Australian consumer watchdog calls for record fine against Qantas over canceled flights

[Lee]

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CANBERRA, Australia: Australia's consumer watchdog on Friday called for Qantas Airways to be punished with a record fine for allegedly selling tickets on thousands of flights that had already been canceled.

Gina Cass-Gottlieb, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chairman, said Qantas' penalty for allegedly breaching consumer law should be more than double the Australian record AU$125-million ($81-million) fine imposed on the Volkswagen Group in 2019 for misleading customers about the level of exhaust emissions from its diesel engines.

"We consider that this should be a record penalty for this conduct," Cass-Gottieb told Australian Broadcasting Corp. "We are going to seek a penalty that will underline that this is not just to be a cost of doing business."

"We consider these penalties to have been too low. We think the penalties should be in hundreds of million, not tens of million," she added.

The commission filed a lawsuit against Qantas in the Federal Court on Thursday alleging Australia's flagship airline engaged in false, misleading or deceptive conduct by advertising tickets for more than 8,000 flights from May through July last year that had already been canceled but not removed from sale.

Qantas canceled 1-in-4 flights during the three-month period.

Qantas kept selling tickets on average for more than two weeks after flights were canceled and in some cases up to 47 days, the commission said.

Customers who bought tickets before flights were canceled were informed on average 18 days after the cancellations and in some cases 48 days later.

The result was that customers were left with less time to make alternative bookings and may have paid higher prices to fly at a particular time.

In one case, Qantas sold 21 tickets for a July 29, 2022 service from Sydney to San Francisco up to 40 days after that flight was canceled, the commission said.

Qantas said it would respond in full to the commission's allegations in court.

"We have a long-standing approach to managing cancellations for flights, with a focus on providing customers with rebooking options or refunds. It's a process that is consistent with common practice at many other airlines," a Qantas statement said.

"It's important to note that the period examined by the ACCC between May and July 2022 was a time of unprecedented upheaval for the entire airline industry. All airlines were experiencing well-publicized issues from a very challenging restart, with ongoing border uncertainty, industry-wide staff shortages and fleet availability causing a lot of disruption," Qantas added.

The lawsuit came a week after Qantas posted a record profit for the fiscal year ending June 30, following years of losses due to the pandemic.

Its underlying profit for the year before tax was AU$2.47 billion ($1.6 billion), compared to a AU$1.86-billion ($1.2-billion) loss in the previous year.

Statutory profit after tax for the latest year was AU$1.74 billion ($1.13 billion).

Since Volkswagen made false or misleading representations over 57,000 diesel vehicles imported into Australia during five years to 2015, the penalty for each breach of Australian consumer law has increased from AU$1.1 million ($712,000) to AU$10 million ($6.5 million).

 

 

Australian consumer watchdog calls for record fine against Qantas over canceled flights (msn.com)

[BrettGC]

This on top of their COVID cancellation policies is landing them in a lot of hot water.  At first they refused refunds and only gave credits, then they put a sunset on the credits.  The current and previous governments carried them during the pandemic and as a result they still managed to show record profits almost immediately when the world opened up again and then had the temerity to screw their customers over.  

There's currently a massive class action against them that will probably cost them more than if they'd just refunded the money.  

They also sacked all their groundstaff at the start of the pandemic and re-hired them through a labour hire company for far less money - illegal under general Australian workplace law (Australians would remember the Work Choices debacle under the Howard Government) and the Jobkeeper pandemic provisions.  The unions took them to court and won but by the time that all played out it was too late for many.  A lot of good people and their families were destroyed financially and emotionally and it could have been prevented. 

Alan Joyce (CEO) is worse than the scum on the bottom of your shoe. 

[Clermont]

Well I for one will never fly qantas again, they’ve made a lot of enemies.

[Lee]

21 hours ago, Lee said:

The lawsuit came a week after Qantas posted a record profit for the fiscal year ending June 30

Pretty easy to make a profit when a company sells a service that it will never have to provide and then refuses to refund money for the service that they cancelled.

[OzeMike]

On 9/2/2023 at 6:19 AM, BrettGC said:

This on top of their COVID cancellation policies is landing them in a lot of hot water.  At first they refused refunds and only gave credits, then they put a sunset on the credits.  The current and previous governments carried them during the pandemic and as a result they still managed to show record profits almost immediately when the world opened up again and then had the temerity to screw their customers over.  

