Qantas ‘Code-Share’ is code for ‘We take No Responsibility’.

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Warning – First world problem / Rant Follows: Just over a month ago I rang Qantas to ask about the upgrade status for my upcoming flight to South America. The flight was booked eleven months ago and was registered for a points upgrade to business. The conversation that follows with the Qantas Premium help desk would be hilarious if it wasn’t so pathetic. Before I could even get through to a human being I was kept on hold for 25 minutes (remember this is their premium help desk). The conversation went like this (after I had input my Frequent Flyer number, personal pin and selected the options I wanted):

Me: Can you please tell me the status of the upgrade request for my flight to South America tomorrow? (I had already provided my booking reference number and flight numbers, phone number, address etc. all to be ‘verified’.

Qantas: Certainly. I see you are on a QF flight number that is code-share with Latam. Therefore, according to our terms and conditions there is no upgrade possible.

Me: Huh? But, I booked a Qantas flight?

Qantas: Yes, I can see that, but we have cancelled that flight and have put you on the code-share flight with Latam. Qantas are not operating a flight anymore on the day of your departure.

Me: But I specifically booked a Qantas flight at the time of the original booking to get the points upgrade as a platinum frequent flyer. You can even see on your own Qantas website the option to select ‘upgrade’!

Qantas: Yes, I can see that, but I am sorry there is nothing we can do. You can try contacting Latam.

Me: If I ring Latam they are going to tell me they cant help me because I am booked on a Qantas ticket.

Qantas: Well… Yes thats correct.

Me: So you are telling me that not only can you not help me, but that Latam cant either. Is that correct?

Qantas: Sorry, thats correct. You are on a code-share flight.

Me: (Getting frustrated now) Look, and please listen, so I don’t have to repeat myself. I deliberately booked a Qantas flight with a QF flight number as a platinum frequent flyer specifically so that I could upgrade to business. If I knew you were going to cancel the Qantas flight, put me on a Latam flight and subsequently deny my upgrade I would have purchased a business seat outright to begin with; or simply, booked directly with Latam.

Qantas: I understand Sir, but you are now on a code-share with Latam.

Me: Ok, (big sigh) we don’t seem to be getting anywhere here. Please tell me how much it is to upgrade my seat to business. Ill just pay for it and chalk this up to experience not to rely on your upgrade system in the future.

Qantas: Let me check (puts me on hold for twelve minutes). Sir, there are no business class seats available.

Me: Did you check with Latam or did you just look for seats allocated to Qantas?

Qantas: I can check with Latam if you wish?

Me: Yes please.

Qantas: Ok (puts me on hold for another fifteen minutes). I cant get hold of anyone at Latam.

Me: (audible groan). Ok, look, I don’t want to go around in circles on this. I just want to be clear that my original booking was a Qantas flight with a QF flight number. Is that correct?

Qantas: Yes.

Me: And I was registered for the upgrade?

Qantas: Yes, I can see you were first in the cue to be upgraded and that you had sufficient points.

Me: And Qantas cancelled the flight and decided to code-share with Latam? (guess they didn’t have enough bookings on the flight to make money)

Qantas: Yes

Me: At which point you no longer accept any responsibility for my registered upgrade?

Qantas: Its a codeshare flight with Latam Sir. As per our terms and conditions code-share flights are not eligible for upgrades.

Me: (Somewhat agitated by this point) Which leaves me with without the possibility of an upgrade, despite the fact I registered for it on a Qantas Flight. And it leaves me without any recourse with Latam who wont deal with me because I am on a Qantas ticket.

Qantas: There is nothing else I can do.

Me: But you haven’t done anything yet?

Qantas: Thats not true, I have told you I cant help you because you are on a code-share flight.

Me: Did you seriously just say that?

Qantas: Sir…

Me: Look, I have lost the better part of an hour of my life dealing with Qantas this morning. I am no better off than I was before the phone call, in fact, the situation is worse because you have frustrated me further. At least I have arrived at the pointy end of my situation realised the folly of it all.

Qantas: What do you mean?

