What is fair compensation? Bumped from a QF flight that I had a boarding pass for

[RSD]

Arrived into Sydney this morning from Bangkok on QF24 and after clearing customs etc I got to the domestic tranfer bus bag drop in time for my QF415 connection only to find out that I had been bumped from the flight for reasons unknown even though I had a boarding pass issued in Bangkok. The flight they bumped me to was cancelled, and then the flight I was eventually put on was delayed so eventually left Sydney four hours later than I should have done. Still don't know why I was bumped but they couldn't put me back onto the flight because it was fully booked - my seat had been given to someone else.

What is fair and reasonable compensation in a case like this?

 

[deejo77]

Did you get home?

We don’t have EU 261

I wouldn’t expect much if anything

 

[RSD]

Did you get home?

We don’t have EU 261

I wouldn’t expect much if anything

Got home 4.5 hours late - four hours delayed in Sydney then another 30 minutes lost waiting for bags in Melbourne.

 

[offshore171]

Could have been knock on effects of the fog in Sydney this morning.

There was a number diversions and cancellations.

 

[Quickstatus]

None.

QF24 arrived at the gate at 0705 and QF415 departed at 0806. Very unlikely you would have made the flight let alone your bags
QF did the next best thing and proactively rebooked you on another flight.
Your flight also has a 45 min delay to departure. Sometimes a departure is delayed because of predicted weather/ fog at destination. Was there an announcement prior to departure about the delayed departure?

@Melburnian1

 

[RSD]

QF24 arrived at the gate at 0705 and QF415 departed at 0806. Very unlikely you would have made the flight let alone your bags

Actually arrived at the domestic transfer bag drop with about 5 minutes to spare after clearing customs, and they were still boarding QF415 at Gate 12 when I went there trying to find answers.

QF did the next best thing and proactively rebooked you on another flight.

and proactively took me off the flight that I would have made!

Your flight also has a 45 min delay to departure. Sometimes a departure is delayed because of predicted weather/ fog at destination. Was there an announcement prior to departure about the delayed departure?

Delayed departure was due to a stuck starter valve on No.2 engine - required a full reboot of the computers. While on the terminal transfer bus I was talking to the QF24 2nd officer and he said the first they knew about fog in Sydney was 2 hours prior to landing

 

[Quickstatus]

You would definitely not have made the flight if you were at bag drop 5 min before departure. Certainly your bags would not as well.

So your flight was delayed by mechanical issues rather than Fog.

Don’t expect any compo. Though if you write a complaint you may get some FF points in account. Maybe 5000-10000 points. You won’t get cash compo.
Did they offer you a drinks or meal voucher?

 

[RSD]

You would definitely not have made the flight if you were at bag drop 5 min before departure. Certainly your bags would not as well.

No - was at bag drop five minutes before the 30 minutes before departure cutoff for bag drop - and they had only just started boarding when I got to gate 12 at the domestic terminal.

So your flight was delayed by mechanical issues rather than Fog.

Yes - something went out of sequence with the start sequence on number 2 and caused the valve to stick - don't know any more than that unfortunately

Don’t expect any compo. Though if you write a complaint you may get some FF points in account. Maybe 5000-10000 points. You won’t get cash compo.

Some points would be better than nothing

Did they offer you a drinks or meal voucher?

They refused to give anything.

 

[Quickstatus]

Ah ok/ 5min before cutoff for bag drop.
Likely you were proactively shunted before the aircraft landed. That’s what they do to ensure timely departure fortunately and unfortunately. They might have estimated you were not going to make the minimum 1 hr minimum connection time.

 

[opusman]

C'est la vie. PITA when you're on your way home but a 4 hour delay is not huge in the grand scheme of things. Without an EU261 type thing you're SOL.

 

[Quickstatus]

My best compo ever was $2500 SGD plus $250 meal voucher for the 5 of us cos SQ overbooked our flight and resulted in a 4hr later departure from SIN

Itinerary was KUL-SIN-SYD travelling Y

No not a credit or voucher. Cold hard cash handed over at the transfer counter at Changi

 

[juddles]

.....
Likely you were proactively shunted before the aircraft landed......

This.

It appears to me also that they foresaw that you would probably not make the connection and proactively changed you to another flight. The fact that you made it with 5 minutes to spare just shows how knife-edge close you were - going through customs upon entering the country is not a precise time-science, and perhaps most in your position would not have made it. So really you should not fault them on this.

I know that the time lost was a tiring experience, but as others have said, four hours is not really a biggie (except at the actual time when you are sufferring it )

We all have our opinions and experience in these things. I personally would have put it down as a bad day, but I would never have even considered trying for any compensation. I just feel that it is "just one of those things", and when you try to seek the compo it just ends up adding far more greater and enduring pain to the whole experience. That is my "zen' opinion

 

[Matt_01]

Delays happen it is a part of travel so get over it, compensation expect nothing and you will not be disappointed. You got home.

 

[Quickstatus]

You got home.

And with that the Conditions of Carriage were met. Note the airline does not promise to get you to your destination airport by a certain time. They just say they will get you there.
Unlike a certain EU LCC airline who deem that an diversion airport is close enough so therefore good enough and consider their CC met!.

 

[albatross710]

Coming back from MNL a number of times and connecting to BNE I get shunted 25% of the time. I always book the sharpest allowed connection with the expectation that I will find out at bag drop onto which BNE flight I will actually get.

My Sydney immigration clearance times depend more upon the arrival of the overnight A380 from other destinations more so than my flight arrival time.

Alby

 

[ajw373]

The cut off time at the transfer desk is not 30 minutes. I don’t know the exact time but it is closer to 45. Reason is that is how long it can take worst case to go through security, wait 20 mins for bus (assuming you just missed the last one and it’s on 20 minute intervals) plus 10 mins drive there plus to to walk in the terminal to the gate.

So as others said no way you would make it under worst case scenario which is what Qantas would need to work on.

 

[muppet]

Irrespective of the particulars of this case - in my opinion QF should not offload pax until they either miss the checkin time (for non checked in or connecting pax with bags) or until boarding closes (for fully checked in pax).

It is very easy to board standby pax in this way - done in the USA all the time.

Pre-emptively offloading pax based on expectations and allocating seats to standby pax is not reasonable in this case given the pax made it. the decision should have been made at flight closing. I understand if QF24 was still in the air or something it is reasonable but not if it makes MCT.

Also waiting 4 hours for a SYD to MEL is just adding insult to injury when they have them almost every 15mins!

 

[Dr Ralph]

$0.

 

[dajop]

Also waiting 4 hours for a SYD to MEL is just adding insult to injury when they have them almost every 15mins!

Not on Sunday mornings. There are basically just hourly flights - at 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 11:30am.

OP was bumped from the 8am as flight from BKK was at gate 36 mins late - 07:01 instead of 06:25 and (I assume) the flight was oversold (due to the 9am being cancelled) so no hope of getting back on once moved off the flight. So next available flight was at 10am, which didn’t leave until 11am ....

 

[cmon0005]

I always found QF good at rebooking proactively whilst in the air if there are delays at the other end, i'd be thankful of this rather than some airlines making you do the runaround to get rebooked.