Delayed flight - what happens ?

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mrsterryn

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I am due to go on QF25 in a week or so. It appears to , unfortunately, have delays on occasions
I am curious what happens when a significant delay occurs .
For example tonight's QF 25 appears to be now leaving tomorrow .
Are the passengers escorted out of airside ? Told to go home/put up at a hotel ?
What happens with connecting flights ?
Does it make a difference if the trip is a points trips ?
Thanks :)
 
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The process for escorting pax back out landside through customs seems very well oiled machine... Then battle royale begins. :cool:

When I had an overnight delay due to a plane becoming un-serviceable, they arranged a hotel (yay for J, otherwise I was going to have to share), a $50 room credit to use at the hotel restaurant and two cab charges.

The process for actually organsing it seemed very unorganised, they first called over PE and told Y and J to wait (status didn't seem to mean anything either). After about 15 minutes a few J pax wondered over and asked why we've been waiting and they where all "Oh, we thought we'd already looked after you all". They got people to form a line in-front of a desk, where the person served three people and then walked away never to be seen again (and they then got that line to join the end of another, luckily people in line 2 saw what happened so we sort of zippered our way in).

Finally, perhaps the real kicker, I got a beer with dinner (not exactly unreasonable) and when I checked out of the hotel the next morning I was told "Oh, that room credit can't be used for alcohol".

Of course, I might have just simply got caught out by inexperienced ground crew, so YMMV.
 
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I fly a lot and have my fare share of delays and cancellations. Most recent was AKL-MEL, apparently a truck drove into an aircraft door and busted the plane. The AKL lounge staff announced we had to go back through transit security, collect luggage and go back out into the arrivals hall, then back to the checkin area for further advice. I travel HLO and was also the first one back at the check in counter.

When I arrived back at the check in counter there was a few delays as expected when trying to organise accomodation for 250+pax at short notice . As a P1, my accomodation was at the AKL airport Novotel so within 15-20 minutes, lounge to hotel, no complaints.

Like @harvyk mentioned, vouchers were also handed out and normally have restriction’s which I am aware of, so in my case there were no surprises .
 
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In my limited experience with QF (low status);

1. Delay of about 20 hrs SYD-LHR in F (using miles), 2 cab charges, room at Pullman (I'm pretty sure cabin class affects which hotel you get) plus meal voucher. Very organised F lounge staff sorted everthing. On arrival in LHR (we landed around 1am), room at Sofitel Heathrow - my connecting flight was supposed to leave around 6am. They will change/rebook your connecting flights automatically.
2. 12 hour delay LHR-SYD in J (via DXB, using miles), as it was a daytime delay, no vouchers, but rebooked on EK flight 9 hrs later and rebooked on a later connecting flight from DXB, and they delayed that flight a couple of hours to wait for us. It was chaos in the BA lounge in LHR, I believe Cate Blanchett was supposed to be that flight, and they sorted her out on the next avail flight while the rest of us had to wait.
3. 9 hr delay SYD-BNE-MNL in J (cash), airport meal voucher for $20 or $30.
4. 24 hr delay/cancelled flight HKG-SYD in J (cash), asked for and rebooked on CX flight that same night, landed in Sydney 2 hrs later than the original ticket.
5. My mate was supposed to fly out on QF25 last night in J (cash); he said QF told him they cant rebook him on a diff carrier anymore (one world or otherwise) and he has no choice other than to wait for the flight today.

I also had an SQ delay LHR-SYD in F (cash) for 6 hours or so, they offered some rather restrictive vouchers to the tune of £20. Consequently it seems like there is minimal difference whether its cash or miles, but I would be a lot more confident asking for a rerouting or rebooking on a diff flight/airline if it was a cash ticket. Be careful with your travel insurance, some do not cover flight delays due to carrier issues (other than bankruptcies).
 
If you have travel insurance you may prefer to arrange your own hotel rather than put up with whatever doss-house QF assign you to :)
 
In my limited experience with QF (low status);

I believe Cate Blanchett was supposed to be that flight, and they sorted her out on the next avail flight while the rest of us had to wait.

3. 9 hr delay SYD-BNE-MNL in J (cash), airport meal voucher for $20 or $30.
4. 24 hr delay/cancelled flight HKG-SYD in J (cash), asked for and rebooked on CX flight that same night, landed in Sydney 2 hrs later than the original ticket.

...I also had an SQ delay LHR-SYD in F (cash) for 6 hours or so, they offered some rather restrictive vouchers to the tune of £20...

Excellent post and most informative. Where do airlines draw the line? Why is Mrs Blanchett more "important" than the businessman or woman who flies 20 long distance trips on the same airline per annum and who may well bring in more revenue, especially if they're a senior staff member who has input into which airline the company or organisation's staff fly?

A$20 to A$40 doesn't buy a lot at most airports in the 'developed world' these days, often not covering two courses plus a beer or 187ml glass of wine.
 
You would be expected to if you live within a certain distance of the airport. You'd just get cab vouchers.

The general rule appears to be 'within 50km of the airport.'

I have a friend who swears by protesting to the airline's airport staff that he now has others staying at his house and therefore he cannot go home. With other airlines, he says it's never failed to get him an hotel room, but he doesn't fly QF internationally.
 
If an international flight is delayed overnight/cancelled or you are rerouted on to a domestic sector to connect to an international flight from another port, you get escorted back through ABF and collect bags. ABF gets sent lists when this happens.

When this happened to me 2 weeks ago, ABF said that they preferred it when it was an entire flight coming back rather then a small group as it was easier to process a full flight returning in the system then a single person. (There was the question of if I should be taken back through departures, or go through arrivals)

They rebook people as needed, either onto the new flight in the event of an overnight delay, or onto other flights with other airlines if needed. When my QF37 was cancelled 2 weeks ago, everyone else on the flight was staying in Singapore or continuing on to Europe and were moved to EK405. I was booked to connect through SIN onto JL to HND. I got rebooked to go back to domestic and to SYD and QF25.

If pax need to stay overnight, the airline has contracts with airport hotels to cover these sorts of things, and sometimes has an amount of rooms ready to assign, but usually it becomes a long process to sort out hotel vouchers and transport to the hotel/s. Transport is often in the form of taxi vouchers, or, depending on the airline, port and amount of people, a bus.
 
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