What changes would you make to the Qantas Booking site?

[willjd]

Not sure if people have discussed this before but a number of things really irk me about the restrictions and lack of ability when making flight bookings.

So to start (and hopefully RedRoo will find this thread interesting)

Ability to book (online) multi class e.g. premium economy to Dubai, economy from dubai to London
Ability to purchase (online) comfort seat e.g. Purchase 2 economy seats and and 3rd as comfort seat
Ability to select Seats during online booking rather than after through My Bookings
Ability to view bookings and have options and prices for upgrade e.g. return ticket Mel - LAX booked in PE, upgrade prices to Business for inward, outward and both journeys.

 

[opusman]

Ability to cancel an ASA booking and get the points + cash back online.

 

[dairyfloss]

For International - the ability to see fares for all classes when searching flights on one screen, even if on tabs, rather than needing to start over... perhaps the lowest fare in each cabin for that day, and expand section to see details and the various fare buckets (Super Saver, Flexi Saver, etc.)

 

[puppysparkes]

For International - the ability to see fares for all classes when searching flights on one screen, even if on tabs, rather than needing to start over... perhaps the lowest fare in each cabin for that day, and expand section to see details and the various fare buckets (Super Saver, Flexi Saver, etc.)

Additionally, include SC's and miles potentially earned.

 

[Red Roo]

Not sure if people have discussed this before but a number of things really irk me about the restrictions and lack of ability when making flight bookings.

So to start (and hopefully RedRoo will find this thread interesting)

Ability to book (online) multi class e.g. premium economy to Dubai, economy from dubai to London
Ability to purchase (online) comfort seat e.g. Purchase 2 economy seats and and 3rd as comfort seat
Ability to select Seats during online booking rather than after through My Bookings
Ability to view bookings and have options and prices for upgrade e.g. return ticket Mel - LAX booked in PE, upgrade prices to Business for inward, outward and both journeys.

Thanks for raising these issues. I'll certainly take note of your comments, and any subsequent feedback received from fellow AFFers regarding their experiences with making bookings.

Of course our Reservations team are available 24/7 on 131313 and happy to assist. However I appreciate the convenience of making and changing bookings online, especially as it avoids some fees.

 

[Limewood]

If there are no J of F seats don't show them with a pop up, its been annoying us all for years.

 

[medhead]

Bring back the ability to log into your QFF account to populate passenger details during the booking process.

Allow me to go back and modify the search using the "back" button instead of dumping me onto an error page.

Include an option to exclude jetstar flights. By rights qantas flights should appear in the jetstar booking function of the jetstar website, if jetstar flights are going to appear on the qantas website.

Bring back the link from the total price that provided a breakdown of that price.

 

[RooFlyer]

Show the fare class (D, Z, Y, U etc) when making a booking - either paid or reward, and either on the first page where you select the fare, or later on, but before committing to payment. Currently doesn't even show if you click on 'red-e-deal' or 'business' links (which opens a pop up to describe the fare) for instance, when comparing fares.

Allow 'my account' or 'my bookings' to be clicked on to open in a new tab whilst making a booking.

When booking a Classic or Any Seat Award, allow the class of travel sought to be selected in the first booking screen (currently no selection and just returns Econ, then need to select J or F or all 3)

 

[anat0l]

My list would be:

• Ability to change search details whilst a search result is already displayed (the same as "Start Over" then selecting new options, e.g. class, number of pax, etc., then "Search" again, but this change would save those extra loading steps
• When your session is about to time out (e.g. 60 seconds), darken the page and put up a cue warning that a timeout is about to happen (this is not a modal pop up or pop up window) with countdown timer and a button which resumes the session. Also, change the browser page title to reflect the timeout time remaining.
• Display fare class codes (e.g. O, N, J etc.). This can appear as a rollover pop-up on the fare display matrix page, and in brackets on the fare selection summary page.
• Display fare breakdown into base fare and component taxes/fees/surcharges (e.g. $100 Adult Fare + $49 Australian Passenger Movement Charge (AU) + $80 Fuel Surcharge (YQ) etc. etc.)
• Ability to filter or sort fare results based on carrier (e.g. Qantas only, exclude Jetstar, exclude Emirates) - this should apply to the operator of the flight, not the marketer. For example, if I choose to filter to exclude Jetstar flights, flights which are operated by Jetstar, irrespective of the flight number used, should be blocked out.
• Ability to filter or sort by the warning that selected class is not available on all legs of the flight option. For example, if I search for a Business class fare, some flight options displayed may have Business on one leg, but Economy on another - there should be an option to either put these options last in the list, or filter them out.
• Ability to log in to QFF during the fare search process
• Ability to view complete and full fare rules (i.e. rules that include additional info like allowed routings, etc. that you need to use a service like ExpertFlyer to find out). Naturally, these fare rules are somewhat non-sensical to most of the travelling public, but can be interesting to some of us. I would expect this detail to be available only in a popup.
• When attempting to book a Classic Award, if you do not have sufficient points, it should still provide a quote as to how much in cash you would need to pay if you had enough points to obtain the award.

