Qantas changed my classic reward seat from business to economy

[aikman]

You still get to keep the economy ticket to make it in time for your event right?

 

[JohnK]

Update - I just got a call from Qantas. Not sure if it’s the promised ‘call back’ from Qantas or if it was because of my email to Stephanie/ Olivia but they said all they could do is give me a refund

Don't accept a refund.

Keep persevering. Keep calling. You may end up speaking to someone who cares enough to help or you may end up speaking to one of Australian call centre staff.

 

[beeroob]

You still get to keep the economy ticket to make it in time for your event right?

Yeah I do have a confirmed economy ticket but it was supposed to be business class as I had booked - I also havent been refunded the points or taxes difference. But I also dont want economy Qantas

Post automatically merged: Jul 9, 2022

That’s appalling. What date do you want to fly?

Mid November, so not too busy a time

Post automatically merged: Jul 9, 2022

So sorry this is happening to you Beeroob!! This happened to me too similarly. I ended up emailing almost every email I could find, calling a million times, posting on all social medias and finally one day someone helpful called me

Thank you, hoping perseverance pays off. I dont want to just give up because of their error and how far in advance I booked it

 

[beeroob]

Don't accept a refund.

Keep persevering. Keep calling. You may end up speaking to someone who cares enough to help or you may end up speaking to one of Australian call centre staff.

Yeah I didnt, I kept trying to push it and they kept saying theres no availability ugh.. they said they'd raise to their manager again and call me back so lets see :/

 

[dylarr]

Update - I just got a call from Qantas. Not sure if it’s the promised ‘call back’ from Qantas or if it was because of my email to Stephanie/ Olivia but they said all they could do is give me a refund

Do you know where the call back was from? Was it one of the offshore centres or Hobart/Auckland?

 

[Doctore1003]

I just had a quick look and there are Canberra-London J awards available with Qatar Airways in mid Nov (10th and 13th; 159k points one way), if that works for you.

 

[beeroob]

Do you know where the call back was from? Was it one of the offshore centres or Hobart/Auckland?

I didn’t ask but had a strong accent so I think Cape Town. Also the lack of knowledge they had saying they “can’t just make a business classic reward” meant they definitely weren’t Auckland/Hobart

Post automatically merged: Jul 9, 2022

I just had a quick look and there are Canberra-London J awards available with Qatar Airways in mid Nov (10th and 13th; 159k points one way), if that works for you.

Thank you so much for looking! Unfortunately I don’t have enough leave to travel then, looking from the 17th-20th ideally

 

[Doctore1003]

I didn’t ask but had a strong accent so I think Cape Town. Also the lack of knowledge they had saying they “can’t just make a business classic reward” meant they definitely weren’t Auckland/Hobart

Post automatically merged: Jul 9, 2022

Thank you so much for looking! Unfortunately I don’t have enough leave to travel then, looking from the 17th-20th ideally

See if you can cobble together your own multi-segment itinerary (one that wouldn’t show up in a simple Syd-Lhr search via the Qantas website), eg Syd-Sin or Syd-Kul, then a different airline to London. Should be bookable via the multi-city tool, though it sounds like you may need to go via the QF call centre.

 

[Deseye]

My story only serves to reinforce the apparent MO at Qantas - they are only interested in new $ business. Refunds, points and credit bookings are not a priority so beware. I was forced to contact bookings when they presented me with an impossible timing connection to make my prem economy seat from PER to LHR. When the connection was sorted I found myself in economy on the long flight, and they resold my prem seat. I was offered $240 compensation, which I haven’t seen yet. A previous cancelled booking in Feb was due for an agreed $5700 refund then which is also outstanding 4 months later. Im so sick of those phone queues…..Grr Adel

 

[Sally Edwards]

Oh my goodness. I am so sorry this has happened to you!!!
There are numerous posts on here about people who have experienced similar absolutely abysmal service since the offshore call centres are helping with rebooking awards.

I don’t know when your flight is but you should send an email to Olivia Wirth and Stephanie Tully.
QF has completely dropped the ball here and they need to fix this for you.

I think there is another name of someone in customer care that was mentioned in one of the other threads about losing Award seats. I’ll try to find it.

Absolutely appalling stories right now left right and centre.
It’s actually making me question my loyalty to QF and I’m a rusted on customer from way back.

What is the full we email address of the the two contacts you have mentioned please? Have an issue with a hkg/per sector rescheduled to depart 9 days before our lon/Hkg leg which is utterly ridiculous and all I get from QF call centre is "oh that's not right" we can xxl and refund you and you'll need to rebook. These were J class booked last October and there's no J class on any carrier on redemption for September now... Been totally shafted...

 

[Princess Fiona]

What is the full we email address of the the two contacts you have mentioned please? Have an issue with a hkg/per sector rescheduled to depart 9 days before our lon/Hkg leg which is utterly ridiculous and all I get from QF call centre is "oh that's not right" we can xxl and refund you and you'll need to rebook. These were J class booked last October and there's no J class on any carrier on redemption for September now... Been totally shafted...

The format is generally
[email protected]

 

[Danger]

Update - I just got a call from Qantas. Not sure if it’s the promised ‘call back’ from Qantas or if it was because of my email to Stephanie/ Olivia but they said all they could do is give me a refund

I think you need to consider civil action.

