Off Line Point in MMB? [It's a 'Voucher']

[sanne]

I have cancelled 4 domestic flights - March and June this year. For each of these I have received a voucher.

In MMB they is no mention of vouchers, just Off Line Point - Off Line Point.

Please could someone explain what this means. Thanks for your help.

 

[esseeeayeenn]

It means they have "parked" the booking, perhaps because those flights don't currently exist, in a way that protects you from a no show or similar penalty.
Probably a temporary admin thing pending issue of vouchers. The two things are probably handled by different departments.
If it doesn't change soon I would call and remind them to issue vouchers.

 

[GoldCanyon340]

Placeholders for your future bookings and a way to reference the booking references.

 

[oz_mark]

It basically is your voucher. Although may still be processing

 

[sanne]

Can I assume at some point they will revert to a voucher in MMB that I can use when booking a flight. If not, then I guess I can’t do the booking myself, I’ll have to call.

I apologise for my lack of knowledge, have never been in this situation before....can I combine several vouchers to make 1 new booking?

 

[GoldCanyon340]

Can I assume at some point they will revert to a voucher in MMB that I can use when booking a flight. If not, then I guess I can’t do the booking myself, I’ll have to call.

Did you receive confirmation emails for the cancellations and conversions to flight credits? When I manage my 'off line point to off line point' bookings in MMB there is an option to 'find flights' as you do for a regular gift voucher.

I apologise for my lack of knowledge, have never been in this situation before....can I combine several vouchers to make 1 new booking?

Not online but the call centre may show flexibility and allow this if all bookings have the same conditions and number of pax, unlikely though I'd think.

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

For me, the Off Line Point to Off Line Point is the flight credit because I chose to cancel/change before 30/4. As stated in post 6, when you go in it show the passenger names and the total amount and the button ‘Find Flights’ is to use those credits for the next online booking. I also got an email confirmation of my choosing to cancel.

For others, it can also happen when Qantas cancelled the flight. In those situations there is sometimes a Refund button at the bottom to obtain your money back. If Qantas cancelled the flight you are entitled to your full money back because of the Conditions of Carriage regardless of fare rule (ie including non-cancellable red e-deal).

Can I ask were your flights in March and June Domestic or International? were they fully refundable or did they have a fee for cancellation or change? And when did you cancel?

I think post 6 is also right about combining. I also checked the FAQ and could not find the answer. As each use of voucher needs to be for the same passengers and a more expensive fare value, it might be complicated to combine. Getting the call centre involve might also involve a change call fee (an extra to be paid I think by money, not flight credit) When they process it.

 

[sanne]

Flights in March were for 2 people MCY/SYD return. I cancelled them. I received email confirmation of the cancellation saying I had a voucher. In MMB this initially was a voucher less cancellation fees. That has now changed to an OffLine Point...

Flights in June we’re for same 2 people SYD/MCY. I cancelled them. Received email confirmation of cancellation and voucher, no cancellation fees. In MMB this became an Off Line Point....

I cancelled a J award booking for 2 people June JNB/SYD. Received the points back but the taxes are in MMB as Offline Point....

Thank you for helping me with this, you are all very kind.

 

[esseeeayeenn]

Flights in March were for 2 people MCY/SYD return. I cancelled them. I received email confirmation of the cancellation saying I had a voucher. In MMB this initially was a voucher less cancellation fees. That has now changed to an OffLine Point...

Flights in June we’re for same 2 people SYD/MCY. I cancelled them. Received email confirmation of cancellation and voucher, no cancellation fees. In MMB this became an Off Line Point....

I cancelled a J award booking for 2 people June JNB/SYD. Received the points back but the taxes are in MMB as Offline Point....

Thank you for helping me with this, you are all very kind.

You can't usually see vouchers in MMB.

 

[RichardMEL]

You should see that the voucher references correlate to the references in MNB lists - ie the off line points are your vouchers more or less. ie when you go to redeem voucher, put in the booking reference you see and you should get the option to find flights, with the value of that voucher shown.

 

[dylarr]

It also seems like there is some correlation between the flight number of these PNRs and why they are there.

i.e. the reservations that myself and some of my family have with QF9250 are in the refund queue.

 

[sanne]

OK thanks everyone.

 

[HappyFlyerFamily]

OK thanks everyone.

Note that this might apply to you. From Qantas website

“Using flight credits and multi-use functionality

We're working hard to improve the conditions applicable to our flight credits. If your original booking was made before 30 April 2020, and you were due to travel on a Qantas flight between 31 January and 30 September 2020, your flight credit can be used across multiple future bookings. This will be updated in our system from June 2020. Further details will be provided shortly.“

Possibly need to wait and see whether it is retrospective (Ie applies to flight credit Issued before 30 April).

