Qantas complaints in a league of their own, unpublished data shows

afr.com:

The number of Qantas passengers disgruntled about refunds, being unable to use $400 million worth of credits issued since the pandemic, poor service and flight cancellations continued to soar in 2022, as pressure mounts on the government to act on competition in the aviation sector.

A draft document from the Airline Customer Advocate that has been held back from release since April, obtained by The Australian Financial Review, showed the number of complaints about Qantas was sharply higher than pre-COVID-19, even though passenger numbers were much lower.

Qantas receives a disproportionate number of complaints.  Getty

The ACA said eligible complaints rose to 1426, but it received a total of 6918 complaints from customers in 2022. Qantas alone accounted for a disproportionately high 4000 of the total, followed by its subsidiary Jetstar, Virgin Australia and Regional Express.

“This [number of eligible complaints] represents an increase of 138 per cent on the previous year … with complaints relating to COVID-19 impacts, flight delays and cancellations, refund requests, and fees and charges representing the biggest areas for customer dissatisfaction in 2022,” the ACA said.

While the advocate, which is funded by the airlines, said the increase was to be “expected based on the increased volume of passenger numbers with the lifting of COVID-19 restrictions in Australia and internationally”, it was higher than 2018’s 1410 eligible complaints and 2135 total enquiries.

In 2018, the airlines carried 80 million passengers, versus 61 million passengers in 2022. Qantas carried 33 million of those passengers in 2018, and 22 million in 2022.

A Qantas spokesman said the period in question was not representative of the current trend.

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