AFR Article - Joe Aston goes BAM!

[pauly7]

Given Virgin went into administration, all ticketholders prior to the data of going into administration became unsecured creditors. This takes things down a different legal path, and there's not a lot to investigate on those tickets.

There is an ever growing class action being mounted against Virgin, but it’s one about disclosure (Ie they were allegedly hiding how badly the airline was performing), I’m not actually sure if ticket holders are a party to that, haven’t looked in detail.

 

[oz_mark]

There is an ever growing class action being mounted against Virgin, but it’s one about disclosure (Ie they were allegedly hiding how badly the airline was performing), I’m not actually sure if ticket holders are a party to that, haven’t looked in detail.

Think that relates to disclosure during the capital raising to buy back Velocity. I would have thought it would just be the bondholders

 

[stm1sydney]

Now, every time I hear the word "Qantas", I am sickened. That's how much AJ has damaged the brand in my eyes. (Pre-AJ, they were just a little bit cough.)

 

[Himeno]

I don't see a problem with Qantas. Sure they've done some dumb things, but so has every other large business.
There are things they can do better. The same goes for every other large business.

The only difference between Qantas and every other large business is that the moment anything "bad"/unliked happens, they get disproportionately attacked over it.
Virgin and Qantas can each do the exact same thing. Qantas will get raked over the coals for it, while no one cares about Virgin doing the same thing.
Heck, Qantas is getting attacked for things a 3rd party did that they have no real control over.

 

[justinbrett]

I don't see a problem with Qantas. Sure they've done some dumb things, but so has every other large business.
There are things they can do better. The same goes for every other large business.

The only difference between Qantas any every other large business is that the moment anything "bad"/unliked happens, they get disproportionately attacked over it.
Virgin and Qantas can each do the exact same thing. Qantas will get raked over the coals for it, while no one cares about Virgin doing the same thing.
Heck, Qantas is getting attacked for things a 3rd party did that they have no real control over.

Same goes for BA in the UK and AA or UA in the US. I think probably NZ in NZ too. I guess just a penalty of being the dominant player. I've met Singaporeans who refuse to fly SQ.

At the time of covid, out of QF, VA & NZ, I think QF had the better policy (they would actually refund a cancelled flight if asked), whereas the other two would not - not initially anyway. My memory could fail me, but I definitely recall a lot of noise coming from the other side of the Tasman over their handling of credits.

I had an expensive QF J booking made before covid (for July 2020) that I was refunded (because I waited for QF to cancel) - a lot of the issues were people not waiting for their flight to be cancelled. I had quite a few QF & JQ bookings made & cancelled during covid that I was refunded for - once you knew how to play the game it was easy. The issue is (not just QF), they didn't make this info freely available. It was often the non-frequent flyers who got burnt.

 

[encryptededdy]

At the time of covid, out of QF, VA & NZ, I think QF had the better policy (they would actually refund a cancelled flight if asked), whereas the other two would not - not initially anyway. My memory could fail me, but I definitely recall a lot of noise coming from the other side of the Tasman over their handling of credits.

Yep, NZ was definitely worse than QF. I've still got multiple emails from my bookings in 2020~2021 - no refund offered for any of these outside of the usual exceptions for hardship etc., despite NZ being the one who cancelled the flight.

Additionally, they wouldn't even refund my Airpoints bookings back to my Airpoints balance (they did at the very start, but not for 2021 bookings), instead creating a credit ostensibly for "tax liability" reasons.




With that said though, NZ's credits were definitely easier to use. You didn't have to go through a funky booking portal with strange pricing, you could book through the normal website booking flow and put in up to two credit PNRs at the end, and the value of the credit would just be subtracted from the total.

I also remember something funky with getting a credit on a half-flown return ticket, but I don't remember the specifics anymore. To be fair, that also tripped up the Qantas system too (and in the end Qantas gave me a refund for the whole ticket, despite being half flown )

 

[Pete98765432]

I had an expensive QF J booking made before covid (for July 2020) that I was refunded (because I waited for QF to cancel) - a lot of the issues were people not waiting for their flight to be cancelled. I had quite a few QF & JQ bookings made & cancelled during covid that I was refunded for - once you knew how to play the game it was easy. The issue is (not just QF), they didn't make this info freely available. It was often the non-frequent flyers who got burnt.

I agree. I waited for flights to be cancelled and received refunds when requested. I opted for travel passes with double status credits for some lower amount credits which helped me reach LTG and maintain WP.

