Are some AFF members "blind" to the Foibles of their 'favorite' carrier?

[burmans]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I know its the biggest airline and FF program in Australia but it irritates me how QF-centric this site is. So many endless threads outside the QFF forum on AFF from members who seem to think the only international route in the world is to LHR on QF.

I'm not one of the QF lovers but not really because I have anything against them, its just because I think I get more value out of my membership of other airlines (e.g. the main recipient of my credit cards points is SQ) and when it comes to my own paid flights I always seem to find much better prices and can't justify the extra money on QF.

But I think it's a demographic thing, I don't travel that much for work these days but when someone else is paying would prefer QF over Virgin (but not by much). Don't fly enough to have status and hence have no loyalty. Have travelled to NZ a fair bit recently, on my own money, Air NZ/VA consistently cheaper and creditting to Virgin gives me status way faster.

Travelling to Europe QF would be one of my last choices, mainly US rewards and have enough on SQ for another F/J flight with my wife. But hey, I've got no problem with the QF bigots, happy for them to ignore the advantages elsewhere! I'm happy for them and happy for me, to me that seems like win/win.

 

[Fantic125]

Even though I only did roughly half the number of flights last year (46) compared to 2011 (82) there's been a shift in balance away from QF for me....

 

[JohnPhelan]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I don't travel that much for work these days but when someone else is paying would prefer QF over Virgin (but not by much).

Why? Why does your choice of airline depend on who is paying for the ticket?

 

[casanovawa]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I pay for all my own travel and have no preferred airlines, hotel partners, rental car partners, status or anything... All based on value and am quite capable of putting up with the odd average experience so don't even really come on here and p!ss and moan... I also don't really have anything against QF, just usually not very competitive price wise... The ANZ credit card is the only real thing that builds up QF points and even then a OW award is bett value... The USDM awards also seem better value so that is where most of my money/attention is going these days...

 

[pat25d]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

The only type of poster that annoys me is one who constantly complains about an airline doing things terribly and how they aren't going to fly with them ever again, but then continue to post bad reports/comments about them.

lovestotravel is a perfect example of this in the VA threads where he/she hasn't flown on them in 6 months or something (except for when they have a J sale or a previous booking or the day has an A in it) but continues to give VA **** at every opportunity possible.

 

[mella2007]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I also pay for all my own travel both business and personal. I rarely read anything to do with QF as I normally fly VA and it's partners. However I have no problem in there being more QF posts on an Australian FF forum. If I don't want to read or participate I won't...just like I don't read many threads on here that have no interest or use to me or what my needs are.
Same as FT. People could say it's very focused on AA, United, DL etc as those threads are most popular....when you're dealing with the national airline/s of the country the forum has originated from, it's only to be expected you will see more posts and have greater knowledge/opinions from it's member (and passionate discussions)

 

[zachary.august]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I personally hate VA, I find their staff rude and I feel like they're a 'chimp in a suit'. i.e their staff still have a LCC frame of mind that they desperately try to mask behind faux CL lounges and purple cabin dividers.

 

[burmans]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

Why? Why does your choice of airline depend on who is paying for the ticket?

Are you pulling my leg asking this, my first thought was is this a wind-up? When I am paying myself value is a high priority, and question such as whether I pay $40 extra for a pretty average meal come into play, not really a factor when travelling with business if the company paying will allow me choice, the cost of that sandwich becomes $0 to me and is nullified as a factor.

Also when I travel with work schedule tends to become more important. i.e. I have to get somewhere by say 9:30 and the right flights gives me more sleep (I like my sleep). Whereas when paying myself it teand to be leisure so schedule less of a factor.

The rewaiting of these two factors is what puts QF slightly ahead for business but rarely for leisure (not always, I did fly QF twice on leisure last year but once with QF points I felt I needed to burn!)

 

[TonyHancock]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

Why? Why does your choice of airline depend on who is paying for the ticket?

That is a good question. For me the answer is a definite no. I seek the best value whether I am flying for business or for pleasure, and I encourage my team to do the same. Those that want to milk travel at the company's expense are likely to milk the business elsewhere so have no place on my team.

 

[Fantic125]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

Why? Why does your choice of airline depend on who is paying for the ticket?

I would have to concur with a few of the posters above.

If there is minimal difference in overall flight costs (e.g. <$500 for a multi sector INT flight) and routings then I will choose the airline I prefer. However if there is a significant difference (e.g. >$1k for a multi sector INT flight) then cost will prevail over preference.

To put it into perspective, the company I work for spent approx $27k on my flights last year. That could have easily blown out to $50k if I had no regard for cost compared to value.

In the ADL site there's also another 20 or so people who do similar amounts of travel, so the cost's add up pretty quickly....

