and names of all conversations to provide to Qantas and the only conclusion I can reach after going through the complaints process, and then emailing incoming Chairman John Mullen, is all of the media hype and promises made by the new CEO and the incoming Chairman John Mullen are disingenuous!

I worked for Qantas for 3 years, most of that time in Telesales in the Brisbane office, so I am more familiar than most with the processes and procedures of booking and issuing frequent flyer tickets.

I would love to connect with you Matt and share my experience to see if there is anyway you are able to assist in getting Qantas to take my complaint seriously. I have written a media release and am ready to fire on all cylinders, including making enquiries into a class action given the serious misconduct of some staff and the inability of Qantas to issue eTKT receipts with the correct amounts paid (my last eTKT shows I have paid $0 in taxes when in fact I have paid almost $2000) - surely that is bordering in fraudulent behaviour.

Anyway, I hope you are able to assist or give some guidance if you are able to review my complaint to Qantas.

Thanks
Sonja

please let me know when you are starting the class action and I will join you.

 

[Flightseeker]

Just happened to me. Changed a booking yesterday to add flights to our RTW (in progress booking) and what do I see, ADL-KUL on Malaysian has disappeared.. No award availability either. Someone else now has our seats. And the auto reply from escalations, "we are prioritising by departure date". Will I be waiting 11 months for an answer? This happened before abut two years ago and the flights were not re-instated. And Qantas is wondering why I am abandoning their scam UNREWARDS program.

 

[muppet]

Just happened to me. Changed a booking yesterday to add flights to our RTW (in progress booking) and what do I see, ADL-KUL on Malaysian has disappeared.. No award availability either. Someone else now has our seats. And the auto reply from escalations, "we are prioritising by departure date". Will I be waiting 11 months for an answer? This happened before abut two years ago and the flights were not re-instated. And Qantas is wondering why I am abandoning their scam UNREWARDS program.

The escalations email is a bit lax on replies, but give them a week or so.

In my case in 8 days they’d negotiated with MH and found a solution (however I had found alternatives before).

By monitoring the booking you will see they are working on options.

I know it is stressful if its an important trip, but give them a chance at fixing it.

 

[drron]

A warm welcome @sonjabella71. Great to have you aboard. Quite amazing that you as a former employee in the BNE call centre get the run around from the new staff who try and tell you things that are so obviously false.

 

[sonjabella71]

A warm welcome @sonjabella71. Great to have you aboard. Quite amazing that you as a former employee in the BNE call centre get the run around from the new staff who try and tell you things that are so obviously false.

Thanks for the welcome Unfortunately it's become more and more frustratingly difficult to get Telesales staff who actually know what they are doing!

 

[kangarooflyer88]

This may or not belong here, but I was booked on a classic reward for MH128 this coming Saturday that was cancelled by MH. Because it was a change by Malaysia, they rebooked me. Except to depart from Sydney instead.

Presumably you could’ve booked your own flight to Sydney in business then just bill Malaysia for the cost of the ticket. You’d also earn status credits and points on this award ticket. Remember Malaysia is on the hook for up to $7,000 USD in damages when they cause disruptions like this under the Montreal Convention

 

[Mattg]

Presumably you could’ve booked your own flight to Sydney in business then just bill Malaysia for the cost of the ticket. You’d also earn status credits and points on this award ticket. Remember Malaysia is on the hook for up to $7,000 USD in damages when they cause disruptions like this under the Montreal Convention

I find it very unlikely MH would agree to pay those costs after the fact. Certainly not without a fight, and I find it a bit disingenuous that you suggest this as a strategy to earn points and SCs on an award ticket.

Sorry, but I don’t think this is particularly helpful advice for most people reading this forum.

 

[BD1959]

@AFF Editor

I would love to connect with you Matt and share my experience to see if there is anyway you are able to assist in getting Qantas to take my complaint seriously.
<snip>
Anyway, I hope you are able to assist or give some guidance if you are able to review my complaint to Qantas.

Thanks
Sonja

I do hope that AFF is able to leverage its self-proclaimed role in assisting Qantas in getting your problem resolved - please keep us in the loop on the the take-up from AFF.

Regards,

BD

 

[sonjabella71]

I do hope that AFF is able to leverage its self-proclaimed role in assisting Qantas in getting your problem resolved - please keep us in the loop on the the take-up from AFF.

