Brewsterz

I booked a flight with Jetstar from Bangkok to Perth return on the internet. BKK-SIN-PER and PER-MEL-BKK. I never received the email confirmation for this booking, and I called Jetstar to ask them and they said that they had problems with the email system, but they would send it again. I suspected a problem from this point, as nothing came through. The inbound routing of PER-MEL-BKK, also seemed odd to me.

The outbound flight was fine. I had an amazing holiday in beautiful WA. I tried to check in online in Perth as my flight home departed at 6.10am. The Jetstar website said I had been put on standby for the first flight – which really worried me, as I had a supposedly confirmed reservation. I knew the flight from PER to MEL was actually a Qantas Citiflyer flight as a code share with Jetstar.

Anyway, I went to Perth airport at 4.30am for the flight from PER to MEL and waited in the queue and was seen at 5am. I handed in my Jetstar itinerary, clearly stating that I was on PER-MEL QF480, which was, to my relief displayed as a Jetstar code share on the screens at Perth. The check in assistant took 30 minutes looking around and calling people, before she told me I was not booked on the flight and that I couldn’t check in. I needed to ring Jetstar...at 5.30am on a Sunday morning and would not help me.

I had no choice but to get my connection from MEL to BKK to get to work, so I absolutely had to go onto QF480 – a flight on which I had a confirmed reservation and itinerary in my hand... The check in lady said I had to go to the Qantas Sales Desk, which I did and she just started to repeat everything that the check in girl had said. That I was not allowed on the flight, as there was no booking for me – Jetstar “had not paid the money for the flight”. This being something that I certainly could do nothing about... Despite my Jetstar itinerary that clearly showed that I had paid to go on the QF480 as the code share. The whole scene was ludicrous. I had my booking on JQ6480 in my hand and that was the flight that was being checked in.

They said that ‘my only option’ was to buy a ticket from Qantas – and, this is the best bit – that the flight was now closing in 8 minutes!!! In a Qantas induced panic, I quickly took out my BA Amex card and bought the cheapest one way to MEL which was over 400 AUD! I had no choice to get my connection. I was then advised to run to the baggage drop to check my bag, as if it was all my fault that I was late... It was extremely humiliating and it was still not even 5.30am!

The flight with Qantas was really nice and I enjoyed it, but basically, as I had already paid Jetstar to go on that flight, I had just bought a 428AUD breakfast!

I am trying to get a refund from Qantas, as we speak...

nonce

I don't quite understand, how is this QF's fault? This is an arms length commercial codeshare agreement between JQ and QF, which is no different to say a BA and QF codeshare flight. If JQ hadn't paid QF for the ticket then you need to take this up with JQ and/ or your credit card company/ travel insurance company. Many a year ago my brother had a similiar issue with CX who didn't endorse the connecting AS segment correctly and as a result he was denied boarding by AS. He didn't get cranky with AS but with the CX.

thadocta

The difference I see between the experience posted by the OP and your experience with AS/CX is that QF (the group, not the airline) likes to paint itself as one totally seamless experience when it suits them (hey look, we are all part of the Qantas group, we have the same maintenance standards, the same customer service focus, the same financial stability, all of that), but when it doesn't suit them they start with the whole "Hey look, we are two seperate airlines, it isn't our fault that one part of the Qantas group - JQ - failed to remit monies to another part of the Qantas group - QF" line.

I just don't buy it, JQ are relying on being part of QF for a whole range of things - credit rating, favourable interest rates, favourable purchasing terms, yet they quickly get rid of the QF linkage when it suits them (such as not paying for seats on QF aircraft which they codeshare on).

I think the OP has a point.

Although, having said that, this strikes me as a weird sort of code-share arrangement, whereby JQ (part of the QF group) has to pay QF (another part of the QF group) for each and every seat on a QF flight sold under the JQ code, and that failing to pay for the seat from one part of the QF group to another part of the QF group results in the passenger being denied boarding.

I can't see this happening, and I think there was some sort of system error and the agents were merely buck-passing.

Dave

Dave Noble

I cannot see how you can expect to get a refund from Qantas; the problem is with Jetstar not confirming you on the flight and it is from Jetstar that a refund is due. Referring to a "Qantas induced panic" , would you rather that they had not told you that the flight would be closing and just let you miss the deadline?

Do you have travel insurance that may cover this eventuality?

Dave

harryhv

Encountered the same pantomime of finger-pointing between QF and JQ with a reschedule of a PER-OOL booking made on the QF site.

JQ rescheduled their SYD-OOL so the QF PER-SYD sector was now too late to connect.

QF - who had sold me the ticket - refused point-blank to fix it; the agent and supervisor both told me that it's not their problem if they've sold a ticket which has become worthless due to a JQ reschedule. This is entirely the customer's problem, as though I had 2 separate bookings.

If I actually wanted to travel that day I would have to pay the QF change fee and up-fare for a new earlier QF flight to connect to the rescheduled JQ flight.

