Why do we hold unreal expectations of Qantas??

[JohnK]

A better question is why do people defend it so much?

As a whole, this is a company that has little regard for its customers. Backend support is terrible, customer care is non-existent... the list goes on.

Qantas does not care much for it's own employees either.

I've lost count of the number of disputes in the past 10 years but what really took me by surprise was reading the CEOs salary is now $24 million/year. I've been out of touch for a few years but last I remember the CEOs salary increased to $5 million/year and there was a huge outcry.

It's the staff that make an airline not one person. I booked Qantas again to HKG in a few weeks. Virgin may have been cheaper but I'll take consistency of Qantas.

 

[Fergo747]

My beef with Qantas is inept & obstinate customer service that is getting worse all the time. My REAL expectation of Qantas is that when things go wrong and I need their help they will do their level best to provide absolutely no assistance whatsoever and they'll make me jump over all their obstacles and through all their hoops just to get what should be the bare minimum outcome...and certainly never anything better than that. I'm talking about the impact of cancellations, schedule changes, downgrades etc. Do I think they are worse than other airlines in this regard? Absolutely, based on my experiences, yes I do!

Then you haven't had IRROPs in the US on AA. WP (at the time) coming off a delayed QF7, was rebooked onto a subsequent connecting flight (all good until this point). Then that flight kept getting delayed over the course of about a 3 hour period...8pm, 9.30pm, 11pm, 2am, 6am, 10am. By the time it had been announced that the flight was delayed (still not cancelled at this point) until 10am the following morning, the lounge had closed and if I wanted assistance I would need to line up in the customer service queue (literally about 300m long) or call the number (which was a 3hr wait time). As such, I was required to find a hotel for myself and come back out to the airport at a reasonable time to try and get a flight to where I was going. And then there was no compensation for the hotel and transfers because it was caused by a weather delay

 

[dajop]

Qantas does not care much for it's own employees either.

I've lost count of the number of disputes in the past 10 years but what really took me by surprise was reading the CEOs salary is now $24 million/year. I've been out of touch for a few years but last I remember the CEOs salary increased to $5 million/year and there was a huge outcry.

Not that it changes things much, but his salary is more like $9-10m/year. The $24m reported isn’t an annual figure, just that in the past year he has realised significant gains from the shares he was given as part of his package when they were closer to $1 than the $6 now. Any shares or options he was granted this year, for example, won’t get anywhere near that sort of gain.

 

[RichardMEL]

I still don't see all these "defenders of QF" that are mentioned.

 

[Zanzara]

Because they overpromise and under deliver

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Sure agree.. but NOBODY expects a rude crewmember on any airline.

I also don't hold an entire organisation at fault or to blame if someone's haviung a bad day or there's a bad experience. Oh that crewmember was in a bad mood and was nasty to me therefore QF suck?

When you have a 50% chance of a bad crew member, i hold the organisation responsible.

 

[RichardMEL]

When you have a 50% chance of a bad crew member, i hold the organisation responsible.

Well that isn't my experience with *any* airline tbh. Certainly not QF and as a P1 for over five years, and many more flights prior to that I have some small number of flights of experience to feel that I hae a fair sample size ....

but that is yours, or your feelings at least, is exactly why I said such things are subjective

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Well that isn't my experience with *any* airline tbh. Certainly not QF and as a P1 for over five years, and many more flights prior to that I have some small number of flights of experience to feel that I hae a fair sample size ....

but that is yours, or your feelings at least, is exactly why I said such things are subjective

Hardly objective as a P1 though? QF crew fawn over top tier elites, and perhaps you get to experience a different side to the airline to the rest of us

Travel paid business international without status and your odds suddenly get a lot worse.

 

[amaroo]

When you have a 50% chance of a bad crew member, i hold the organisation responsible.

IME that would be BA.

 

[Quickstatus]

Because their operating margin on the domestic front is in excess of 20%

 

[JohnK]

'Not competitive' is subjective, ya?
Qantas knows their target market and they focus on that market.

Sure they lose a few bunch of customers around the edges - but when the company is measured entire on financial performance, and the last 5 or so years have been record-breaking - it's difficult to fault the current strategy.

I'm not sure the current strategy is that great. Yes it has got them out of a mess but they may have lost some very loyal customers in the process.

It used to be that customers were the key focus and that lined everyone's pockets but the latest steategy is geared to lining the pockets of shareholders and senior management at the expense of the customer

- increased airfares
- continued enhancements to frequent flyer program
- long phone wait times for customer service
- replacing specialised and experienced customer service staff with off shore call centres that deal with many industries
- replacing 747s/A380s with inferior economy products

 

[drron]

IME that would be BA.

For us in Paid BA F it has only been 1 in ~20.
Whereas QF was at least 25%.

 

[amaroo]

For us in Paid BA F it has only been 1 in ~20.
Whereas QF was at least 25%.

