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QF flag of convenience

Old 29th Jan 2012, 10:56
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QF flag of convenience

Anyone know what the legalities are of purchasing a full fare QF ticket and ending up on a foreign crewed/registered/maintained Jetstar aircraft?

Sailing awfully close to the wind from a legal point of view I would have thought. QF Group or not.
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Old 29th Jan 2012, 19:47
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Under what circumstances??

Was it booked on the QF website?



Its fairly obvious its Jetstar if it was..
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Old 29th Jan 2012, 21:27
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A bit less obvious for JetConnect flights; you have to hover over the JQ flight number for it to come up saying its operated by JetConnect.

Legal? Why not? Plenty of brands have their product made in various subcontracting or subsidiary factories or hire sub contractors to do the work without the client ever knowing. Not sure why airlines would be different.
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Old 29th Jan 2012, 22:41
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Ticket was purchased on a red tail QF. Flight up Red Tail return flight sorry plane is over sold you are now on jetstar.

So a direct QF economy ticket became a one stop flight on Jestar Asia no food etc. On a foreign registered aircraft.

Is that a breach of contract on behalf of QF?

People dont go and purchase a Lexus only to drive out in a Corolla.
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Old 29th Jan 2012, 22:56
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Originally Posted by ga_trojan
Ticket was purchased on a red tail QF. Flight up Red Tail return flight sorry plane is over sold you are now on jetstar.

So a direct QF economy ticket became a one stop flight on Jestar Asia no food etc. On a foreign registered aircraft.

Is that a breach of contract on behalf of QF?

People dont go and purchase a Lexus only to drive out in a Corolla.
JQ7/8 is not Jetstar asia, it's Jetstar International, therefore Australian registered ASFAIK.
When you get bumped down to Jetstar, you normally get food and amenities supplied, just like the jetstar punters that paid for that stuff in advance.
Tech crew are Aust based as is the purser.
Rest of the cabin crew are SIN based.

Yeah it's a 332 not a 388 and a 5 minute increase in planned flight time but not quite as bad as you make it out to be ga_trojan?
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Old 30th Jan 2012, 00:41
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I was using JQ7/8 as an eg for the website...
No idea what he was actually on.

Search conditions of carriage on their website.

Under the circumstances you have mentioned you should be able to seek compensation from Qantas.

From a technical standpoint, the conditions of carriage you agree to when making the booking do specify that QF are only contractually obligated to get you from A to B. Times and specific flight services do not form part of the contract.
They also reserve the right to oversell the flight, in which case providing you are at check-in on time you should be accommodated on their next available service. If those arrangements are not deemed acceptable by yourself then you are entitled to the 'denied boarding compensation policy' available on request.
I don't really know what that policy details.

You can argue the definitions at the beginning of the conditions of carriage imply our next service to be 'qantas, qantaslink and jetconnect' and by putting you on 3K/JQ they breached their contract with you.

Read over the terms of carriage and then contact customer care quoting the relevant sections they breached and you will probably get something from them.
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Old 30th Jan 2012, 01:12
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Two different things going on here:

1) The flight was overbooked and you were bumped.
2) Instead of QF, you took the JQ option.

Basically, 1) is quite common, they are allowed to do it and it is how they keep the fares down. If you are unlucky enough, they put you on a flight (much) later. Don't like it? Full-fare paying customers don't get bumped.

In this case, though it may not have sounded as such, you were given the option of flying on another airline and you took it. You could probably have asked for another "real" QF flight, but it would have been later.

I certainly would write to QF and complain about the extra stop and lack of food. Good chance they'll give you a voucher or deposit some miles into your account.

But as far as "legal" goes, I don't think they have done anything wrong. Their plan didn't come together for whatever reason and they did they best to get everyone where they wanted to go as quickly as they could.

People dont go and purchase a Lexus only to drive out in a Corolla.
No, but they do reserve a "Lexus or similar" from the rental place and end up in a Corolla. ;-)
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Old 31st Jan 2012, 02:15
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the conditions of carriage you agree to when making the booking do specify that QF are only contractually obligated to get you from A to B
Not quie true... QF are not obliged to carry you anywhere according to the fine print on tickets. A ticket is just a receipt for money.
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Old 31st Jan 2012, 09:47
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True, they do have the right to refuse you travel for whatever reason they see fit. The point was, assuming you don't say/do something stupid, times and specific flight services are not part of the contract you agree to. Only flying from A to B.
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Old 31st Jan 2012, 12:53
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A "contract" is one thing, but under Fair Trading legislation what you offer the customer either implied in advertising or represent in a way that a reasonable person would expect it, then that is what you sold. Proving what is what is another matter, but in general it comes down to how the "product" was represented.

I work in Telco, so fair trading is something that they hammer in because the ACCC takes such an interest in it. Advertising things like "unlimited data" gets smacked down because in reality the fine print says you get throttled or have excess charges, which is not really "unlimited". Other far more subtle issues come up with the way products are advertised versus how the contract plays out - even things like wording such as "premium" or "discount" if they imply something the contract does not deliver or does not deliver as you expect. There is also laws about bait advertising etc.

In my view, if you go to Qantas to buy a ticket from A to B, you do it because their advertising shows you the nice planes and the smiling hosties and people relaxing in a happy cabin. It is a "premium" product even if you are flying economy, versus the "cheap fare" product they also offer. As you bought the premium product, that is what you expect. If you don't get that as a reasonable customer, regardless of the reason, they are obliged to make up for it i.e partial refund or some other offering.

Most reasonable people would understand a flight being delayed or a maintenance isssue, and might just be happy to get to their destination, so no real issue. Still, I think it would be at least good customer service to do something to make up for the shortfall between a cheap and premium service.

Now, if they are selling seats knowing full well they are going to bump people to a cheap alternative, then that could be viewed as bait advertising (big smacks) - good luck proving it though.

I don't think any of this would apply to something like JitConnict because its more of a subsidiary service at the same level, rather than a separate product they are trying to shift you onto.
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Old 31st Jan 2012, 19:58
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It's called code sharing - been going on for 40+years worldwide. recently rebooked on an asian carrier after the Beluga connection in SYD was missed due to late out of BNE.

You are not buying the seat on an airline. There is no ownership. You are renting space.
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Old 31st Jan 2012, 20:45
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The rules and sale conditions of international travel on QF are contained in the International Air Services Commision Act as QF and any Australian international carrier works under this Act. The details that you require should be on the IASC website.From memory, the IASC have passed on the consumer side to the ACCC.
A bit of web research on these 2 sites should give you an answer.
Wunwing
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Old 1st Feb 2012, 23:53
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Ever gone to catch a train and found a bus service running due to work on the track?
Ever had your plane break down and thankfully get put on another airline to get home?
I think there is only a problem if there was an intent to deceive you on which flight you would be buying. As always you have to read the small print.
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