Scott K
Member
- Joined
- Sep 18, 2017
- Posts
- 273
I'll just preface this next bit by saying this isn't a bag-out or a complaint about QF - of which there are endless examples off, but it is a unique situation that indicated that something behind the scenes was as robust as it should have been. This is also a bit of an insight into the process for people who may want to book it themselves.
So the Covid years had not been kind and I gained some stress chonk by working long hours in two hospitals, frequently right at the coalface of the impact. These things happen and the Ms also had pretty much the same journey. She's from Brisbane, I'm from Melbourne - so we find ourselves travelling a lot for family reasons back and forth, additionally for our work related travel and we're not likely to just stop as we found ourselves a bit chonkier.
Earlier this year we took a family visit trip in J, but due to no availability when we needed to travel back we booked in E. Oddly enough that was a very full flight and we ended up compressed into the E seats in the very back corner of the 737. Feeling like Tuna stuck next to another chonky passenger, the Ms asked can we just pay for an extra seat between us next time. My wallet balled up sphincter tight but my heart conceded it sounded like a good idea. After all, I had read about it on here on AFF of the perks doing it. Why not give it a go next time?
Booking
I needed to take a trip to Adelaide. Sure, not a busy route not particularly long. I was travelling for work purposes but the Ms wished to come along as I was visiting a site managed by a long time friend of hers. I also needed 30 more status points to hang onto my status for the year and as I had no more trips planned for the rest of the year, so I thought - this seemed a great time to experiment with the comfort seat booking process. Especially as QF would give me status points and FF points on that extra seat. This is an excerpt from their site:
Booking these seats (EXST as Qantas designates it) is a semi non-trivial affair. You either get a travel agent to do it (I can't remember the last time I walked into an agent's office. What do they even look like these days?) or you call Qantas directly, which I did. No websites. Qantas doesn't really have an obvious pathway on their call system to booking this, and I got diverted away from the normal booking line quickly by the call centre worker. 35 minutes on the phone later, I had my booking reference in hand. About few hours later I could see it on the Qantas app on my phone although at first the EXST wasn't visible, but that turned up the next day. Perfect.
Checking in
First oddity with this process came at checking in time. QF send you a text message about 24 hours out that check-in was open. I had a big day at work and only worked through urgent messages on my phone when I had a chance, so I didn't check in until about 12 hours after I got the first message. In the meantime QF sent me several reminders. The fun thing is that QF was also sending me messages for the EXST. By the time I got to read my messages Qantas had filled me inbox with so many repeated messages it felt like I was being messaged by an unhinged passive aggressive Tinder connection to just check in. In the interim the Ms had checked herself in, so I just needed to online check myself - a process that showed only me - not me and the EXST.
Then it all starts to fall apart....
Upon arriving at the airport I popped my bag along with its Qantas Bag Tag onto the conveyor and stuck my phone with the boarding pass visible under the QR code reader - as I usually did.
"We cannot accept your bag at this time. Please find an available staff member"
What? Weird. I closed my app, took my bag off and then repeated the process again. Nope - no go. I looked over and looked at my Ms also struggling with her luggage in the same way, and she didn't even have an extra seat booked against her name. I dragged my case off and found a staff member. They checked me in, threw a printed out tag around my bag, and I watched the the Ms and My bags disappear into the mouth of the airport Moloch - maybe to return at the other side.
At the gate the Ms flashed her boarding pass for reading and headed to the plane. I swiped over the reader to be met with Cannot board passenger.
Wait. What?
The gate person popped aside and tapped on the computer with a perplexed expression on his face, but then sent me through to the plane. Okey. That was weird. I wouldn't get an idea of what happened until our return flight (foreshadowing) Our flight ended up being delayed as we waited for a passenger who failed to board's luggage to be found and removed.
Can I just say there is a special kind of relief you get when you get sit on a seat and know from the outset there is going to be no one shoved in between you. The seat may not be as roomy as a J seat, but it felt on top of the world having that guaranteed space, which was lovely to spread into during the flight. Was the cost of the seat worth it? I think so - depending on how busy the route you are flying is. Was the effort taken to get it worth it? Oh.... No. Upon arriving in Adelaide my bags came out from the dark beyond just fine and I popped my phone open to check the points for the flight and EXST had come through. I'm used to the points being sent to my account during the flight. Sadly no points for either my seat or the extra seat came though. The Ms's points had however.