 

[Peasant]

Same goes for BA in the UK and AA or UA in the US. I think probably NZ in NZ too. I guess just a penalty of being the dominant player. I've met Singaporeans who refuse to fly SQ.

At the time of covid, out of QF, VA & NZ, I think QF had the better policy (they would actually refund a cancelled flight if asked), whereas the other two would not - not initially anyway. My memory could fail me, but I definitely recall a lot of noise coming from the other side of the Tasman over their handling of credits.

I had an expensive QF J booking before covid that I was refunded (because I waited for QF to cancel) - a lot of the issues were people not waiting for their flight to be cancelled. I had quite a few QF & JQ bookings made & cancelled during covid that I was refunded for - once you knew how to play the game it was easy. The issue is (not just QF), they didn't make this info freely available. It was often the non-frequent flyers who got burnt.

I don’t disagree for the most part. Most airlines were difficult to deal with during Covid and in some respects, even worse in the recovery. Was Qantas the worst? Probably not.

Qantas’ current position in the firing line is however a result of its own goals. Early on, instead of being transparent, the spin doctors were hard at work, aggressively putting their case that things were fine, when they were not. Too much hyperbole, too little substance, and if wore away at the thin veneer of authenticity and transparency. Simply put, Qantas was no longer perceived as honest.

This transparency was again apparent with the way they’ve fumbled the flight credit numbers. It feeds into the perception that whatever Alan Joyce says cannot be relied upon to be factually accurate, because they hadn’t been.

That’s a big deal for a premium brand. Their operational reliability has been badly tarnished - it masquerades and markets proudly that it’s a premium product - but the reality for many passengers is that it is little better than an LCC.

So, there’s a widening gap in terms of customer expectations and service delivery, compounded by the industry-wide yields that most airlines are enjoying. If fares were cheaper, would there be as much noise? Probably not.

There’s also the issue of some decisions made in the last few years that could be regarded as unethical and out of step with community expectations. They lobbied against VA receiving financial assistance early on in Covid, only to then stick their hand out after they’d folded. Having taken government assistance, they then illegally sacked 1700 workers as part of long-term cost saving ambitions. And it was after these decisions were made that the reliability of their operation started to collapse.

To Joe Public, it looked like management’s greed got in the way of maintaining a sufficient workforce to deliver a competent ground experience. They created a perfect storm for themselves. The white hot anger has been palpable.

Qantas needs to learn to better manage its messaging and what it promises if it wants to rebuild trust. Stopping the spin and focussing on the basics will go a long way in restoring trust and faith. Only then can the brand slowly start to recover.

 

[RooFlyer]

Qantas needs to learn to better manage its messaging and what it promises if it wants to rebuild trust. Stopping the spin and focussing on the basics will go a long way in restoring trust and faith. Only then can the brand slowly start to recover.

All nicely put. Sure Qantas weren't the only ones - but lets look at the CEO's performance just yesterday ... dissembling, evasive, trying to minimise the amount of customers credit held (not including overseas customers nor JetStar customers - over $100 mill difference). Why? Why would he do that? He knew he was in for a bit of a hiding but just couldn't help being shifty.

Just about all the odium Qantas has in the media, customers etc is an own goal and a large slab of it through the CEO's own mouth. So, no @ozbeachbabe , I don't think its because everyone 'picks on' Qantas; Qantas brings a lot of the attention on itself.

ABC's The World Today led with two stories, negative to Qantas.

Criticism grows of Qantas' influence

Criticism grows of Qantas' influence - ABC listen

The founder of Flight Centre says the Government's decision block Qatar Airways from doubling its flights into Australia makes no sense.

www.abc.net.au

and

Flight Centre boss says Qatar Airways veto makes no sense

Flight Centre boss says Qatar Airways veto makes no sense - ABC listen

Flight Centre founder Graham Turner says the federal government needs to better explain the decision block Qatar Airways from doubling its capacity into Australia.

www.abc.net.au

This isn't Joe Aston with his vendetta against Qantas. The ABC; still running with the QR story and putting Qantas in the frame with the government.

 

[justinbrett]

ABC's The World Today led with two stories, negative to Qantas the government.

Fixed it for you. I really think you mistook his position on this, he's spoken about it at length. He doesn't blame Qantas at all.

 

[RooFlyer]

Fixed it for you. I really think you mistook his position on this, he's spoken about it at length. He doesn't blame Qantas at all.

No, you didn't . Look at the ABC headlines in the links and then listen to the story with Graham Turner. Both were negative to Qantas.

'His' in your post I assume refers to Turner. He doesn't 'blame' Qantas, but sure isn't complimentary of them wrt the decision.

