The Qantas Group owns two distinct brands in the Australian market. Qantas is supposed to be the premium, full-service brand while Jetstar is positioned as the low-cost carrier with cheap fares but less service. Ironically though, the customer service provided by Jetstar at the moment is far superior to that of Qantas!

The problems with Qantas customer service, particularly the long wait times and poor service from the call centre, are well documented on Australian Frequent Flyer and elsewhere. The problem is compounded by the fact that the Qantas website lacks the functionality to do many basic things. Qantas has also closed its airport service desks, forcing customers to phone the call centre – which is almost impossible to reach.

As an experiment, I decided recently to call Jetstar on a Friday morning to see how long I would have to wait on hold. Being Qantas’ low-cost carrier, you would assume that the waiting times would be even longer. This was not the case.

Jetstar picked up the phone immediately and I was already speaking to a real person within a minute of dialling Jetstar’s phone number! The operator in the Philippines was friendly and competent, too.

If Jetstar can do this, it beggars belief that even Qantas Platinum members are routinely waiting hours on hold to speak to somebody at the Qantas call centre. Qantas airfares are significantly higher than Jetstar’s, but this is not reflected in the customer service provided. It makes you wonder what you’re actually paying for when spending a significant premium to fly with Qantas!

So, what is Jetstar doing right that Qantas is not?

Firstly, it seems that Jetstar has adequately staffed its call centre and trained its workers. That’s the first step.

It’s also worth pointing out that Jetstar makes it really easy to self-serve online, and their website actually works most of the time. Many of the things that often require a phone call to Qantas, like flight changes or redeeming a flight credit, can be easily done on the Jetstar website. This shows that Jetstar has also adequately invested in its technology – again, something Qantas has failed to do over recent years.

It’s a sad day when Jetstar’s customer service outshines Qantas by such a huge margin. Jetstar’s management team deserves full credit for this.

For the record, I also called Virgin Australia, Rex and Qantas at the same time as part of my experiment. Virgin Australia also answered the phone immediately, even though I didn’t enter my Velocity number for priority service.

My experience calling Rex wasn’t quite as good. On my first attempt to call Rex, I was offered a callback around the 8-minute mark but opted not to take it, as this came with a warning that you would probably only be called back in a few days. The call was then abruptly disconnected after around 9 minutes. My second call to Rex was at least answered after 17 minutes and the operator was helpful once I got through.

Qantas did not offer a callback and I gave up waiting on hold with Qantas after two hours…

You can leave a comment or discuss this topic on the Australian Frequent Flyer forum.

Matt Graham

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to over 90 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil & Kazakhstan. His interests include economics, aviation & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.