 

[sanne]

Note that this might apply to you. From Qantas website

“Using flight credits and multi-use functionality

We're working hard to improve the conditions applicable to our flight credits. If your original booking was made before 30 April 2020, and you were due to travel on a Qantas flight between 31 January and 30 September 2020, your flight credit can be used across multiple future bookings. This will be updated in our system from June 2020. Further details will be provided shortly.“

Possibly need to wait and see whether it is retrospective (Ie applies to flight credit Issued before 30 April).

Thank you very much for finding that information. That looks quite promising.

 

[doctau]

Seeing a flight for "offline point" makes sense if you understand what is actually happening behind the scenes in the airline's PSS and the GDSes. I have more experience with Sabre and QF uses Amadeus, but it should be similar. This is simplification of what actually happens, but hopefully enough to make sense.

Two important things in your booking are your confirmed segments on the flight(s) and your tickets. When you make a booking, the agent (person or computer program) asks the airline for a hold on flight inventory in the particular class and saves the PNR with the confirmed segments. They then get a ticketing agent (often a computer program) to have the tickets issued and stored in your PNR.


For a flight change, the three parts are cancelling your existing segments, holding your new segments, and then having a "ticket exchange" performed which could either be a level exchange (no cost) or with ADCOLs (additional collection of funds). Normally a "voucher" is just putting a break in time between those steps. First your existing segments get cancelled but your tickets are still active (to 12 months from issue). Later the new segments are held and the ticket exchange performed.

Because there is a limited number of possible PNR locators, PSS/GDSes need to "purge" old PNRs and this can be 30 days after the last segment. To stop this happening to PNRs used as credit shells, agents create "retention lines" which are segments that aren't real flights (e.g. GK passive segments) 180 days in the future. To not mess up reporting, they use placeholder IATA airport codes, usually the "offline points" which is why you see that.

There is a bunch of other stuff that can happen, especially if the credit voucher needs to live longer than the original ticket 12 month expiry or with different rules/value than the original ticket, and that is more airline-specific.

 

[jpp42]

Thanks for the explanation, but why couldn't vouchers simply be held in an entirely different system, something more associated with the funding side of things than the travel side of things? It looks like that's the approach taken by VA with their "TravelBank." Other business talk about loading funds onto a "gift card." You can even contract with external companies to manage these "gift cards" if you don't want to fully develop the in-house systems yourself. It seems like an incredibly convoluted process that's not very consumer friendly. Is it simply due to inertia/that's the way it's always been, in the travel industry?

 

[calmelb]

Thanks for the explanation, but why couldn't vouchers simply be held in an entirely different system, something more associated with the funding side of things than the travel side of things? It looks like that's the approach taken by VA with their "TravelBank." Other business talk about loading funds onto a "gift card." You can even contract with external companies to manage these "gift cards" if you don't want to fully develop the in-house systems yourself. It seems like an incredibly convoluted process that's not very consumer friendly. Is it simply due to inertia/that's the way it's always been, in the travel industry?

I think its also this is how it works with QF and would cost a lot of extra $$ to change when its not necessary

 

[woodborer]

Thanks for the explanation, but why couldn't vouchers simply be held in an entirely different system, something more associated with the funding side of things than the travel side of things? It looks like that's the approach taken by VA with their "TravelBank." Other business talk about loading funds onto a "gift card." You can even contract with external companies to manage these "gift cards" if you don't want to fully develop the in-house systems yourself. It seems like an incredibly convoluted process that's not very consumer friendly. Is it simply due to inertia/that's the way it's always been, in the travel industry?

It's all built-in to the the accounting/revenue system side of the GDS. Holding a credit in a booking is just part of what the system does.

The booking system is well aware earned and unearned revenues related to bookings and service provisions. It's not something built in house - it was just using the facilities available.

 

[PineappleSkip]

It seems like an incredibly convoluted process that's not very consumer friendly.

That could be said about a lot of QF's website.

[RANT] I would love to have a booking from 'off line point' to 'off line point'. Have had a six week battle, so far, to get such a voucher after converting a booking with mixed award and revenue sectors into a voucher. No success so far but plenty of email responses from QF saying 'just wait a little longer'. My experience of such mixed bookings is that QF IT has trouble coping and they tend to end in tears. And of course this was my one and only DSC booking [/RANT]

Cheers skip (tearful)

 

[RichardMEL]

The vouchers have always been a real kludge built on top of Amadeus back in the day and they've not really ever done a lot to improve things - likely due to a mix of cost and care factor. Half the reason for the various conditions on gift vouchers are all technical (in my view anyway) rather than policy related (eg: no multi-city bookings online, etc). I have a fair understanding of how the PNRs are built as per above explanation (which is great btw). I think more or less QF want to use their existing toolset to manage ALL bookings and we have this sort of jerry built solution to provide (some) functionality but hardly optimal and I am sure there has never been incentive or budget to make a real go of it.

In fact the latest work QF are doing to extend validity and usability of the vouchers (across multiple bookings for example) is almost certainly the most work done in this area in years.

IMO.