BA = Bloody Atrocious

Done plenty of paid F and J with BA. In fact my first post on FT and AFF was about how I could fix a problem with a booking for 5 x F SYD-LHR-SYD. That was 8 years ago, not much has changed IMO.

 

[ajw373]

@juddles , I notice that the OP had 'disappeared' - should we be suspicious?

Check out this thread and see if that answers your question.

Qantas blocking [pre-auth] AND [separately] charging credit card for fare

Every revenue booking in the last 4 years (I think) with QF is via a GV and haven't had phantom charges. Edit: had a couple of Amex travel credits.

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

But seriously, juddles, if you were to fly a greater variety of airlines, you would probably understand better why people are so down on Qantas. It's simply much better elsewhere. And I don't care if the competition is Government owned or not. I'm just a passenger paying a fare. Qantas over promises and under delivers.

Funny over the years I’ve flown plenty of other airlines, and mostly in J and I have the opposite view to you. Which is on a whole the Qantas product if far better than most, especially on domestic flights.

Sure it isn’t perfect but I am yet to find any airlines that are, even the famed SQ that some here think are the benchmark. And don’t get me started on Emirates or Qatar.

 

[BAM1748]

Some passengers are never going to be pleased by QF, those passsengers would do better for themselves and QF to fly another airline where they will be happy, valued and get the 100% service they expect and complain QF doesn’t deliver on.

 

[RooFlyer]

Funny over the years I’ve flown plenty of other airlines, and mostly in J and I have the opposite view to you. Which is on a whole the Qantas product if far better than most, especially on domestic flights.

Sure it isn’t perfect but I am yet to find any airlines that are, even the famed SQ that some here think are the benchmark. And don’t get me started on Emirates or Qatar.

I'm only talking about international - I agree QF domestic J is very good and great compared to domestic J in say, USA, Canada and Europe.

Ah! Qatar Airways - QSuites, consistant immaculate service, great meals. Qantas - angle flats or droopy MKIIs or a few J suites, hit or miss service, Neil Perry salads ... SQ has come off in J hard product since they've ruined their beds - but the service and meals are still superb. I don't care for Emirates J. Flown all in the past few months.

 

[p--and--t]

Some passengers are never going to be pleased by QF, those passsengers would do better for themselves and QF to fly another airline where they will be happy, valued and get the 100% service they expect and complain QF doesn’t deliver on.

I strongly suspect that will not happen

1. many will not change and keep complaining
2. some may change and after a time, find the grass is not greener on the other side *all the time*. Just like QF is inconsistent, so are many others, just depends how many times you've flown with them to get the coughpy crew, bad food, cancelled flight, broken seat etc. (then there will be new threads complaining about other carriers)

 

[juddles]

......

It used to be that customers were the key focus and that lined everyone's pockets but the latest steategy is geared to lining the pockets of shareholders and senior management at the expense of the customer
.......

It "used to be" that Qantas were bleeding and about to fold. Those past glorious practices were directly funded by shareholders who were bleeding - not out of the pax pocket - who had a service that was not sustainable.

I think that Qantas actually still does have a strong customer focus, but they have quite rightly decided to make that focus on those pax that actually pay their way, literally and figuratively.

They are not a charity.

 

[dajop]

It "used to be" that Qantas were bleeding and about to fold. Those past glorious practices were directly funded by shareholders who were bleeding - not out of the pax pocket - who had a service that was not sustainable.

I know you have some good insights, and mostly I agree with what you say, or ponder. But I think you, like many, have swallowed the Qantas "Kool-aid" of 2014.

They were bleeding, not because of their excessive customer service, but because they chose to engage in a deep and prolonged war with their competition (VA) to try and remove them from the market, by increasing capacity to unsustainable levels, Coupled with some extreme asset write downs in one specific year, and fuel prices killing international profitability , they successfully drove the share price down to record lows and tried to leverage the situation to get favorable treatment by the government (not so successful) and create a doomsday scenario for the unions (successful). They pulled it off (and AJ and his team got some good options and shares out of it @ the $1 range, which were only ever going to go up) , but I do not believe for one moment the spin that they were on the brink of collapse, or that is was primarily related to unsustainable service levels.

They had some strong profits for many years, mediocre profits for a couple of years, massive losses for one year only, and consistent strong profits thereafter. I don't think that's quite the miracle recovery that many make out, just the product of the A380 writeoffs and VA capacity war both at the same time, which were easily resolved.

 

[JohnK]

It "used to be" that Qantas were bleeding and about to fold. Those past glorious practices were directly funded by shareholders who were bleeding - not out of the pax pocket - who had a service that was not sustainable.

I think that Qantas actually still does have a strong customer focus, but they have quite rightly decided to make that focus on those pax that actually pay their way, literally and figuratively.

They are not a charity.

They were bleeding because of poor decisions from the board and management.

Is it just me that thinks almost every measure taken in the past 5 years has had a negative effect on the customer and staff? What have the CEO and senior management sacrificed?