For the OP's case it's clear what to do, an immediate credit-card dispute of the $400 plus a complaint to the department of Fair Trading.

aurigakb

Agree with thedocta!

Sorry to hear about the OP's situation. I guess it is important to check and double check everything, preferably from different sources.

nonce

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5H11 Safari/525.20)

You cannot make a complaint to DFT without attempting to resolve the issue yourself first. It is the first question the DFT officer will ask. It also cost $$$ to go to DFT. Much better to attempt to resolve via JQ and credit card company first.

What I object to is people are willing to take the LCC fare from JQ because they think big brother QF will bail them out if there is an issue. No where have I read that JQ are saying this. JQ is run as a standalone business and works with QF on commercial terms as any airline does from an operations perspective. This is no different than any other commercial codeshare agreement. What suits JQ is they do have a big brother they can leverage as needed but this is not and should not be relied on. It is a bit like buying something at coles and trying to return it to Bunnings as they are all part of Westfarmers and both leverage the same supply chain.

perthite

I am just going to ask at this point, and extending thadocta's writings even further to Jetstar, and the way things get portrayed.

Which Jetstar should it be taken up with? The first segment that was flown seems be my reading to be BKK-SIN, which I would guess was a 3K flight. If 3K ticketed the flight, would that be where the claim should be.

Presumably, if 3K issued the ticket, then 3K pay JQ who pay QF!

lokijuh

In theory your are correct.

BUT - just take a moment and go onto the QF website and try and book a fare from PER to OOL. I did this all the way thru to the credit card payment screen. It books these as one fare with one set of pricing (I was surprised that it didn't go the the JQ website for the JQ component). OK those of us who frequent these sort of forums probably do know better but for 99.9% of the population who don't, the booking process falsely gives the impression of both flights being on the same itinerary if not the same ticket and that if one flight moved the selling airline (ie Qantas) would take care of it for you. There is no warning given that "Jetstar is Low Cost Carrier and if there is a schedule change any change to the Qantas flight will be at your own expense" - that might be detrimental to sales.

As has been pointed out QF/JQ play up their relationship when it suits them (such as selling what appears to be a throughfare on the website), but adhere to the "separate airlines" line when it doesn't suit them.

In short the solution for flying routes like PER-SYD-OOL is purchase a throughfare on Virgin Blue.

And as for the OP, a Qantas claim will rightly be fruitless. Jetstar is the "at fault" airline in this circumstance.

turtlemichael

If you are talking about the OP, I think that is a little harsh. If not talking about him then I can't see it's relevance

There is no evidence at all that he had in mind that QF would "bail him out" when he bought the ticket. He is seeking a refund from QF I think because he had to pay them extra after some sort of failure in the commercial arrangement between JQ and QF. May be misguided and there may be better ways to get a refund, but his approach doesn't seen unreasonable in the first instance and certainly not worthy of a slight to his motivation.

Brewsterz

As ever interesting responses - thank you.

I should have mentioned that I have written to Qantas and Jetstar equally.

I am quite certain that I had already paid to go on that flight and was forced basically to pay again... That is grounds for a refund in my mind, I don't really care where it comes from.

You might be interested to know that I was actually told by the Jetstar personnel at Melbourne that Qantas were exactly the people that I had to apply for a refund to, and infact given the Mascot NSW address to which to address my complaint. But I guess they would say that, wouldn't they?

There is no issue with me choosing to fly LCC - I paid the money and expected the level of service that they offer - ie: being able to sit on the flight from A to B and not much else, but I was denied that.

moa999

And note that QF own less than 50% of 3K with whom the ticket was presumably booked (the OP commencing in SIN)

Think they had 40% of OrangeStar, now potentially going to 49% of the new HoldCo

TravelTil

Hindsight is 20/20 they say, but as the OLCI gave the error message with the standby info, would a call to Jetstar have been in order to determine if there was a problem with the flight the night before?

After a bad experience with Jetstar previously changing flight times, I tend to expect that something will go wrong

Lonely Flyer

Hang on the only way he could fly into OOL is on Jetstar if he sticks with a QF group airline so do not pick on him for picking an LCC. Both QF and JQ have an obligation here and as they are related companies can both be dealt with as responsible if there is a breach of the TPA. I would certainly have them both as defendants.

Now the OP says an awful experience. I was suspecting he was served a warm beer in the QC or on board. That would be awful. He had a screw up and this happens in the best of businesses. Go at QF and JQ as hard as hell because they should have done better.

Dave Noble

There is no grounds to dispute the charge. The passenger agreed to make the purchase and the transaction was not a mistake or dual charge or otherwise unauthorised

If anything, to proffer a credit card with the intent to dispute would be closer to fraud on the customer's side ( obtaining goods or services without payment ) and I would doubt that once QF provides a copy of the purchase slip with customer signature that the CC company would uphold the dispute

As far as QF goes, as far as it concerned them, there was no ticket for the flight and so quite validly refused to take the passenger. The issue is with whoever the ticket was purchased from

Dave