Loooooong couple of days (OZ-NZ-OZ) but some shining service in testing circumstances

[shambles]

As I mentioned in the "Ash cloud" thread on Tues, I set sail for NZ with a planned LAN J ticket SYD-AKL-SYD, out Tuesday, back today. Being the source of all this ash stuff, needless to say that LAN pilots ain't clocking too much stick time this week. I had two QF one-way tickets up & back to SYD from MEL. Got to SYD Tuesday, and got great service from Carlos the LAN supervisor who put me on a NZ J ticket for later that day. Worked Wednesday, got the expected calls & emails from LAN re the return flight also cancelled and decided to lob back at AKL by 4am this morning to try & get a similar reticket with whoever was crosing the ditch today. Unfortunately, LAN's NZ CSM was not so flexible and dispite my pleas, they stuck with the line of we'll refund your ticket, please feel free to rebook another carrier.

So, the games began... Plan A, Air NZ wanted 1000NZD for Y and 1100NZD for J to SYD but soonest their ticket guy could offer was Friday AM depature. Wanting to avoid another night in AKL, and sensing this Ash cloud problem aint going away any time soon, Plan B quickly became Pacific Blue, as the board still had them operating to SYD, BRIS & MEL circa 7.30am. Got me a ticket on the 7.30 BNE flight in prem Economy for 750NZD and thought all good (sort it out with insurance etc later). Went to the (deserted) QF lounge and the lovely lady (Juliet) let me in despite me not travelling on OW anymore, and then she really impressed me - she came over to me 10 or 15 mins later and said she'd changed my SYD-MEL JASA ticket to BNE-MEL for an hour or so after the DJ arrival time into Brissy - I was well impressed with her proactive service and at no extra charge to boot.

So, thinking its all beer n skittles and I'm heading home, I head down to the DJ gate only to hear them cancel the MEL & SYD flights and say "watch this space" for the Bris one. Hmmm... time goes on and my gut is telling me Bris will def get cancelled as well. 8am arrives and the departures board now says new ETD 1300 - ouch - there goes my newly booked BNE-MEL connection So, I trundle back to the QP, update my new best mate Juliet with the news and sit and wait for a bit. With an eye on the monitor I'm noticing the mid morning NZ flights accross the ditch are all still running, including one to Bris at 9am. At this stage the DJ flight still isnt cancelled but I'm thinking - bugger it, and run up to the Air NZ transfers desk as they call the bris flight for boarding. After some serious too n fro ing with the bosses, they agree to re-open ticketing and sell me one of the few seats left (economy for $350 ish NZD) so I bit the bullet and now with both DJ and NZ active boarding passes in hand, I rush back to the QP to grab my carry-on, update princess Juliet with the saga as I run back out to hop on the NZ flight. This genuine contender for QF staff menber of the year rings my mobile as I'm boarding to say she'd called DJ to say I'm cancelling AND shes changed my JASA again to make sure I have enough time to transfer on arrival in Bris (again without penalty). Wot a legend she was. I've written a feedback email to QF to tell them they need to clone this girl!

So (if you are still reading ), my NZ travel saga is over and I'm home pretty much in the original planned timeframe. Wot an adventure and credit to Air NZ for taking all the extras as well.

phew - essay over thanks for reading if you got this far

PS.. now for the email to QFF to try & get all my original routing SC & points then the fun and games to be had with insurance (QF Amex)

 

[Bugalugz]

Re: Loooooong couple of days (OZ-NZ-OZ) but some shining service in testing circumsta

Hey Mate,

I'm flying J on LAN SYD-AKL-SYD in August. Just wondering on the day the flight was cancelled, did you just show up to the airport and did they rebook you on NZ at their cost or your cost? Also did QF/LAN end up crediting you with original SC and Points? Did you book via LAN website or QF Website?

Obviously at your cost for the AKL-SYD but travel insurance should cover that difference anyway, and in the same boat with my travel insurance on the QF Amex card, did Amex pay the difference between your original J fare and the new one or how did that work?

My biggest problem is got connections in AKL and SYD. AKL ones aren't too important as can change them the next day off to DUD for 2 weeks. However the SYD connection is pretty importanat as I need to be in Perth by that night as I'm off to Singapore on SQ for a week. My SYD-PER is in J so shouldn't be any probs in re booking and being looked after.

Sorry about the questions, just a bit worried about this ash cloud thing now as it still seems to be ongoing.

Thanks,

 

[straitman]

Re: Loooooong couple of days (OZ-NZ-OZ) but some shining service in testing circumsta

Hey Mate,

I'm flying J on LAN SYD-AKL-SYD in August. Just wondering on the day the flight was cancelled, did you just show up to the airport and did they rebook you on NZ at their cost or your cost? Also did QF/LAN end up crediting you with original SC and Points? Did you book via LAN website or QF Website?

