Best time to Call QANTAS?

[PaulyB]

Hello . After having spent 3 very frustrating hours on a Sat morning with QANTAS chat and phone attempting to update OneWorld Classic Flight Reward with extra flights, I have given up.

I made my original booking with a terrific guy in Hobart on Thursday. Does this mean during the week is the only time to do it? Tricky when my desired flights are rare. I'd love to know when the best expert times are.

And - really? Are one hour wait times on the phone normal these days? Wow!

Thanks!

 

[love_the_life]

Surely you are making a little joke. Is there ever a best time? I avoid calling like the plague. Last resort if I really really can’t do it any other way.
Seriously though, have no idea if there is a time which is ‘less bad’ to call.

 

[pyffii]

when you call make sure you get answered in Hobart otherwise just hang up and try again and no I wouldnt wait an hour...just keep redialing...recently it took 5 phone calls over a few days to get my award ticket reissued after Iberia cancelled and rebooked the first leg of our ticket without amending the connecting flight that was now to misconnect by 24 hours !!...Great agent in Hobart resolved the issue quickly and without fuss as should always be the case !!

 

[Pushka]

The one time I had fabulous service was Saturday morning. I told the person that and she laughed and said she was only working Saturdays for the next 3 weeks to help out.

So, how do you know you’ve connected with Hobart?

 

[MEL_Traveller]

And - really? Are one hour wait times on the phone normal these days? Wow!

I'd say an hour is pretty short!

One of the advantages of any sort of status on QF (silver or above) is the offer of a call back.

 

[Limewood]

As Allan says Qantas is a world class airline, does not say world class call call centre.

 

[pyffii]

So, how do you know you’ve connected with Hobart?

...i just ask and if its Auckland just say sorry i need Hobart !!!...hang up and ring again.....the other month when i got through to Hobart and then asked the agent if she was a "senior "...laughter ensued and she asked why I wanted to know her age...I told her it wasnt her age that was important but how many years experience she had...When she told me 12 years we were good to go and she was the agent that rectified my booking when no other could !!!

 

[Simo]

Unfortunately there is no good or bad time to ring QF

I have found the chat feature great

 

[Denali]

Feb 29th, 2019.

Good luck, prepare a bento box for the wait.

 

[Mattg]

I used to find that around 7am on a Saturday morning was a good time. If you have to wait 3 hours on hold even then, then I'm not sure that any time works any more!

 

[PaulyB]

Hi all,

These are all great answers and have brought me to a smile at least. Sadly I have just dropped from Silver to Bronze so ringing back was never an option so today's winner is Pushka:

"...i just ask and if its Auckland just say sorry i need Hobart !!!...hang up and ring again.....the other month when i got through to Hobart and then asked the agent if she was a "senior "...laughter ensued and she asked why I wanted to know her age...I told her it wasnt her age that was important but how many years experience she had...When she told me 12 years we were good to go and she was the agent that rectified my booking when no other could !!!"

My crisis has been temporarily averted with another 43 min wait and then 90mins of valuable time on the phone...

TIP: NEVER use chat for major bookings - I had 2 very ugly experiences, the last when I realised too late that the chat guy had NO idea about round the world tickets which led me to my current call.

I ended up with Amelia in Capetown who (after asking if she was experienced!!) navigated our way through a very ugly fix. So ugly I just tried explaining it for you but it took too long.

Hopefully everything will resolve on Monday after the Thai office opens and we can force the reimbursement of the points that Chat Guy managed to burn after booking my final legs in the OneWorld Classic Flight Reward to another booking reference number.

Thanks for all your valuable input. It cheered me up no end.

 

[kermatu]

Admittedly the premium line so have never had more than a 7 minute wait (yesterday in fact) but I've found Saturday or Sunday evenings to be best for either line. The later the better.

 

[Drac]

I called at 10:50 pm Brisbane time on a Saturday night and they connected me straight through.

 

[eddie 73]

For 20+ odd years, my line of work is in businesses that operate national inbound call centres. Try around 3pm EST/EDST, there is always a lull in activity. Anecdotally, I’d say it’s the school pick up time, post lunch / pre end of business period.

And higher QF status escalates you in the queue too.

 

[Pushka]

For 20+ odd years, my line of work is in businesses that operate national inbound call centres. Try around 3pm EST/EDST, there is always a lull in activity. Anecdotally, I’d say it’s the school pick up time, post lunch / pre end of business period.

And higher QF status escalates you in the queue too.

True. It’s the worst time on the roads. Shopping centres quiet too.

 

[Pleb Status]

Over the past week or so I have been trying to get an OW RTW award flight ticketed correctly (still without any success). This will be my first QF/OW based booking in more than a year.

Although now only a lowly LTG, the QF customer service experience has been completely embarrassing. It would be quite funny if it was not so frustrating. I cannot recall waiting longer (>20 minutes) to speak to a CSR of any airline, including those whom I have no FF relationship at all.

On every occasion l have been forced to use the call back service, as the minimum wait time was at least '25 minutes' and up to 'more than one hour'. The actual shortest wait time for a call back to occur has been 42 minutes. The longest actual wait time was well over three hours. I have tried calling at different times throughout the day and night but the day is better as at least the CSR can talk to the 'other' departments as required. I have also had to wait over ten minutes to speak to anyone even after receiving the call back.

Once you actually get to speak to someone, if they are not from QF Premium you would be far better off hanging up and trying again. The non premium CSR do not know what they are doing and could be part of the problem rather than part of the solution. On every occasion, a premium CSR has had to 'fix' an 'error' with the booking. This intervention has not helped getting the booking ticketed correctly however.

If only the online booking system did not have a continual 'central database' error, I may not of had to waste several hours of time trying to get someone at QF to fix a problem of their own making.

I expect I will need to invest an hour or two more as well...

 

[Rangalad]

For 20+ odd years, my line of work is in businesses that operate national inbound call centres. Try around 3pm EST/EDST, there is always a lull in activity. Anecdotally, I’d say it’s the school pick up time, post lunch / pre end of business period.

And higher QF status escalates you in the queue too.

About 13min wait time today just after 3pm. Call answered by AKL.

 

[Scott K]

I called at 10:50 pm Brisbane time on a Saturday night and they connected me straight through.

There’s your answer. Brisbane time. Everything in Bris is still 20 years behind, which means you get the service that could be had 20 years ago!

 

[Aussiejosh]

Sunday afternoons. 0-10 minute wait usually

 

[Pleb Status]

Current wait time for LTG is 'more than one hour' with no opportunity to request a call back.

Therefore, QF effectively cannot provide any customer service at all (despite how incompetent they are when you can actually speak to them).

The QF ticketing issues carry on without any fix on the horizon....