About 4 hours later the points for one of the seats quietly popped into my account, but not the EXST.
The return flight.
I hypothesised that the problem at the airport on the way over was a result of how we checked in - the booking was made with all three seats on my account, but we broke it up when the Ms checked in separately.
However this was quickly proved wrong. I checked both of us in and when we arrived at the airport the same saga occurred with our luggage. Then, again at the gate the Cannot board passenger alert flashed up on the screen. The gate attendant again pulled me aside and tapped at the computer with the same confused expression. However this chap was a lot more vocal about what was going on.
"It says you have already boarded the plane". I blinked at him and assured him I was in fact right in front of him. He jumped on the phone and called a supervisor and they had a little discussion. "Oh, I see you have an extra seat" he continued after hanging up. "That has not been checked in. Let me sort that". I asked him about the points, and he told me just to call QF.
I am not sure what was going on there with the boarding pass. The luggage person said nothing along those lines about being checked in and this was news to me. The computer beeped and the attendant waved me through. Soon I was sitting in my glorious E seat with EXST space next to me, enjoying the last flight on the route for the day back home with a bottle of wine handed to me along with a.... ham and cheese toasted sandwich.
To paraphrase Peter Russel Clarke - Where's the points?
At the other end the points situation was the same. Nothing at first and some time in the morning enough for just one seat arrived. I thought I would leave it a few days in case it was like the extra status points that come later when you book during double status periods, but by the end of the week nothing had come.
So I called Qantas. My workday ended late so I didn't call until a bit after 6pm. Aware that the call centre closed at 7 I thought I was would just get in and chat and see what I could sort out. I was sure it wouldn't be a complicated problem when I spoke to a person - and to this point all the QF staff had been really accommodating with sorting the immediate issues up to this point.
I pushed the buttons to get through the on-phone menus and quickly got a human to speak to. Great! I thought. The Covid era long wait times must be a thing of the past now. I was greeted by a tired but pleasant sounding woman with a Malaysian accent. I explained the situation and informed her I simply was chasing the missing EXST points.
"Oh no. No. we doing give points for extra seats".
I told her at the time of booking that I had confirmed with the booking person that there would be both status and flight points. She asked me if this was a Qantas booking person that booked with, and I said "yes". She then started telling me what she believed the policy was and mid sentence the phone went dead - the line dropped as though I had been hung up on.
I called back. This time a man with a Malaysian accent answered. We had the same conversation however this time I wasn't challenged on the points issue and he popped me on hold while he went to sort it with his supervisor. While on hold my call again got dropped, as though I was hung up on.
This seemed to be a technical fault rather than a staff member hanging up. iI certainly wasn't behaving in a way that was anything less than polite and accomodating - I usually make calls like this with a smile on my face as I have found you can go so much further if the person you are talking to likes you. This has been my practice for years, mastered over decades of having to contact patients and family members to tell them things they don't want to hear.
So I was onto call 3, 6:45pm and I was worried that the 7pm closure time would interfere with getting this sorted for the day. Again, another polite woman answered with a Malaysian accent. I told her about the conversation I had with the man and asked if I could follow it up with him. She told me there were no notes about my previous call and then asked if we could start again. From there the conversation went very much the same as the first call and she informed me I wasn't entitled to points. I detailed to her of both the Qantas booking's assurance, and that the Qantas website itself detailed I do. She didn't challenge that further. At this point I got a sense that this call centre may cover two or more different companies, with the other not offering points on the EXST.
She popped me on hold so she could discuss this with her supervisor, however there was no music. The only thing to indicate that I had not been hung up on was the counter on my phone slowly clicking over telling me I was still on the call.
7pm came and went, and I was still listening to silence - with only the occasional crackle giving any indication of life. about 7:10 a cheerful voice popped on - and with no ado informed me that she had sent the status and points to me account, then asked if there was anything else I needed. I confirmed with her that that she had sent them now, expecting more of a conversation than that about it - she said yes, so I thanked her and we ended the call, Sure enough when I opened my Qantas App there they were - status and FF points. My account clicked over to preserve my status for another year.
With that it was all done. No cranky discussions, just lots of what seemed to be IT related failures and time wasted.
I'm curious about what everyone else's experience has been with EXST. On reflection for such a short trip, I appear to have spent more time on the phone around getting the EXST sorted, along with the aftermath, than I actually spent in the air. But that's not really saying anything as I spent more time at the airport side, boarding on and off than I did on the flights.