If you delete your erroneous post, I'll delete my quote of it.

 

[justinbrett]

No, you didn't . Look at the ABC headlines in the links and then listen to the story with Graham Turner. Both were negative to Qantas.

'His' in your post I assume refers to Turner. He doesn't 'blame' Qantas, but sure isn't complimentary of them wrt the decision.

If you delete your erroneous post, I'll delete my quote of it.

No, I've seen many interviews from him on this topic and he's been very clear, and has literally said he doesn't blame Qantas and would do exactly the same. This is an issue for the government. I have posted clips from a different interview before. He's said exactly the same in your second link.

I think you're hearing what you want to hear.

 

[drron]

I thought AJ's performance at the Senate Committee was best summed up by this remark -
"You've done a commendable job defending the indefensible thus far."

 

[RooFlyer]

No, I've seen many interviews from him on this topic and he's been very clear, and has literally said he doesn't blame Qantas and would do exactly the same. This is an issue for the government. I have posted clips from a different interview before. He's said exactly the same in your second link.

I think you're hearing what you want to hear.

You've moved the goalposts again. I posted about two stories on ABC radio about Qantas, quoting only the ABC headlines, describing them as 'negative to Qantas', which they were. The story was negative; I didn't say Turner was. And for some reason you are now talking about other interviews Graham Turner have done.

Make the point about Turner's general views by all means, but they are irrelevant to my post about the tone of ABC stories and your 'correction' is wrong. But let it stand and we can all see the attempted deflection. Not going to debate this further.

 

[justinbrett]

You've moved the goalposts again. I posted about two stories on ABC radio about Qantas, quoting only the ABC headlines, describing them as 'negative to Qantas', which they were. The story was negative; I didn't say Turner was. And for some reason you are now talking about other interviews Graham Turner have done.

Make the point about Turner's general views by all means, but they are irrelevant to my post about the tone of ABC stories and your 'correction' is wrong. But let it stand and we can all see the attempted deflection. Not going to debate this further.

The headline is "Criticism grows of Qantas' influence" - not of Qantas. I don't think you understand the difference. It's a huge difference.

Again - you hear what you want to hear. That much is obvious.

Both of those headlines had Turner as the main point of the sub headline - so to call that deflection is laughable. I'm not even sure you listened to the interviews now I think about it.

 

[anyonebutqantas]

I thought AJ's performance at the Senate Committee was best summed up by this remark -
"You've done a commendable job defending the indefensible thus far."

Who said that?

 

[kyle]

I don't see a problem with Qantas. Sure they've done some dumb things, but so has every other large business.
There are things they can do better. The same goes for every other large business.

The only difference between Qantas and every other large business is that the moment anything "bad"/unliked happens, they get disproportionately attacked over it.
Virgin and Qantas can each do the exact same thing. Qantas will get raked over the coals for it, while no one cares about Virgin doing the same thing.
Heck, Qantas is getting attacked for things a 3rd party did that they have no real control over.

Or on the flipside, is Qantas getting disproportionately too much support simply because they are more "Aussie"?

 

[drron]

The headline is "Criticism grows of Qantas' influence" - not of Qantas. I don't think you understand the difference. It's a huge difference.

Again - you hear what you want to hear. That much is obvious.

Both of those headlines had Turner as the main point of the sub headline - so to call that deflection is laughable. I'm not even sure you listened to the interviews now I think about it.

Actually to me the huge difference in the 2 terms is that "Qantas influence" when we are talking about Government decisions is way more disturbing.

 

[justinbrett]

Actually to me the huge difference in the 2 terms is that "Qantas influence" when we are talking about Government decisions is way more disturbing.

That's the point though. It's up to the government to set the framework and limits for lobbying (including informal lobbying from CEOs) and police its own members with regards to acceptance of gifts / conflict of interests etc.

Other than that, you can't blame a company for operating up to and including the legal limit of what's permitted. I don't think anyone has suggested QF has acted unlawfully.

 

[BAM1748]

I've said previously and say again.

While some here hate AJ and QF and keep repeating themselves in multiple posts about the same thing, as CEO AJ fronts the media himself and takes all questions. I have a certain respect for that. People on AFF bashing AJ don't even put their real names to it.

AJ fronting the media himself is more than many big business of this size do, look at banks as an example, rarely does a bank CEO, a religion and in the smaller range eg aged care provider CEO front the media and take all questions, they "issue a statement" and run even after a Royal Commission.

While I don't agree with all QF actions they are no better or no worse than other businesses I deal with and the boss takes the credit but also fronts up and takes the heat.

Matt