Qantas/Jetstar Extra Luggage Mess

[mikewsmith]

Hi - First post so please excuse if I'm in the wrong place!

I have booked a Qantas points flight for me and the OH from Launceston to Canberra with an obligatory swap in Melbourne. After booking (like i have done with most paid flights) I went to add extra luggage as we are taking bike with us - again done a lot. I was able to add the extra on the return flight (Qantas both legs) but as the outbound from Launceston is Jetstar and the onward is Qantas I am unable to pre book an extra piece of luggage on the Mel-Canberra leg. The phone line says that Qantas will not allow pre booking of luggage when the flight is fed by another carrier. So along with having to collect and re check the bags we now have to pay the airport fee for extra bags - It's only going to be another $20/30 but there is a principle here really. I have mailed them asking if there is anything they can do to waive the extra charges as they are providing no way of prebooking. Anybody got any experience of this? I was going to join the Qantas Club as I thought you got an extra piece of luggage like Virgin Silver does but they only seem to up you to 32kg rather than 2x 23.

Thanks

Mike

 

[gaz0303]

Hi Mike,

Have you been able to get the extra baggage on the Jetstar leg via their website? Its just the QF flight from MEL to Canberra that you need to purchase extra baggage for? If it is, this is just nasty as you may have to be paying 2 sets of extra baggage fees. Look forward to the answer -might be another way I get locked into flying QF and need avoid Jetstar.

 

[mikewsmith]

Yep, going to be paying 2x for the outbound leg, the QF flights out of Launceston (not that many) were all the wrong times or over priced so ended up with Jetstar, in the process of trying to get somewhere with online before heading over to twitter (got 2x Lounge passes last time I was messes round by them)

 

[Mwenenzi]

Welcome to the forum

Off topic a little. You can join Q Club at a discount to the retail price as here http://www.australianfrequentflyer....-find-qantas-club-corp-9333-4.html#post316450
http://www.australianfrequentflyer....es/save-200-qantas-club-membership-10788.html

 

[mikewsmith]

Cheers for the link to the QC, will have to decide how much I'm going to use Qantas... Virgin seems a lot easier.

As an update Qantas Customer Support called me back after bouncing e-mails where they missed the point a lot.

The official position is they wont pre book extra luggage when the flight before in the booking is a different carrier (even Jetstar) so despite offering no way to pre pay they expect you to pay airport rates for excess luggage. On this occasion they agreed to make it happen but as a strict one off. The long shot is I still paid twice for luggage on the way out and once on the way home. Not that impressed really.

 

[gaz0303]

If you had picked a Qantaslink flight for MEL to Launceston, would it have ended up cheaper with all the bags checked through?

 

[mikewsmith]

Not sure about cheaper but avoiding the 6am flight out of here and a 5hr wait in Melbourne is still worth it.

 

[ozbeachbabe]

I was going to join the Qantas Club as I thought you got an extra piece of luggage like Virgin Silver does but they only seem to up you to 32kg rather than 2x 23.

Thanks

Mike

Effective 01 June 2011 the QF Club/FF Silver allowance is only one piece up to a total weight of 32 kg not multiple pieces.

 

[straitman]

Cheers for the link to the QC, will have to decide how much I'm going to use Qantas... Virgin seems a lot easier.

As an update Qantas Customer Support called me back after bouncing e-mails where they missed the point a lot.

The official position is they wont pre book extra luggage when the flight before in the booking is a different carrier (even Jetstar) so despite offering no way to pre pay they expect you to pay airport rates for excess luggage. On this occasion they agreed to make it happen but as a strict one off. The long shot is I still paid twice for luggage on the way out and once on the way home. Not that impressed really.

Maybe you should have booked VA for this trip also.

 

[Robbi]

Pretty sad really. It's part of QANTAS!

 

[blu]

Effective 01 June 2011 the QF Club/FF Silver allowance is only one piece up to a total weight of 32 kg not multiple pieces.

Just got caught by that change, for our ski & snowboard bags SYD-OOL-SYD. $40 each bag at airport per sector ($160).

 

[mikewsmith]

Maybe you should have booked VA for this trip also.

Yep I probably would have but got a heap of Qantas points through an offer and it seemed worth it at the time...

 

[eastwest101]

Another excellent reason to never mix up JQ and QF in the same trip/booking, whenever there is any incompatibility or complication between the QF and the JQ booking systems and fees, chagres and conditions you can pretty much garantee that it will be the customer who ends up wearing the cost and inconvenience. Use JQ for point to point travel only and only if its unimportant that you leave on time or arrive on time.

Booking either with QF or VA all the way from Launceston to Canberra and return would have been easier, less time consuming and possibly less expensive anyway.

 

[ozbeachbabe]

The problem with a combined QF/JQ domestic booking is that you cannot through check luggage (even JQ to JQ) so if there is excess payable it must be oaid each time you check in.

Even though domestically I mostly travel with HLO, in the OP's case I would prefer to get up earlier & do the Qlink to QF connection despite the lengthy transit enroute.

Combining QF/JQ bookings internationally has the potential of being problematic when excess baggage is concerned due to not being able to pre-pay excess at an attractive rate.

QF res do not offer the facility to pre-pay excess if it is a multi airline itinerary eg a mixture of QF/JQ/BA/CX. JQ will take pre-payment of excess baggage but this is of use only if you are checking in for the JQi flight at JQ checkin not if you are being checked in by QF when you are travrlling on a QF flight immediately preceding the JQi one.

My brother's friend was flying BNE QF PER JQ CGK with 3 pcs weighing approx 40 kg all up & he pre-paid excess with JQ direct who may not have seen he had a QF flight prior.

He then rang QF & was told he could not pre-pay excess & had to do it at the airport.

Problem was the interline excess rate for QF/JQ was something like $30.00 per kg so around $600.00 all up.

The only way to make it cheaper would be to have bags tagged to PER only & pay QF 2 Pcs of excess on the domestic rate at the time of $30.00 1st piece & $60.00 2nd piece then checkin with JQ in PER where they could see the excess had been pre-paid.

Although the MCT between flights in PER was met there wasn't time to collect bags at PER Dom then get the shuttle around to PER Intl as the JQi flight would've closed for checkin.

End result was QF through checked bags to CGK & didn't charge any excess.

This issue isn't just a QF/JQ issue as it applies to a multitude of other airlines when there is mixed carriage & you have excess baggage.

 

[blu]

This issue isn't just a QF/JQ issue as it applies to a multitude of other airlines when there is mixed carriage & you have excess baggage.

And with JL you have to also have to comply with a complex, length+width+ height measurement as well (but maybe that is just for skis).