 

[RooFlyer]

Welcome to AFF @Deseye and @Sally Edwards . Sorry to hear of the circumstances that brings you here. I've been saying that a lot, lately. From all the reports, I reckon no question of a certain 'MO' from Qantas - stuff up a points booking, offer points refund then .... ker-ching??

 

[Anna]

I think you need to consider civil action.

Seeking what remedy? (Not saying it's a bad idea, just exploring it).

 

[Anna]

stuff up a points booking, offer points refund

There's one situation where I'm possibly developing a bit of sympathy for QF. That's the (probably quite narrow) situation where QFF points have been used to buy a flight on another carrier. The other carrier reschedules the flight (not QF's fault) and it no longer suits the QFF member for whatever reason, and there are no other reward seats now available on that carrier. QF doesn't fly that route, so there's no possibility of QF making a seat available on its own metal.

What is QF supposed to do in this situation? Fork out its own cash to buy replacement flights on other carriers for every single QFF member with a QFF reward booking on another carrier that has been stuffed up by that other carrier? Most of the current call centre staff wouldn't have a clue how to do it and probably lack the authority to do it anyway. Offering a full refund seems like a sensible option. The QFF member will be disappointed but what is the realistic alternative?

Part of me thinks this is the chickens coming home to roost for QFF's massive expansion over the past decade or two, encouraging people to amass QFF points at every opportunity, usually paying more in hidden ways for the privilege of doing so, with the lure of being able to use the points for luxurious flights. QFF has always been trumpeted as a very profitable part of the QF operation and now it's being forced to confront some downsides of its own success.

But another part of me thinks travel generally is still clawing its way out of the pandemic mess, and why should QF be held responsible in this unstable environment to rebook pax where other airlines have changed flights that were scheduled perhaps many months prior? I don't see how QF can force another airline to make a reward seat available for a QFF member, and QF probably can't afford to stump up cash for replacement flights for every QFF member who finds their reward booking on another carrier has been rescheduled or cancelled.

I'm not sure which part of me is winning this debate.

I'm not talking about QFF bookings on QF metal where frankly imo QF has no excuse for not pulling out all the stops to fix up its own mess. Or where QF delays have caused someone to miss a partner flight - QF ought to fix that too, and quickly. It's where the partner airline has caused the mess that I'm debating why QF should have to fix it, other than by a full refund.

 

[aikman]

What is QF supposed to do in this situation? Fork out its own cash to buy replacement flights on other carriers for every single QFF member with a QFF reward booking on another carrier that has been stuffed up by that other carrier?

Yes.

Isn't that what everyone here wants and expects?

 

[serfty]

The other carrier reschedules the flight (not QF's fault) and it no longer suits the QFF member for whatever reason, and there are no other reward seats now available on that carrier. QF doesn't fly that route, so there's no possibility of QF making a seat available on its own metal.

In that situation generally the other carrier will make seats available as they are the ones who made the changes.

Certainly MH has done so with a few of my bookings this year (even if one of them involved moving me to a flight three days later - it was their only flight on the route within cooee of the date). When the carrier does not do this automatically, a QFF bronze contacts Qantas and ends up with an inept agent who often makes things worse.

The big problem with other carriers and Qantas Frequent Flyer is Ticketing. Qantas fails to ticket in time and the other carrier cancels the seats. It is upon Qantas to rectify such a situation, not the other carrier.

 

[Matt_01]

There's one situation where I'm possibly developing a bit of sympathy for QF. That's the (probably quite narrow) situation where QFF points have been used to buy a flight on another carrier. The other carrier reschedules the flight (not QF's fault) and it no longer suits the QFF member for whatever reason, and there are no other reward seats now available on that carrier. QF doesn't fly that route, so there's no possibility of QF making a seat available on its own metal.

I agree with your post, when booking booking on partner airlines QF is nothing more than a TA and points are the currency. As I do not use TA's following comment may or may not be be correct, if a TA makes a booking and then the carrier changes/ cancels and impacts the travellers plan is it the TAs fault, is the TA expect to pay for another flight etc.

When using points to book partner awards pre Covid QF if something changed at the partner end there was little QF could do.

 

[serfty]

When using points to book partner awards pre Covid QF if something changed at the partner end there was little QF could do.

See my previous post; generally the carrier in this situation does endeavour to provide an alternative . The main problem occurs if the alternative is not suitable and having to contact "Qantas" (as the agent) ... and ending up in a call centre seemingly staffed by poorly trained people.

 

[AJEVA]

Absolutely appalling !
I booked a return flight from Syd to US for me and my family 2 adults 2 kids for $9k. My wife extended with our 2 kids and qantas wanted to charge us $14k for one way back! They are absolute criminals! They are price gauging and taking advantage of passengers any way they can and ripping everybody off! I called over 10 times spent over 12 hrs on phone all up . Spoke to Cape Town , Fiji , Phillipines they were all incompetent and had no idea. I threatened legal action and told them I was going to the AVA.. after Persisting I was not going to pay them a cent! They finally issued me a ticket for no charge. But now they have seated my 2yr old and 4yr old in different rows away from their mother! And they still can’t seat them together because the system said it doesn’t let them and all seats are restricted and the flight was 3 weeks away. These people have no idea!! No idea!! Allan Joyce got to go!! How can u sit a 2yr old away from their mother on a 15hr flight! Because seats are restricted.
Absolute joke! Im seating fighting and still want compensation . They return home 14th July . Good luck to anyone dealing with qantas customer service. Good luck