Qantas Lounge Gold Coast

[pyffii]

Flew today on QF879 down to Melbourne, the 3.00pm service....went to the lounge at 1.10pm expecting to find it open and blow me dead CLOSED !!!....only opens ONE HOUR before a QF operated flight and as there were only two QF flights remaining for the day the lounge didnt open until 1.45pm which gave us a miserly 40 minutes in the lounge and there was no food available cause it was only open for an hour....just some veggies,dips and cheese and fruit and licourice and the coffee machine was broken !!...and with no lunch served on board ( economy ) went and bought a sandwich....Have QF really stooped this low ?....I know what you all might say but really this is very very sad

 

[encryptededdy]

Maybe more appropriate in the Qantas forum, but I'm pretty sure all Qantas domestic lounges have always opened "One hour before each Qantas operated service", so this is nothing new unfortunately.

 

[serfty]

Maybe more appropriate in the Qantas forum, but I'm pretty sure all Qantas domestic lounges have always opened "One hour before each Qantas operated service", so this is nothing new unfortunately.

With my 30 year experience, no, not all lounge opening times are one hour beforehand.

Qantas only pretend to have a lounge at OOL. They only converted it from a Jetstar lounge because they were bleeding HVC revenue to DJ.

@pyffii You are better off flying VA out of there ...

 

[pyffii]

serfy you are so right.....Cant pretend you either have a lounge or dont have a lounge....Unfortunately we fly to the gold coast 6 times a year and dont really fancy the drive up to Brisbane on the M1 just for lounge access

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

Maybe not so many flights out, so lounge not open longer, also saves them money.

 

[Flyfrequently]

Flew today on QF879 down to Melbourne, the 3.00pm service....went to the lounge at 1.10pm expecting to find it open and blow me dead CLOSED !!!....only opens ONE HOUR before a QF operated flight and as there were only two QF flights remaining for the day the lounge didnt open until 1.45pm which gave us a miserly 40 minutes in the lounge and there was no food available cause it was only open for an hour....just some veggies,dips and cheese and fruit and licourice and the coffee machine was broken !!...and with no lunch served on board ( economy ) went and bought a sandwich....Have QF really stooped this low ?....I know what you all might say but really this is very very sad

Have booked that flight for February @pyffii - hope I can at least get a !

 

[Fifa]

I always fly VA when departing OOL and usually QF when I return! That lounge is dire for the number of people who use it.

 

[ric_melb]

Monday before Melbourne Cup Day could have seen less flights than usual in the before 3pm period. Last time I flew out of OOL there were a number of QF flights so lounge was open continuously from Noon to 3pm.
Many QF Lounges, as opposed to Qantas Clubs in the major capitals, only open one hour before the next QF flight.
As others say the alternative is to fly VA from OOL. The QF Lounge can be a busy lounge, but over the past three years, for a number of flights, I have found it satisfactory.

 

[justinbrett]

OOL is attempting to enforce dress codes too (no thongs), even though OOL is not on the website list of lounges with a dress code.

Excluding thongs on the Gold Coast is basically excluding 80% of your passengers.

It's a reasonably lousy lounge, really only good for the coffee in the AM or the booze in the PM. But having just moved from NTL that didn't have a lounge, I can't complain too much.

Monday before Melbourne Cup Day could have seen less flights than usual in the before 3pm period. Last time I flew out of OOL there were a number of QF flights so lounge was open continuously from Noon to 3pm.
Many QF Lounges, as opposed to Qantas Clubs in the major capitals, only open one hour before the next QF flight.
As others say the alternative is to fly VA from OOL. The QF Lounge can be a busy lounge, but over the past three years, for a number of flights, I have found it satisfactory.

The pre-DST schedule had the MEL and SYD afternoon flights staggered IIRC - now they are bunched up with no flights between 12pm & 3pm.

 

[Mh4k]

Everything else aside it is a tiny windowless box that is easily one of if not the worst lounges in the network.

 

[RichardMEL]

This has been the rule at OOL for ages. QF has been JQ heavy at OOL for a long time now and unfortunately the summer schedule is a bit dire for that period of the day (the 881 - when it flies - goes before 1pm, and there's only the 2:50p SYD and 3p MEL flights afterwards (why no later to SYD is somewhat surprising, but I presume QF just points at JQ for that.

OOL is one place where VA services vastly outdo QF and so their lounge is pretty much open all day as there's flights at LEAST every hour to various places, if not moreso.

(I'm also on a few of those arvo QF flights coming up, so I'm going the late check out option of hotel )

 

[henrus]

I was under the impression that the OOL lounge isn't actually operated by Qantas, it's operated by the ground handling agent for them. In my mind this would explain the small hours as they're probably paying that company by the hour.