Me: I mean Code-share is code for no one takes responsibility. You wont help me, and Latam wont help me. No one is taking responsibility. Do you have a supervisor there who has any authority to act?

Qantas: Let me check (Puts me on hold for another seven minutes) There is no supervisor available right now.

Me: Look, do you have anyone there in your office prepared to actually take some responsibility?

Qantas: Its not about responsibility sir, its about the fact that you on a code-share flight.

Me: Goodbye. Click.

As you can see I became more than a little frustrated during the course of the conversation with the representative from Qantas. When I arrived at the airport on departure day I personally checked with both Qantas and Latam desks to see if there were any seats available in business (either paying or points) and was told that the flight was totally sold out. If this had been the end of the story I probably would have just let it go, but the story did not end here. When I boarded the plane and the final door was closed ready for take off I stuck my head into business to find it half empty.

Further frustrated by being blatantly lied to I checked with both Qantas and Latam again at the next stop in Auckland. Qantas were beyond useless and simply repeated the ‘code-share’ story and told me the flight was sold out. Latam at least checked to see if there were seats available; which I was again told no, the next segment is also sold out.

Boarding for departure to Santiago I yet again discovered on take off that business was only about half full. I decided at this point to try and see the humour in the situation and simply document the experience in the hope that perhaps someone at Qantas might actually read of my experience and act on it. Subsequently, I sent this entire post to Qantas more than three weeks ago and have not received a single reply to even acknowledge receipt.

I admit, the above is definitely a first world problem. And in light of everything going on in the world it is going to seem trivial or even petty to many, but when you fly as much as I do these sort of things count. Beyond the triviality of it all though is the outright appalling lack of service and responsibility taken by what is supposed to be Australia’s premiere airline. All I can say is I am very pleased with my decision to switch to Emirates wherever possible and that Qantas is going to have to work extremely hard to win me back as a customer.

If Qantas do ever decide to get back to me I will follow up on this post with their response. I am not holding my breath though……

7 thoughts on “Qantas ‘Code-Share’ is code for ‘We take No Responsibility’.”

  1. I thought I was the only one who had to deal with this type of nonsense and scripted replies from “customer service” agents.

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  2. Joshua,

    I do a fair amount of corporate interaction regarding service. I also have a colleague who is one of the top speakers/trainers to corporations regarding performance. Would you allow us to reprint your post so we can share it with the corporations we work with?

    I’m sure Qantas would love to be featured to Fortune 1000 companies around the world who fly their airline and be held up as a company with no responsibility.

    Really enjoy your site and posts. Thanks for the effort!
    Bill

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  3. Qantas Has let me down so many times. I am not surprised. Legislation should change to end this fraudulent kind of behavior.

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  4. Emirates no good too . Codeshare basically is a tool for shifting blame to no one , shame on them!

    Qantas codeshare with Emirates , which means my flight ticket was provided by Qantas, but the flight operated by Emirates. Seriously, no one able to help you if there’s flight cancellations/ delayed. Everyone blame everyone else , qantas said it was Emirates flight while Emirates said it was Qantas ticket . Please take this point into consideration if you are going to flying with “codeshare” !

    I had a terrible experience with Emirates Ground Services at Singapore Airport.

    I would like to emphasise that the flight we booked was from the same group booking ,same airline ( Emirates) from Melbourne to Kuala Lumpur via Singapore and then back to Melbourne from Kuala Lumpur via Singapore. 

    On 27/6/24, My family and me took Emirates Flight from Melbourne to Kuala Lumpur via Singapore, by carrying 2 units of airwheels onboard with no issue.

    On returning flight of 13/7/2024, we were stranded at the check-in counter in Singapore airport at local time 9am. We were supposed to check in for our Melbourne flight departing at 10.25am. Suddenly, the Emirates ground staff ( Brent) told us that we are not allowed to bring airwheels onboard due to the battery capacity has been categorised as dangerous goods. He showed us a piece of paper that states Lithium batteries considered as dangerous goods. 

