I’ve been Qantassed - Failure to Issue Ticket
 

Hi folks,

I arrived at Oslo airport this morning for a classic rewards flight to London (on BA).

I had made a date change to the flight. This was confirmed verbally by a Qantas agent on the phone, and updated in my Qantas online profile.

When I arrived at the airport, I was informed that the new ticket had not actually been issued. Qantas was unable to reissue the ticket in time, and I missed the flight.

Qantas is offering to book me on a much later flight this evening, which means I miss meetings I’m meant to be at in London.

Any thoughts about whether I have any avenue for compensation?

Many thanks in advance!

Try the complaint and you might be given something. But, you were delayed rather than being totally shafted. There are enough postings floating around on FT and AFF saying you need the ticket number before anything else. So, sympathy on FT will be shallow only :)

FWIW, I’ve been caught out in BKK with a res on AY but no ticket number. AY spent an hour sorting it out for me - it was their fault but I was naieve at the importance of a PNR and a ticket number. I had not checked on the e-ticket Issuing.

Thanks - yes perhaps a bit naive not to have checked this. The rest of the booking has been fine though, so I didn’t suspect there would be an issue. Lesson learned.

As you were on BA, while it is QF fault I expect QF to owe you EU261 and duty of care. Best to post in the excellent BA EU261 thread as they will have the best advice. QF will owe you, but the BA people can guide you.

Great - thanks for this advice!

BA refused to take the person since the person did not have a valid ticket, so it is not liable for EC261 compensation. Since QF was not the operating carrier, it wouldn't be liable under EC261 either I think

Dave, it is an interesting one, which is why I suggested to go to the BA forum. Lots of actual and deep experience over there, and whether to go to MCOL etc. if EU261 was as simple to get around as to have tickets issued by other carriers, I am sure we would have seen some creative solutions by airlines ;-)

let’s let the Op play it out and see where it ends up rather than armchair quarterback it.

Not sure if you saw this recent thread in the Alaska Airlines forum but a similar thing happened to someone else there. Maybe there’s some good advice in that discussion even if your situation isn’t exactly identical?

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/alas...te-ticket.html

a ticket being issued on another carrier's stock does not get around EC261. The issue here was that the ticket had neither been reissued nor revalidated

QF is only a travel agent in this situation. If, for example, this was a situaiton where a ticket was sold by Amex travel (for example) but after a requested change Amex didn't reissue the ticket, it wouldn't be liable under EC261 nor would the operating carrier

There are numerous examples of where a carrier’s failure to issue a ticket even on other carriers due to their internal incompetence does not get them out of EU261. MCOL and CEDR have been clear on this. As long as it is reasonable that the customer can have expected a ticket to be issued. Reasonable does not include being sufficiently savvy to have looked for a ticket number. But just to have received a changed booking.

of course, as I suggested, asking in the excellent BA EU261 thread would provide a more substantive response.

of course if it was Amex, as per the example, or any other TA that dropped the ball rather than an airline, I would be looking for substantially more including consequential damages. Airlines do not pay consequential under EU261. Small claims would be an appropriate channel if not Amexes internal processes that would have for example provided a full refund as I have received in the past.Simple charge back.

KF

Not related to the original problem, but how do I know a ticket has been issued, or re-issued after changes? And also later to check that the ticket is OK? Can I look this up somewhere?
For normal bookings I can get the itinerary sent from the booking page which emails a PDF and together with the passengers lists the ticket number. But this PDF doesn’t have a ticket number on points flights (at least not for Emirates).
Reason to ask, after a delay MH needed to re-issue a ticket for EK flights (booking from QF) and failed 4x - exactly the situation that PNR was available but no ticket. (post from me in MH Forum to understand what happened, but no response yet)

In my experience, with non AA flights, I would use the Finnair manage my booking on their website (https://www.finnair.com/en/manage) and click on the link to send/email the tickets. This will send a fairly accurate ticket info on a single page pdf with ticket number, booking class, price paid, taxes etc. It will also display the "OK" status. It is not fool proof but in most cases is pretty good. That is what I use and works with most OW PNRs. RJ I think also displays the same info but not as neatly.

I'll keep you updated!

Update from Qantas
 

Here's the update from Qantas:

"Regulation EC 261/2004 only applies to non-Community carriers in relation to flights they operate that depart from an airport located within the European Union. Regulation EC 261/2004 does not apply extraterritorially to a non-Community carrier in relation to flights they operate that depart from an airport located outside the European Union. In this regard, please refer to Article 3(1) of the Regulation.

By reason of the above, EC 261/2004 only applies to Qantas for flights that Qantas operates that depart from an airport located within the European Union.

Please refer to https://www.qantas.com/us/en/book-a-...ty-regulations


As such, Qantas denies your claim for compensation under EC261/2004.
We do, however, acknowledge the inconvenience you experienced as a result of the significant delay to your flight and we regret the impact this had on your travel plans."

Suggested next steps? Many thanks!

The response is almost word perfect to what I would have expected

Not having a valid ticket was a valid reason for BA to deny boarding and EC261 doesn't cover an agent failing to issue a ticket

I cannot see any compensation due other than any ex-gratia amount of cash or miles that it might be prepared to give

If you really feel that you have a claim against Qantas, may need to just start action