Obviously at your cost for the AKL-SYD but travel insurance should cover that difference anyway, and in the same boat with my travel insurance on the QF Amex card, did Amex pay the difference between your original J fare and the new one or how did that work?

My biggest problem is got connections in AKL and SYD. AKL ones aren't too important as can change them the next day off to DUD for 2 weeks. However the SYD connection is pretty importanat as I need to be in Perth by that night as I'm off to Singapore on SQ for a week. My SYD-PER is in J so shouldn't be any probs in re booking and being looked after.

Sorry about the questions, just a bit worried about this ash cloud thing now as it still seems to be ongoing.

Thanks,

My bookings were LAN bookings (much cheaper) and I got the Qantas points and SCs. (SCs are the same but the points are more)

On the two occasions that this has happened to me they simply transferred me to QF50 which is 45 minutes later than the LAN flight. It was done on arrival at the airport.

 

[shambles]

Re: Loooooong couple of days (OZ-NZ-OZ) but some shining service in testing circumsta

I booked mine on LAN.com and had a seperate 1 way booking with QF to get be to Syd from Mel and back again on return from Akl.

I assume the 1st option for them would be QF as per the prev post but as QF were not operating that day, they re-booked me on a later NZ flight in J at no additional cost to me. On return however, all they would do s offer a refund for the AKL-SYD bit and said it was up to me to rebook on another carrier. Whilst I'm still awaiting LAN to process the refund (takes some time it seems), Im expecting circa $390 back from them and I ended up only spending $270 on my one-way NZ ticket in economy so I'm not out of pocket; suprising really considering the overall situation at the time with thousands of people scrambling for whatever seats they could get. Even though my NZ flight got me to Bris instead of Sydney, QF (at no extra charge) changed my JASA SYD-MEL flight to BNE-MEL so I could get home without hassle. As a side issue, I was momentarily $790 out of pocket for the DJ Prem Economy ticket I bought (AKL-BNE) and even though I had hopped on the NZ flight before the DJ was officially cancelled, (my hunch was correct - it did eventually get cancelled) and I got a call from Virgin next day saying theyd given me a full refund

All in all, I rekon it washed up OK... after a chat & email with QFF, got full J SC for both directions across the Tasman & BNE-MEL SC instead of the SYD-MEL that I'd actually paid for

Not that I'd suggest trying to replicate all that in the name of a status run but turned out pretty sweet - spent about $800 all up and got 230 SC's

A final note to mention... I also have to return to AKL in mid August and AFAIK LAN are still not running AKL-SYD-AKL at present and I'm not sure how long before they start again. I'll wait another 2 weeks and then I'll have a crack at booking LAN again for that trip - lets hope I get to try them this time round as I still reckon the AUD$747 is a pretty good J fare for crossing the ditch.

 

[Bugalugz]

Re: Loooooong couple of days (OZ-NZ-OZ) but some shining service in testing circumsta

Thanks guys,

Well hopefully it's over by August 18 but will have to wait and see I suppose. At least they seem willing to rebook onto QF and getting the orginal status credits (which is mainly why I wen't with OW as I could of flown NZ PER-AKL in J cheaper but didn't get points or status)

But sounds like it won't be too bad, but i certainly hope if the flight is cancelled on Aug 31 that they rebook me on QF, as gotta get on the 1010 out of Sydney as I am flying to Singapore that night.

Hopefully it will work out, I guess it's still 6 weeks away.

Thanks guys

 

[Myrna]

Re: Loooooong couple of days (OZ-NZ-OZ) but some shining service in testing circumsta

Hi shambles

Sorry to hear about your looooooooong journey, but glad that all ended well in the end.

This is the same dilemma I am facing at the moment (and others on this forum). I have started a separate thread on the forum over the weekend (on what to do with cancelled flights) before I saw this one today. We have booked (months ago) SYD-AKL-SYD with LAN in J leaving this Friday for a short holiday in NZ. I have phoned LAN 4 times already to ascertain what they would do for pax when flights were cancelled, but got nowhere. I just would like to know what to expect if the flights were cancelled.

From your thread, it appeared that LAN would try to put you on another flight. Some forumites in my other thread have also suggested that I should rock up on the day and LAN would try to book me on a flight with another airline. The LAN call centre said I should contact them the day before. At the moment, my flight is not being cancelled (yet!) Flights to 5th July have been cancelled.

I have a question for you: Was it correct that even though you ended up travelled with other airlines, QF still gave you the FF points and SC points for the orginal booking with LAN?

It sounded like LAN CSM in Sydney was more accomodating than LAN CSM in Auckland. If when I am in NZ and the flight back to SYD is cancelled, then should I do what you did - buy a ticket with a different airline in order to get home? Sorry, I may have sounded all nervous and worrying, but the holiday was planned months ago and I still wanted to enjoy it.