    For some  inexplicable reasons, our mind went completely blank . This is because we got permission from Emirates ground staff in Melbourne prior to departure, that enables us to carry airwheels  onboard. They only required us to get the batteries detached from the airwheels and stored the batteries in another carry-on suitcase. We explained that was what we had been told by Emirates Ground Services in Melbourne Airport. We also tried to clarify the situation by asking Brent why Emirates ground staff at Melbourne airport allowed us , given that both flights are from the same airline?  

    He said: “MELBOURNE IS MELBOURNE , SINGAPORE IS SINGAPORE, SINGAPORE IS VERY STRICT “ ! 

    We were completely SPEECHLESS! 

    Imagine if you were the passenger , how did you feel when you first heard about this? In that moment I realised how vulnerable flight passengers could be !

    Regardless of what we said, Brent started to give us the cold shoulder and quit listening. He was just sitting there and you can read his face “THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ME”!  

    Because of his “ DEIGN to work” behaviour, making us felt so lost and confused .

    By looking at our children, we knew that we must took the initiative in order to get onto the flight. We agreed to dispose of the batteries at the airport but he said it was not possible even if we had thrown the batteries away.

    We asked Brent again if there’s any solution for this situation, he informed us to store the airwheels at baggage storage in Jewel. However, he added that we had only 10 minutes to do so because he was going to close the counter at 9.25am local time. It was 9.15am when he suggested the alternative. It was impossible to do that in time. We begged him to extend the check-in time by 10 mins so that we could drop off the airwheels at the baggage storage. Unfortunately,He blithely ignored about our concerns and refused to extend check-in time. Out of desperation, we decided to dispose of the two airwheels at the airport just to be in time for the flight. But Brent denied us because we are not allowed to leave our belongings in the airport due to security reason. 

    Imagine if you were the passenger, what could you do? 

    When we were still trying to approach Brent for another solutions, he immediately shut us down and refused to check us in . He said that it was 9.25am , check-in counter closed. Brent had cancelled our flight without our consent ! He also refused to provide us a piece of paper with a reason why our flight being canceled when I made a request for a statement . Brent caused us to miss the flight and just walked away. He seemed so aloof and detached when he left.

    By standing in the front of ‘empty’ check-in counter , we felt abandoned .We were in desperate need for someone who can come up with a solution. Unfortunately, we were so out of reach, no one come to help us.We didn’t even know who is the person in charge at the check-in counter. The only person that we had ever dealt with was Brent who had already left us behind. We ceaselessly ran all over the airport in order to get assistance .Sadly,everyone had essentially ignored us and no one ever reached out to us directly . It seems like there is no connection between the airline and the airport.  

    We contacted every customer service (Emirates, Qantas, AMEX) as we bought the tickets through AMEX. Qantas was the provider and Emirates was the Star Alliance flight. Everyone was pushing the blame on each other.  The system was completely fragmented. When we asked for an official letter regarding the issue to claim insurance, not a single party (Emirates and Qantas customer service) was willing to help or issue anything for us. We didn’t have a choice but to purchase a new tickets. 

    There is misinterpretation and misleading between ground staff in Melbourne and Singapore that causes us to miss the flight. It is absolutely unfair and unacceptable to let passengers to suffer in such circumstances. 

    I tried to lodge a claim online via Emirates Website, unfortunately the ticket is invalid. I contacted them and they said I should send my compensation to Qantas as they are just a codeshares while my ticket is provided from Qantas. 

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  5. I have just experienced the same, trying to upgrade to business on a QANTAS codeshare flight with LATAM Santiago to Sydney. I have since checked the costs for the same flight depending if you book through QANTAS or LATAM. Are you aware that QANTAS charges approximately twice what LATAM charges for the same seat and flight? I would expect that part of the reason is that there are other benefits such as access to QANTAS lounge, upgrades etc which do not flow through to LATAM customers. To my way of thinking QANTAS has charged you the higher price with all the frills and then off loaded you the the no frills LATAM service and have not compensated you for the difference in fares. I would be pushing for a part refunds because they did not deliver what you paid for. I can be like a dog with a bone when I believe I have been ripped off. What airlines try to get away with stinks.

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