Originally Posted by
rheumdoc
Flying Quantas for the first time for son's wedding. Just got downgraded because of A380 issues. Travelling with friends they were put on a different flight and maintained premium economy status. Am going to be like a pretzel - Quantas couldn't give a damn and will get a minimal refund. Has anyone got anything positive to say about Quantas - have flown other airlines n the past - this is my worst customer service experience- very charming on the phone - - but couldn't give a damn. They did offer alternative days and routes but couldn't guarantee that those flights would not be changed and downgraded too, and we would be cutting it too close to the wedding. Would love to hear what Quantas has to say
Firstly welcome to FT.
Not sure if you are aware, but there is no airline called Q
uantas. The airline is called 'Qantas' without the 'u'. The name comes from
Queensland
and
Northern
Territory
Aerial
Service.
Needless to say, the recent RR incident on QF32, and the consequent grounding of the carrier's A380 fleet has put an extreme amount of pressure on the QF fleet. Many flights that the carrier have been disrupted as aircraft have been moved around the network in order to move the greatest volume of passengers. It was inevitable that downgrades were going to occur.
If you read some of the threads, some passengers have received worse downgrades than yourself, which is something that could not be helped. This situation looks likely to remain for the next couple of days at least, and remember that QF will now be short one A380 aircraft for quite a number of months. This will of course mean continuing disruption to some extent.
As you had been offered alternative dates which would have provided you with the cabin you were originally booked in, I'm not sure that they could do terribly much more for you, especially since you chose to stick to the original dates in your booking. Personally I think you have managed to get off fairly lightly considering the tens of thousands of passengers affected. Remember that QF don't just have spare aircraft sitting around.
Suggest you write a polite letter to Customer Relations / Customer Care upon completing your journey, outlining the situation, although keeping in mind all of the above. Details of how to contact them are found on the following web page:
http://www.qantas.com.au/travel/airl...ther/global/en