Checking validity of QF email address
 

I received a QF email with special deals / offers etc this morning. It wanted replies to the following email address:

Qantas Frequent Flyer <[email protected]>

I am curious that QF is using a .net.au email. Usually it is a .com.au

Upon phoning QF to ask to speak to someone in IT who could verify the email address as valid, the friendly switchboard operator said "you'll have to give me a real name - we have so many IT people, I can't transfer you without a name". Surely she has a list that says: "public enquiries person, manager, slave, or whatever.

Can anyone comment on whether this is likely to be an OK email response address.

Dont know - looks suspicious.

That said I never bother replying to those emails as usually reply doesnt go to anyone. Better to use a specific contact or phone up if have questions.

og, the reply address seems to be unique for each recipient. Mine is the same for the first part (25.10228), but the last section is a different number to yours, and so was Mrs NM's email. So I suspect they are using that as a way of tracking who is replying to their email.

But the only reason I could find for replying to the email is to unsubscribe. Otherwise all the information sections contains web URL links for further information.

I would not be concerned by the reply address. QF bought the qantas.net.au domain name a long time ago and this is a legitimate use of it in my opinion.

I have a different reply address as well.

In fact I received three of these (I have emails fowarded to my work automatically) and they all had slightly different content.

My subject was [AU QC G] Massive Australia-wide seat sale and Dec e-news .

Mrs Serfty was similar but started with [AU QC B] ... and Mini Serfty had [AU FF B] ...

(I reckon they have this wrong, it should be OZ SG for me, OZ QP NB for Mrs & OZ NB for mini :D )

But then you might get confused why Asiana is sending email from qantas.net?

InternetTechnically speaking, the unique reply emails are most likely used to handle bounced emails. The server will parse the bounced email and simply remove, or alert QF to the email address that didn't work. This is often used in mailing list management software and has been around for years. It can also be used to track who is

a) replying to emails
b) opening emails, if using html

This technique was used by spammers in 2001-2002.
Hope this helps!