Tell me If I'm the one who is in the wrong

[puzzigully]

Hi,

after opinions on this issue:

Been a WP for 15+ years, have over 1 million points and 40,000 lifetime status, so pretty regular business customer of Qantas.

Recently had booked MEL-PVG (via SYD), this meant an early start for me.
Woke up to a text message: you're now going via Hong Kong. no reason given

Means 4 hours later arrival, screws up arrival plans at Shanghai etc etc.
Pain in the butt and normally would be mildly pissed, but here's why I'm VERY pissed off.

Over the past 3-4 weeks I've been trying to get me +2 to USA in October on points.
Was flexible in going in/out of SFO or LAX

Managed to get 2 seats, but not 3

Despite numerous requests, pleads etc, they refuse to release one more seat.

"Customer Care" dont care, not can I escalate it to anywhere - they are the final decision (a bit like the police investigating the police)

My beef is this:
Qantas expect me to accommodate their operational issues, be loyal and be flexible, but show absolutely NO flexibility to me.
They say "purchase a ticket" or try again closer to the travel dates (nonsense as I need to book hotels, car hire etc)

I'm not asking for anything other than a seat to be released so I can use points and pay their exorbitant "fees and charges"


Am I being unreasonable or should I take my business elsewhere (not that they will care anyway)?

 

[RooFlyer]

While I loath Qantas' operational shenanigans, having a seat released is a 'privilege' and can never be relied on.

Qantas don't care about your history, loyalty etc. Take business elsewhere (which is what I did) but don't cut off your nose to spite your face.

 

[puzzigully]

While I loath Qantas' operational shenanigans, having a seat released is a 'privilege' and can never be relied on.

Qantas don't care about your history, loyalty etc. Take business elsewhere (which is what I did) but don't cut off your nose to spite your face.

RooFlyer,

thanks for the reply, I tend to agree with you about them not caring about history/loyalty etc
My request was in conjunction with the other two seats which were already available
Didn't think it was a big ask.

I'm LTG, will never get to LTP, so no real reason to continue to be loyal.
May as well use my $ to build up a history with the competition.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Remember that true award seats are seats the airline doesn't think it is going to be able to sell (diferent from 'anytime award' seats where you're paying full whack for the seat, but via points).

Award seats are often pre-determined ('x' number per flight, based on historical loads.

Requesting an award to be released means someone from revenue management (yield control) will manually review your particualr flight and see if there are one or more seats that are unlikely to be sold. If so, they may release one.

in your case, this will have occured but they believe, due to current loads, that they will be able to sell all the remaining seats. $8000 for the seat vs the 192000 points (business return) which comes to $1344, plus the $1000 in fuel and tax = $2344.

Is it unreasonable for you to ask? No. But should you get a $5000 freebie? Probably not.

 

[KitKat]

It's perspective - I guess you are asking for release of J/F seats?
If so,
QF release 1 seat not avail online: I'm thankful (I love you QF)
QF release 2 seats............... Yessssssssssssssss (I love you soooooo sooo much QF......)
QF release 3 seats............... so unlikely (I don't even dare to ask.....maybe I should...... but don't want to be disappointed/destroy the love!)

It's a big organisation. An inconvenience caused to you by one side has little to no bearing on how they may treat other requests unless it is directly related

Have you tried getting seat released in different classes?

 

[puzzigully]

Remember that true award seats are seats the airline doesn't think it is going to be able to sell (diferent from 'anytime award' seats where you're paying full whack for the seat, but via points).

Award seats are often pre-determined ('x' number per flight, based on historical loads.

Requesting an award to be released means someone from revenue management (yield control) will manually review your particualr flight and see if there are one or more seats that are unlikely to be sold. If so, they may release one.

in your case, this will have occured but they believe, due to current loads, that they will be able to sell all the remaining seats. $8000 for the seat vs the 192000 points (business return) which comes to $1344, plus the $1000 in fuel and tax = $2344.

Is it unreasonable for you to ask? No. But should you get a $5000 freebie? Probably not.

I like your logic on the $5,000 freebie and if you use the same logic, they are getting (using your numbers) $4688 for 2 seats they think they wont sell vs $0
Its the door swinging both ways that seems to get lost....