Happy flying.
Scott K
So the Covid years had not been kind and I gained some stress chonk by working long hours in two hospitals, frequently right at the coalface of the impact. These things happen and the Ms also had pretty much the same journey. She's from Brisbane, I'm from Melbourne - so we find ourselves travelling a lot for family reasons back and forth, additionally for our work related travel and we're not likely to just stop as we found ourselves a bit chonkier.
Earlier this year we took a family visit trip in J, but due to no availability when we needed to travel back we booked in E. Oddly enough that was a very full flight and we ended up compressed into the E seats in the very back corner of the 737. Feeling like Tuna stuck next to another chonky passenger, the Ms asked can we just pay for an extra seat between us next time. My wallet balled up sphincter tight but my heart conceded it sounded like a good idea. After all, I had read about it on here on AFF of the perks doing it. Why not give it a go next time?
Booking
I needed to take a trip to Adelaide. Sure, not a busy route not particularly long. I was travelling for work purposes but the Ms wished to come along as I was visiting a site managed by a long time friend of hers. I also needed 30 more status points to hang onto my status for the year and as I had no more trips planned for the rest of the year, so I thought - this seemed a great time to experiment with the comfort seat booking process. Especially as QF would give me status points and FF points on that extra seat. This is an excerpt from their site:
Booking these seats (EXST as Qantas designates it) is a semi non-trivial affair. You either get a travel agent to do it (I can't remember the last time I walked into an agent's office. What do they even look like these days?) or you call Qantas directly, which I did. No websites. Qantas doesn't really have an obvious pathway on their call system to booking this, and I got diverted away from the normal booking line quickly by the call centre worker. 35 minutes on the phone later, I had my booking reference in hand. About few hours later I could see it on the Qantas app on my phone although at first the EXST wasn't visible, but that turned up the next day. Perfect.
Checking in
First oddity with this process came at checking in time. QF send you a text message about 24 hours out that check-in was open. I had a big day at work and only worked through urgent messages on my phone when I had a chance, so I didn't check in until about 12 hours after I got the first message. In the meantime QF sent me several reminders. The fun thing is that QF was also sending me messages for the EXST. By the time I got to read my messages Qantas had filled me inbox with so many repeated messages it felt like I was being messaged by an unhinged passive aggressive Tinder connection to just check in. In the interim the Ms had checked herself in, so I just needed to online check myself - a process that showed only me - not me and the EXST.
Then it all starts to fall apart....
Upon arriving at the airport I popped my bag along with its Qantas Bag Tag onto the conveyor and stuck my phone with the boarding pass visible under the QR code reader - as I usually did.
"We cannot accept your bag at this time. Please find an available staff member"
What? Weird. I closed my app, took my bag off and then repeated the process again. Nope - no go. I looked over and looked at my Ms also struggling with her luggage in the same way, and she didn't even have an extra seat booked against her name. I dragged my case off and found a staff member. They checked me in, threw a printed out tag around my bag, and I watched the the Ms and My bags disappear into the mouth of the airport Moloch - maybe to return at the other side.
At the gate the Ms flashed her boarding pass for reading and headed to the plane. I swiped over the reader to be met with Cannot board passenger.
Wait. What?
The gate person popped aside and tapped on the computer with a perplexed expression on his face, but then sent me through to the plane. Okey. That was weird. I wouldn't get an idea of what happened until our return flight (foreshadowing) Our flight ended up being delayed as we waited for a passenger who failed to board's luggage to be found and removed.
Can I just say there is a special kind of relief you get when you get sit on a seat and know from the outset there is going to be no one shoved in between you. The seat may not be as roomy as a J seat, but it felt on top of the world having that guaranteed space, which was lovely to spread into during the flight. Was the cost of the seat worth it? I think so - depending on how busy the route you are flying is. Was the effort taken to get it worth it? Oh.... No. Upon arriving in Adelaide my bags came out from the dark beyond just fine and I popped my phone open to check the points for the flight and EXST had come through. I'm used to the points being sent to my account during the flight. Sadly no points for either my seat or the extra seat came though. The Ms's points had however.
About 4 hours later the points for one of the seats quietly popped into my account, but not the EXST.
The return flight.