One of the biggest advantages I find with the Qantas website is that it is very functional and yet quite fast compared to many other websites out there (including a certain other Australian carrier whose website is looking a bit substandard right now). I would hope that improvements to the booking engine will not significantly slow it down (like Singapore Airlines had done so to their booking engine).

 

[medhead]

Allow 'my account' or 'my bookings' to be clicked on to open in a new tab whilst making a booking.

Right click, open in new tab? :?:

 

[Gold Member]

Remove those excessive credit card fees that just add salt to the wound (YQ).

 

[Shelf]

Changing departure/arrival/class resets the travel dates. :evil:

 

[timster]

Major annoyance is not being able to see many partner flight options. I can understand it when QF flies the same route. But why when QF does not fly that route ?

Why can't I just type in airports by code (many sites allow this), instead of having to choose from a mile-long dropdown list ?

Trying to book itineraries via multi-site that include intra-US flights (ie AA routes) - most of the airports come up for selection, but select them and most come back with a 'choose a valid route' error. I can guess and assume many flights are actually routed start_airport-DFW-end_airport and enter again as two flights, but other engines don't require me to know that. Just means I go to Skyscanner and end up booking direct with AA, or worse United or Delta.

The QF site should have all the filter facilities of sites like Skyscanner, if not Matrix ITA, eg number of stops, time of day, show fares for whole month / year (not just on sale page), airline combinations (what's the point of showing variation in fares across days when the ones showing as cheap are Jetstar and the rest are not, but you don't find that out until you select one and get to the flights page). These could all be 'Advanced' options so as not to overwhelm the average punter.

Also, some parts of the site showing the fare basis will just say 'Sale'. Others will say the 'Sale' and also say it must be booked by June 20. One is useless the other is useful.

If 'seat guru' type sites can show me the exact plane seat layout before I book, why can't QF ? How am I supposed to know which of the several layouts offered by the QF seat layout information page will actually fly that flight ?

 

[JohnK]

Option to remove JQ and even EK flights from available flights. Some routings only show 7-8 options and those are littered with JQ and EK flights to the point where I can only see one connection available for SYD-BNE-SIN and that is an unsuitable flight.

Yes I would like to choose the 6:30am SYD-BNE flight to connect to the 10:30am BNE-SIN flight not have the 7:30am SYD-BNE flight as my only option.

 

[cmon0005]

Make multi city booking engine work correctly all the time.. too many times it doesn't show the routes I want, end up making the booking directly with the airline concerned in the end.

 

[Must...Fly!]

Yes I would like to choose the 6:30am SYD-BNE flight to connect to the 10:30am BNE-SIN flight not have the 7:30am SYD-BNE flight as my only option.

You should be able to do that in multi-city if the fare bucket still has availability, but granted this does come with the problem of having to ring up 131313 for itinerary change which costs extra $$$...and forgiving agents are few and far between.

 

[JohnK]

You should be able to do that in multi-city if the fare bucket still has availability, but granted this does come with the problem of having to ring up 131313 for itinerary change which costs extra $$$...and forgiving agents are few and far between.

That is multi-city but ex-SIN.

I used to see 3 SYD-BNE flights offered to connect to the BNE-SIN flight and now there is only 1 while there a countless SYD-BNE flights to connect to the EK BNE-SIN flight in the evening. Last time I saw this was a couple of months ago and things may have changed since then.

At the end of the day this is not the end of the world but with my luck the SYD-BNE flight is going to be delayed and miss the BNE-SIN flight. So even though I am protected as it is all on the one ticket I will miss the MH SIN-KUL-BKK flights on separate tickets and a night accommodation in Bangkok/Pattaya.

Yes I know what I am doing is risky but Qantas should be able to offer the first SYD-BNE flight instead of the 3rd and heaven forbid if they were to offer a SYD-BNE flight the previous evening to make the BNE-SIN flight the next day. Why not?

 

[anat0l]

Why can't I just type in airports by code (many sites allow this), instead of having to choose from a mile-long dropdown list ?

I thought this can be done? Typing the destination using either the full name or the IATA code will work.

On some pages you have to use a drop-down, but you can at least cut down the scroll time by typing the first letter of the destination.

 

[puppysparkes]

I thought this can be done? Typing the destination using either the full name or the IATA code will work.

On some pages you have to use a drop-down, but you can at least cut down the scroll time by typing the first letter of the destination.

I think it's dependant on the device used to access the website. iPads and iPhone have the scrolling issue. Interestingly the new QF mobile app lets you search without scrolling when on the "sale page". But if you opted to book via the "book flights" tab you are presented with the scrolling option.

Perhaps QF could get some AFF members to do the user acceptance testing of any new upgrades? Perhaps with J class ticket plus accommodation thrown in

 

[VHOEJ]

Allow me to go back and modify the search using the "back" button instead of dumping me onto an error page.

Include an option to exclude jetstar flights. By rights qantas flights should appear in the jetstar booking function of the jetstar website, if jetstar flights are going to appear on the qantas website.

Could not have said it better myself - both of those are extremely annoying. The 'back' option is frustrating on many pages - you really just have to start over again each time.