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I like your logic on the $5,000 freebie and if you use the same logic, they are getting (using your numbers) $4688 for 2 seats they think they wont sell vs $0
Its the door swinging both ways that seems to get lost....

Yes, but you're asking for a third seat. That will have a real impact on revenue. The two award seats are worth $4688 to them, but if you don't take them, someone else will. So QF will still get their money. Now, if you were to sole person in the world looking at the seats, and they had no other chance of off-loading them, they may well consider the three seats as a block - $2344 for each of the three seats vs $0 for three seats. But that's not going to be the case (at worst they'll be snaffled up as part of the upgrade lottery.)

 

[33kft]

Perhaps when you go to another carrier you should first get them to commit to you that if you shift your business to them, as a platinum, you will expect to be accommodated when requesting 3 rewards seats on a flight 3-4 months away. IRROPS will still happen regardless of operator (although the frequency does change) so I'm not sure being rerouted has all that much to do with the request and response you got - pax without status get rerouted too, and can't demand a thing.

You're worth loyalty and retention effort regardless of flight rerouting but not in a way that accumulates into some sort of debt that you can call in at any time.. sounds like the problem here is more the contempt bred by familiarity which we all experience when dealing with a company extensively. In which case you probably should move on if nothing else to find yourself out of that situation, but I don't suspect your new carrier will be signing off that open ended commitment above anytime soon.

 

[Quickstatus]

Classic award seats on request is an official perk for WP1 but not for WP. That they do it for WP is actually in a way a bonus.

Because it is unofficial I would hope to maintain the “goose that lays the golden egg” rather than make a fuss of it if I don’t get a U released.

All you can do is ask but a refusal is always on the cards.

They will know that you have been rerouted and inconvenienced. This comes up on the CSM iPads and they may send you some “extra” considerations next time you fly, but this does not usually extend to an extra U seat.

I remember one time I was invited to a F seat (A380) from J prior to arrival to LAX. I put this down to a prior inconvenience - my bags did not arrive on the same flight as me.

 

[offshore171]

Transpacific in school holidays is always going to be a challenge.

Did you look at availability of alternative routings, like via Narita?

 

[puzzigully]

Thanks for all the replies.

the timing was outside of school holidays.

Perhaps I take a deep breath and step back and let it go, re-evaluate my position after some research into other reward programs based on my typical routes flown for business, then decide if its worthwhile to take my business elsewhere.

Thanks guys

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Thanks for all the replies.

the timing was outside of school holidays.

Perhaps I take a deep breath and step back and let it go, re-evaluate my position after some research into other reward programs based on my typical routes flown for business, then decide if its worthwhile to take my business elsewhere.

Thanks guys

It depends what you think you might find from the research. Qantas makes award seats on its own flights available in greater numbers than it does for its partners. So whether you have points with American Airlines or Alaska Airlines - or any of the other oneworld partners - you won't have more availability through them than you do through Qantas. In fact you will have less.

It is true that both AA and AS have far cheapr awards for flying on Qantas. But you still need the availbility. While AA may have more availability on its own services if you join them, they only have one flight a day from AU to USA. And those seats are snapped up instantly.

You may also wish to factor in the move to dynamic pricing. UA will go 'dynamic' from November. Try finding an 80K one-way business class award seat (the current saver level) any time between now and mid next year and it's like finding a gold nugget. Most of the seats are now 200K for the one way journey. AA is also going down that path with 40K economy awards SYD-LAX now pricing as 'web specials' for 62K one way (and up). But the dynamic web specials have greater availability. I haven't seen anything in business class.

Alaska can get you cheap availability on Japan airlines. But you can only originate in Asia for those awards, not australia. And the same availability is available on Qantas.

 

[TonyHancock]

Perhaps when you go to another carrier you should first get them to commit to you that if you shift your business to them, as a platinum, you will expect to be accommodated when requesting 3 rewards seats on a flight 3-4 months away.

Alternatively join a program that offers 'space release' vouchers for up to five people flying on the same PNR, to force open reward seats.

Now I am being unfair because this is a benefit that BA offers its GGLs so clearly flights to the US direct from Australia are not on the list....but I post to highlight the problems of Australian FF schemes. There is little competition and few defined benefits.