I hypothesised that the problem at the airport on the way over was a result of how we checked in - the booking was made with all three seats on my account, but we broke it up when the Ms checked in separately.
However this was quickly proved wrong. I checked both of us in and when we arrived at the airport the same saga occurred with our luggage. Then, again at the gate the Cannot board passenger alert flashed up on the screen. The gate attendant again pulled me aside and tapped at the computer with the same confused expression. However this chap was a lot more vocal about what was going on.
"It says you have already boarded the plane". I blinked at him and assured him I was in fact right in front of him. He jumped on the phone and called a supervisor and they had a little discussion. "Oh, I see you have an extra seat" he continued after hanging up. "That has not been checked in. Let me sort that". I asked him about the points, and he told me just to call QF.
I am not sure what was going on there with the boarding pass. The luggage person said nothing along those lines about being checked in and this was news to me. The computer beeped and the attendant waved me through. Soon I was sitting in my glorious E seat with EXST space next to me, enjoying the last flight on the route for the day back home with a bottle of wine handed to me along with a.... ham and cheese toasted sandwich.
To paraphrase Peter Russel Clarke - Where's the points?
At the other end the points situation was the same. Nothing at first and some time in the morning enough for just one seat arrived. I thought I would leave it a few days in case it was like the extra status points that come later when you book during double status periods, but by the end of the week nothing had come.
So I called Qantas. My workday ended late so I didn't call until a bit after 6pm. Aware that the call centre closed at 7 I thought I was would just get in and chat and see what I could sort out. I was sure it wouldn't be a complicated problem when I spoke to a person - and to this point all the QF staff had been really accommodating with sorting the immediate issues up to this point.
I pushed the buttons to get through the on-phone menus and quickly got a human to speak to. Great! I thought. The Covid era long wait times must be a thing of the past now. I was greeted by a tired but pleasant sounding woman with a Malaysian accent. I explained the situation and informed her I simply was chasing the missing EXST points.
"Oh no. No. we doing give points for extra seats".
I told her at the time of booking that I had confirmed with the booking person that there would be both status and flight points. She asked me if this was a Qantas booking person that booked with, and I said "yes". She then started telling me what she believed the policy was and mid sentence the phone went dead - the line dropped as though I had been hung up on.
I called back. This time a man with a Malaysian accent answered. We had the same conversation however this time I wasn't challenged on the points issue and he popped me on hold while he went to sort it with his supervisor. While on hold my call again got dropped, as though I was hung up on.
This seemed to be a technical fault rather than a staff member hanging up. iI certainly wasn't behaving in a way that was anything less than polite and accomodating - I usually make calls like this with a smile on my face as I have found you can go so much further if the person you are talking to likes you. This has been my practice for years, mastered over decades of having to contact patients and family members to tell them things they don't want to hear.
So I was onto call 3, 6:45pm and I was worried that the 7pm closure time would interfere with getting this sorted for the day. Again, another polite woman answered with a Malaysian accent. I told her about the conversation I had with the man and asked if I could follow it up with him. She told me there were no notes about my previous call and then asked if we could start again. From there the conversation went very much the same as the first call and she informed me I wasn't entitled to points. I detailed to her of both the Qantas booking's assurance, and that the Qantas website itself detailed I do. She didn't challenge that further. At this point I got a sense that this call centre may cover two or more different companies, with the other not offering points on the EXST.
She popped me on hold so she could discuss this with her supervisor, however there was no music. The only thing to indicate that I had not been hung up on was the counter on my phone slowly clicking over telling me I was still on the call.
7pm came and went, and I was still listening to silence - with only the occasional crackle giving any indication of life. about 7:10 a cheerful voice popped on - and with no ado informed me that she had sent the status and points to me account, then asked if there was anything else I needed. I confirmed with her that that she had sent them now, expecting more of a conversation than that about it - she said yes, so I thanked her and we ended the call, Sure enough when I opened my Qantas App there they were - status and FF points. My account clicked over to preserve my status for another year.
With that it was all done. No cranky discussions, just lots of what seemed to be IT related failures and time wasted.
I'm curious about what everyone else's experience has been with EXST. On reflection for such a short trip, I appear to have spent more time on the phone around getting the EXST sorted, along with the aftermath, than I actually spent in the air. But that's not really saying anything as I spent more time at the airport side, boarding on and off than I did on the flights.
Happy flying.
Scott K