 

[Mal Ware]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

Yep there are clearly some people who work for either airline who post on here as they defend each airline far too much

I don't think you would be far from the truth there, but to that you could include people with Qantas shares and friends/family who work for Qantas.

I do wonder sometimes. Is medhead an airline employee?*

Sometimes you would think so but I doubt it. Reading his blogs the other day it was funny to see him complaining about Priority boarding, considering recent comments.
Also amusing to read his blog about reclining. lol.

 

[RooFlyer]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I don't think you would be far from the truth there, but to that you could include people with Qantas shares and friends/family who work for Qantas.

<snip>

Get out your tin foil hats, its conspiracy time.

Could it also be that there might actually be real satisfied customers! Shock, horror

 

[browski]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

Could it also be that there might actually be real satisfied customers! Shock, horror

I don't think it is any surprise that posters who have only ever flown Qantas, Virgin, Tiger or Jetstar would speak well of Qantas.

 

[777]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I think the word "foibles" in the subject is pretty spot on. An unacknowledged factor here is simply that we all care about different things. I am constantly reading reports here where people are going over the top complaining about things that i personally regard as trivial. I don't have the energy in life to get worked up about a lot of the issues posted here but each to their own.

What i struggle with is the logic that says "Because trivial thing A happened to me Qantas/ Virgin/ <insert airline name here> are a hopeless airline and i will never fly with them again" - more often than not the complaint and the larger analysis are completely unrelated. Just because you didn't like something or were slightly inconvenienced does not mean the whole operation is a shambles.

I have even less sympathy with a small subset of flyers here who seem to fly in order to be upset. They know that a particular airline does things in ways that they don't like, they keep flying them and then complain about it all the time. Really, that's got nothing to do with the airline and everything to do with the mindset of the person who is complaining.

Am i blind to foibles? Yes, probably a lot of the time because people are getting worked up about things that are well beyond my care threshold.

 

[oz_mark]

The thing with loyalty programmes and the language that is used (status, elite, premium) is that much of it is about ego and how well the airline strokes the egos of its top tier customers.

As much as some complain, I think as long as their ego is stroked enough, they will keep flying that carrier.

 

[medhead]

What I find amusing is people who've been around for about 3 minutes making making comments about something from a previous era that demonstrate their ignorance of the history and context.

 

[TonyHancock]

I get a bit fed up with the DYKWIA types that use this forum to post their own poor attempts at humour, whilst taking pot shots at European nations.......errrr....errrrrr

This post brought to you thanks to sponsorship of the "Angleterre C'est de la Merde Societe"

 

[harvyk]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

I have even less sympathy with a small subset of flyers here who seem to fly in order to be upset. They know that a particular airline does things in ways that they don't like, they keep flying them and then complain about it all the time. Really, that's got nothing to do with the airline and everything to do with the mindset of the person who is complaining.

Those ppl may have no choice, I've always been lucky that I've been able to choose which carrier I fly. I have never been forced into the true BFOD policies and as such even when I didn't do my own bookings I could "suggest" flights which I wanted to be on.

But there are a load of people out there who are on BFOD policies or exclusive use policies. They grudgingly get onto a flight, knowing how much they hate the airline of choice, but knowing how much they love having a job. They have no say in who they fly. Their travel guys have picked out where they will be, flying whom, and they have zero say in it.

 

[777]

Those ppl may have no choice, I've always been lucky that I've been able to choose which carrier I fly. I have never been forced into the true BFOD policies and as such even when I didn't do my own bookings I could "suggest" flights which I wanted to be on.

But there are a load of people out there who are on BFOD policies or exclusive use policies. They grudgingly get onto a flight, knowing how much they hate the airline of choice, but knowing how much they love having a job. They have no say in who they fly. Their travel guys have picked out where they will be, flying whom, and they have zero say in it.

I think if that's genuinely the case it's a fair cop. But a lot of the complainers are hardly in that position and make it very clear that they can choose where to send their business.

 

[burmans]

Re: First refurbished 767 enters service end of the month

That is a good question. For me the answer is a definite no. I seek the best value whether I am flying for business or for pleasure, and I encourage my team to do the same. Those that want to milk travel at the company's expense are likely to milk the business elsewhere so have no place on my team.

So you fly Tiger then? I don't really disagree with the sentiment you are expressing but think the view that it's the cheapest flight or nothing a bit simplistic, schedule and comfort come into it too. If I've got an employee who had to get up before 6 to get a flight to Melbourne and is now on a 6:30 pm flight back I won't be begrudging them taking a flight that cost $20 more but means they get a "meal" and a drink on the way back. And I certainly won't be accusing them of trying to milk the system either.