Regards,

BD

Thanks BD. I am new to this forum, so not sure how long it takes for a response. So far I haven't heard from Matt. The bottom of the article states "You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor " so hopefully I will hear something soon. Will keep you posted for sure.

 

[Danger]

I do hope that AFF is able to leverage its self-proclaimed role in assisting Qantas in getting your problem resolved - please keep us in the loop on the the take-up from AFF.

Regards,

BD

Despite its proclamations, AFF wasn't able to get it done 20 months ago. The problems at Qantas leave me little hope AFF will be successful this time.

Over the past year or so, many Qantas Frequent Flyer members have lost their Classic Flight Reward bookings for travel on partner airlines due to Qantas' failure to get the bookings ticketed (or re-issued) on time.

This is something AFF has been in regular contact with Qantas about over recent months. The good news is that Qantas has now taken some concrete steps to fix this problem, which you can read about here:

Qantas Fixes Ongoing Reward Flight Ticketing Failures

Qantas is taking concrete steps to ensure Classic Flight Reward tickets are issued and re-issued correctly in the future.

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

If you have a ticketing issue relating to a Classic Flight Reward booking, you'll be able to escalate this by emailing a dedicated support team from midday today.

You can leave a comment or discuss this topic below.

 

[RooFlyer]

Despite its proclamations, AFF wasn't able to get it done 20 months ago. The problems at Qantas leave me little hope AFF will be successful this time.

I don't see any proclamations there that AFF "would get it done". They contacted Qantas and prodded, with apparently some reaction, but I don't think they've ever said that Qantas has "fixed it" because of that contact.

I mean, it took the ACCC and court to get Qantas to admit its ghost flights etc. I don't think Qantas is going to do much in response to anyone below that level.

 

[Danger]

I don't see any proclamations there that AFF "would get it done". They contacted Qantas and prodded, with apparently some reaction, but I don't think they've ever said that Qantas has "fixed it" because of that contact.

I mean, it took the ACCC and court to get Qantas to admit its ghost flights etc. I don't think Qantas is going to do much in response to anyone below that level.

My comments were largely in relation to the most recent AFF article and the fact this saga has been long ongoing, despite AFF's apparent involvement but, yes, I take your point.

 

[JessicaTam]

[mod hat]
Off topic posts have been deleted. This is not a thread for irrops discussion.
[/mod hat]

 

[bullerdude]

I’ve had to escalate to reward ticket escalation recently to get new tickets issued after a schedule change for some reward flights.

I waited a few weeks to see if new e-tickets would turn up but no luck, despite the qantas website indication the flights confirmed.

I pity those who don’t know how to escalate the ticketing issues. They really need to sort this out and have a way to notify customers when flights don’t ticket and/or show this clearly on the website.

 

[ThatMrBlake]

Had an issue with a AA classic reward ticket needing re-issue. Radio silence from the escalation inbox. Only resolved it by calling up.

 

[glennp]

Perhaps QF could add an option for reticketing to their telephone rotary options and route these calls directly to AKL (and maybe HBA) as they appear to be the only locations capable of correcting the errors their other call centres create.

Years ago I had a first class reward re-ticketed into economy and was all but called a liar by the Sth African call centre who were unable to receive emails so I could not send them the first class ticket I held before QF stuffed the booking. Ultimately, I had no choice but to cancel and rebook in business.

A couple of days ago another re-ticketed reward booking went into QF limbo because the person re-ticketing the booking created an error. After not re-ticketing within 24 hours I called back and after an hour on hold was told the AKL Dealing Team had been contacted and would re-ticket the booking within the day, which fortunately happened.

I can't help but wonder how many pax show-up to the airport with their original ticketed booking to learn it did not re-ticket and they no longer hold a valid ticket. Similarly, how is it reasonable to expect the individual to monitor this when the QF website shows the updated (but non-ticketed) booking? QF should be addressing re-ticketing issues in real-time and not require its customers to understand and troubleshoot their systems when many of their own call centres cannot.

 

[sonjabella71]

I will watch this thread with hopeful anticipation, but after many years of false promises and complete award tickets stuff ups, I am not holding my breath. It is great that AFF are following up, but so far I have felt that QF is full of empty promises. It is unfortunate, and I truly hope my faith in QF can be reinstated.