As it happens my travel patterns suited the BAEC and I did shift my business from QF. I sit at just over 31k SC's with QF and have now gone past 36k with BA securing GFL in four and a half years. I didn't need to get BA to commit to anything because the BAEC benefits are clearly defined.

It is frustrating being a Frequent Flyer in Australia.

 

[RichardMEL]

While these are two separate situations I absolutely see your link between the two and frustration.

I am certain QF sees it as that they got you to PVG with "only" a 4 hour delay and that probably more or less meets some sort of guarantee or whatever from them. You may have gotten (or not) a "We're sorry" email but that's about it (that's all i got for a 6 hour delay out of SIN recently). Is that reasonable? Well as you say you can take your business elsewhere..... That's your right.

With the FF release... even for P1 these aren't guaranteed to always be available and for WP as noted above it's sort of an unpublished benefit to be even able to request seats.

I understand you said 2J were available but getting the 3rd is the issue.. but you also said you're flexible... so I am confused? Did you mean they would open 2 J but not the 3rd? That's a very different situation to my thinking than there being 2J available for anyone and you've asked to get a 3rd J released (ie asking for 1 seat to be made available vs 3 seats)?

I understand you've been WP for years and LTG and all that... You're also asking for seats to be made available in only a few months which is also a bit of a stretch.

However absolutely take your business elsewhere.. but here's the question - would VA (or whoever) also grant you the same? Maybe.. maybe not. Each case and situation is very different.

(personally I have two main programs and then fly other carriers depending on need and sched/price etc but spread over Star and OW to be less locked in to the one-hence flying NZ J to the USA multiple times this year alone) rather than QF)

 

[trippin_the_rift]

This thread highlights how AFF is 'self-moderating'.

OP has a relationship with 1 company "Qantas". Their loyalty is to one company - Qantas.

Because internally, QF has separate divisions and entities with their own agendas - it means the OP has to deal with two separate issues across multiple areas of the organisation.

QF (ok other airlines need this too) could benefit from introducing an internal advocacy team that can cut through the internal BS and is empowered to "just fix it" for the customer AND improve internal policy/procedure/SOP at the same time. Redroo was providing this type of service to an extent.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

This thread highlights how AFF is 'self-moderating'.

I would argue it has nothing to do with AFF being ‘self moderating’ (which it isn’t!)

Qf saying it is ‘self moderating’ is a little insulting to all the hard work the moderators actually put in!

 

[trippin_the_rift]

I would argue it has nothing to do with AFF being ‘self moderating’ (which it isn’t!)

Qf sayingnit is ‘self moderating’ is a little insulting to all the hard work the moderators actually put in!

Totally agree with you!

Time for the AFF model to change? Charge the airlines for helping customers.
Also means airline staff don't need to be as highly educated on the product since AFF/FT/other forums take-over the detailed questions. Cost-saving for the airline and AFF makes nothing.

 

[RichardMEL]

Ah a customer advocate! What a nice idea....

I seem to have a vague feeling one of the US majors may have tried this at some point in time - or advertised something similar? I can't seem to find any evidence of that though in a quick search.

Of course an internally funded/run group would face pressures from all those internal agendas. A bit like the P1 SST probably wanting to do more than they actually can to assist the "most valued customers" (ie: marketing vs operations v revenue management and so on)

I wnder.. if the OP had received, for example, X QFF points as compensation for the delay to Shanghai would that have been reasonable.. and if so, would that then preclude the need for further exceptions being made to make it right to them (eg: opening that 3rd J seat)? Are even the two things something you can equalise - ie: is a J reward seat redemption exception worth as much, or more than, the delay to PVG? All very grey questions.

And additionally you can run into an issue of expectation... if they did it this time.. why not every time? (but we know, QF is consistently inconsistent(tm)).

 

[MEL_Traveller]

It’s not unusual to want to link perceived injustice in one area to a request in another, but these really are two completely separate issues.

‘My flight was delayed by a four hours and now I would like you to open up a business class award seat for me’ doesn’t sound reasonable when you take out the emotion.

 

[Matt_01]

@puzzigully depending on your situation and location have you considered sending x2 out of one port and x1 out of another. All 3 QF morning fights to LAX arrive within a reasonable timeframe of each other so you could just meet up at LAX. Maybe not ideal for some however our family of 3 have become quite used to travel on alternate routes if we are all travelling on points.