There's currently a massive class action against them that will probably cost them more than if they'd just refunded the money.  

They also sacked all their groundstaff at the start of the pandemic and re-hired them through a labour hire company for far less money - illegal under general Australian workplace law (Australians would remember the Work Choices debacle under the Howard Government) and the Jobkeeper pandemic provisions.  The unions took them to court and won but by the time that all played out it was too late for many.  A lot of good people and their families were destroyed financially and emotionally and it could have been prevented. 

Alan Joyce (CEO) is worse than the scum on the bottom of your shoe. 

Agree wholeheartedly Brett...Alan Joyce is a class A hole.

I have lost all trust in Qantas...terrible behavior 

[Lee]

In a related story.

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Qantas CEO steps down as airline falls out of favor

CANBERRA: The boss of Australian airline Qantas said on Tuesday he would leave his job immediately — two months earlier than planned — following a series of embarrassing revelations about the company, including allegations it sold tickets for flights that had already been canceled.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Alan Joyce said that after 15 years running the national carrier, he was bringing forward his planned retirement date.

The airline said Vanessa Hudson would take over as managing director and group chief executive from Wednesday.

The announcement came after a difficult few weeks for Qantas and Joyce. He was grilled by Australian senators last week on flight delays and costs, while a consumer watchdog group announced Thursday it was taking legal action against Qantas and would seek a penalty that would run into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said it was taking the action after Qantas "engaged in false, misleading or deceptive conduct by advertising tickets for more than 8,000 flights that it had already canceled but not removed from sale."

The commission said that in many cases, Qantas continued selling tickets or delayed telling ticket holders the flights had been canceled. That often led customers to have less time to make alternative arrangements and to potentially pay higher prices for new flights, the commission said.

Last month, Qantas announced a record pre-tax annual profit of nearly AU$2.5 billion ($1.6 billion), up from a loss of almost AU$2 billion the previous year.

The airline has since come under pressure to pay back the AU$2.7 billion it received from the Australian government during the coronavirus pandemic.

Qantas Chairman Richard Goyder said the board thanked Joyce for his leadership.

"Alan has always had the best interests of Qantas front and center, and today shows that," Goyder said.

Shareholders will formally vote on the appointment of Hudson as managing director at the company's annual general meeting in November.

Qantas shares rose about 1 percent after the announcement but remained down more than 11 percent from a month ago.

 

 

Qantas CEO steps down as airline falls out of favor (msn.com)

[BrettGC]

5 hours ago, Lee said:

In a related story.

 

Qantas CEO steps down as airline falls out of favor (msn.com)

Coward.  Drops the mess in someone elses lap and cuts and runs.  Too gutless to face the consequence of his own actions.  23 million payout apparently; great message to be sending about corporate malfeasance.  To call him a worm is insulting worms.  Good riddance anyway. 

Gerry Harvey next?  If the pressure is on Qantas to pay back the pandemic support there's going to be a lot of nervous corporate boards in Australia if the precedent is set.  I doubt it will happen though as under the original terms of the payments there was no provision for aquitting the money or returning it if it wasn't required in part or full.  A glaringly stupendous oversight  by the previous government.  Or was it?  In many cases this was a gravy train that should never have been allowed to leave the station without due diligence, but it did.  As a result I can't see how the current government has a leg to stand on with regards to recovering the funds. 

Edited September 6, 2023 by BrettGC

[Onemore52]

But there is more to this, the prime ministers son getting access to the Chairman’s lounge at the same time as Joyce had graffiti painted on two aircraft which coincided with the decision to ban Qatar from getting access to Australia, something stinks here, because of elbows fears of the vote on the voice not going to his devious plan.

Australian politicians not corrupt? Of course they are.

[GeoffH]

Qantas stuffed me around on my trip from Manila to Melbourne via Sydney. My Manila to Sydney flight was delayed then they cancelled my domestic flight putting me on a later flight.  Then when we landed late we had to wait 20 minutes for buses (no gate available).

My comfortable wait at Sydney was turned into a stressful rush where I almost missed my connection, only getting to the gate near the end of boarding.

They're not the airline they were pre covid...

[Onemore52]

Not good mate, I am heading back this afternoon but am not connecting with another flight as I have learned the hard way with DLTB buses breaking down,so I am having a car and driver arranged.

What could possibly go wrong? Touch wood.