Edit: Ah bingo, knew I'd seen it somewhere, so when the lounge reopened in 2012 as a Qantas Club - Oceania aviation took over running the lounge including reception.


I'd guess there aren't too many other domestic Qantas lounges in the network that are Qantas branded but all the staff are third party? At other lounges the lounge reception staff all seem to be QF employees?

 

[pyffii]

From a business perspective the way QF operate the OOL lounge makes absolutely no sense….the costs of bringing staff in for less than minimum hours must mean the lounge can’t pay its way….so as I said previously either run OOL as a proper lounge or close it down….the way it operates now is just poor really poor

 

[utaussiefan]

I was under the impression that the OOL lounge isn't actually operated by Qantas, it's operated by the ground handling agent for them. In my mind this would explain the small hours as they're probably paying that company by the hour.

Edit: Ah bingo, knew I'd seen it somewhere, so when the lounge reopened in 2012 as a Qantas Club - Oceania aviation took over running the lounge including reception.
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I'd guess there aren't too many other domestic Qantas lounges in the network that are Qantas branded but all the staff are third party? At other lounges the lounge reception staff all seem to be QF employees?

I'm pretty sure many of the lounges are staffed by Accor staff members in the hospitality areas and the reception is either staffed by Qantas or outsourced.

 

[Major]

The QF lounge at OOL is a dump. To be avoided at all times

 

[Silvia]

Agree, best to skip the lounge as you are not missing out on much. Very small and outdated. Seems VA does a better job -ex OOL

 

[RichardMEL]

Agree, best to skip the lounge as you are not missing out on much. Very small and outdated. Seems VA does a better job -ex OOL

As I noted above, they absolutely kill QF with mainline service to/from OOL. I suppose it would even up a lot if QF counted JQ, but it really is a different product imo and not a real comparison to VA mainline - certainly when it comes to the premium cabin/eco X seating and of course lounge.

I would say though that their lounge, while it has natural light and some views, it's probably not much bigger than the QF lounge tbh (a bit hard to tell due to the design). Yeah the food & bev options and probably slightly better but more or less on par. I have to say the times I've used it, it's been just as packed as the QF lounge tbh. I would definitely say though VA > QF in OOL though for sure when the frequency of service is taken into account.

of course the other thing to remember about OOL is that it is primarily a leisure destination. Yeah, I know lots of conferences and things go up there, but in general it is treated as a leisure destination and that's mostly why QF all but pulled out at one point. I think it was mostly the SYD based corporates that pushed QF to bring a token mainline service (and lounge) back. Gradually mainline service has increased sporadically but the main focus has always been on JQ.

 

[jase05]

Everything else aside it is a tiny windowless box that is easily one of if not the worst lounges in the network.

Our Apple Island friends would be ecstatic if the HBA lounge was at the same quality as the OOL lounge

 

[justinbrett]

(why no later to SYD is somewhat surprising, but I presume QF just points at JQ for that.

of course the other thing to remember about OOL is that it is primarily a leisure destination. Yeah, I know lots of conferences and things go up there, but in general it is treated as a leisure destination and that's mostly why QF all but pulled out at one point.

Don't discount that OOL is also an origin - its reach is over a million people (Gold Coast + NNSW), many of whom are very wealthy and more likely to travel overseas. Hence, I think a lot of the QF flights are timed for connections, so not really any need for evening flights to SYD. Whenever I've checked in at OOL this year flying QF, a good proportion of people were on international connections (including me).

As I noted above, they absolutely kill QF with mainline service to/from OOL. I suppose it would even up a lot if QF counted JQ, but it really is a different product imo and not a real comparison to VA mainline - certainly when it comes to the premium cabin/eco X seating and of course lounge.

If we're talking quantity (not quality) VA and JQ are actually pretty close in market share on both SYD/MEL routes (VA 43/47% and JQ 40/43% respectively). QF market share is very small, 13% on SYD and 5% on MEL.

The QF lounge at OOL is a dump. To be avoided at all times

I don't have a problem with the decor or cleanliness - it's a very standard QF lounge in that regard. I've never not been able to get a seat, which is more than I can say for some of the other lounges. It's really just the opening hours and food options that I'd complain about.

 

[RichardMEL]

Great points about the origin traffic @justinbrett - hadn't even thought of that aspect at all tbh. Makes a lot of sense.

I definitely agree VA and JQ are probably neck and neck in OOL markets give and take - my thought was more - as you noted too - product wise since VA offer premium cabins. JQ and VA in Y probably are reasonably on par from what I've seen.