NEVER USE QATAR AIRWAYS AND QATAR HOLIDAYS
Dear All,
We are posting this with an intention to help all travellers that are travelling with Qatar airways and Qatar Holidays so they don’t end-up in the same situation that we did last night.
And the story goes like this:
Me and my husband booked and paid a holiday package for Eid holidays with Qatar Holidays for Singapore, beginning August 2009. We knew that we will have 3 to 4 days of holidays, and we planned it very well, so we can use as much time as possible. After arriving at the Doha Intl. Airport, of course on time (2 hours before departure), we were informed that there are no seats for us even though we have tickets for the flight, and we were told to wait because maybe there will be some free seats in business class. After one hour of waiting, and no seats in business class available they finally started to search for a seat or for an alternative. Seat we did not get (of course they told us that it is not possible to get a seat when our plain took of) but they gave us some alternatives, which involved change of flights, flying with lower class plains, moving our flight for another day which was all unacceptable. All the time Qatar airways personal behaved like they are doing us a favour and that we are the guilty ones and not them, and the thing is that they tricked us with selling us a ticket without providing us our seats. The worst thing is that we were not the only ones with the same problem.
Now we have to plan how we are going to spend our holiday here in Doha. We hope that Qatar airways and Qatar Holidays will give us our money back, but they can never give us our holiday back as well as to remove all the stress that we had to go through.
Hi. I'm planning on using this holiday package. Can I trust this package? Since its been 6 years?
If you visit the Privilege Club website, you'll see where the problem starts.
Here is one of the Gold benefits:
"Guaranteed Economy Class seat
As a Gold member, if you are unable to buy a ticket because all classes of travel are sold out, Qatar Airways will guarantee you an Economy Class seat, provided you book a full economy fare and your booking is made at least 48 hours in advance of the flight. "
http://www.qmiles.com/about_prog_benefits_gold.html?linkap20
So even if the flight is 100% full, a Gold Member can ALWAYS buy a seat in economy and be guarenteed a ticket, while other, less frequent travellers, will be bumped off.
I think we can say which sort of people this policy favors, and who it adversely impacts.
Actually most airlines around the world overbook, its a common practise. Statistics tell them a certain % of passengers will not turn up for any given flight. So they maximise their revenue even if they have to pay compensation for some people that are inconvienced.
... does an airline which OVERBOOKS seem to exist!!! There is no such thing as overbooking! There is sale of seating capacity, THEN waitlists to cover those who have not yet paid for their tickets and might cancel them.
Of course somewhere along the line there has been backhand money to get on the flights. Just a shame that the family who created this topic had to go through that. Compensation should be HIGH! Please keep us updated about the outcome.
QA sucks, literally! I lived in Abu Dhabi 4 years and have many friends working for Etihad and all I can say is take a lesson from them, THAT for sure IS a 5 star airline!!!
QA is really disgusting.
Had the same experience last year.
I was about to fly back from Manila to Doha.
I was like 2 hours before the flight.
When i was on the line, the flight attendant, took time to arrange my boarding pass telling me there was confusion about my boarding meal. imagine 'boarding meal' problem?!?! i cant remember her excuses, but that was just damn excuse or she was trying to fool me. So i waited.
Then, there was three people who came in rushing manner.
After a while, they got their boarding pass and rush to get inside. Then the flight attendant told me that theres no more seat. And its not only me, there were about 10 people out there who were left behind.
All of us got pissed off and of course created fuss out of it. confrontation here, argument there.
Later on, they admit their mistake of accepting too much booking despite limited seats. Wow, that was freaking s#!t!
I guess they really prioritize some passengers than others! in what way, i dont know. but i guess, those passengers that were book to well-known travel agencies that those who booked personally, but im not saying im correct. But as they say, one must do the 'flight confirmation' thing either thru phone call or internet.
But anyhow, they manage to provide us another booking.
But sadly, we have to go manila-cebu-doha connecting flights. almost 20 hours flight!
When i came to doha, the flight made me sick coz i cant normally sleep during flights. im not used to that. it was so stressful.
Hope QA be more mean to people and dont make over bookings. They should know basically their limitations.
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Women's Rights Are Human Rights
Famous Speech by Hillary Clinton
Guys thanks for your comments. We will see what will happen tomorrow when we get there at Qatar Holidays. This is the first time we hear for overbooking and this kind of problems, and it is not the first time we are travelling.
The thing is that if you take a full package with some travel agency (in this case Qatar Holidays) and you pay them full amount 1.5 months in advance then you should not think about things like seat availability, transfer to hotel availability, room availability etc. In my opinion that is how the things should work. We cannot escape from the feeling that somebody tricked us very much last night. It is because until the plane departed they were telling us, after we insisted to board on the same flight, that they will find us a seat. The funny thing was that one guy (told to be a manager of all those trip supervisors) even told us not to speak with other passengers that were having the same problem. Allegedly he left somewhere to look for our seats and of course never came back, not even to tell us that we are not boarding. What to say – no comment.
One thing more I want to mention - last night we called emergency number in Qatar Holidays 3 times and nobody answered. They called us this morning at 8:15am. What kind of emergency number is that? Maybe this is another thing that we should know – agency emergency number is working from 8am till 8 in the evening or what?
ALWAYS confirm your seats with QA.
please understand that airlines here are plagued by people wishing to have a flight to somewhere booking every conceivable flight to make sure thy are covered whenever they wish to fly. Until recently airlines accepted this but lately decided to impose a penalty of I think 100Qr for changes. What is that compared with the loss of a holiday for someone else? Best advice is complain loudly. I've had the police called to stop me but it paid dividents, I got an alternate flight. Qatar Airlines is wonderful in the air, best trained flight crews around, on the ground maybe not so good in customer relations, defensive shields go up at every complaint! Persevere and it will be ok!
Mandi,i may not know the rules & regulations of commercial aviation but i do know this,as smoke correctly pointed out,booking/overbooking is one thing & a fully paid for ticket is something else all together...these people bought a holiday package from QR & reached the airport to board their flight...can we safely assume that their seats,hotels,transfers,etc. were already paid for in full?...i think we can...if they've paid for their seats,please explain to me how the airline is losing money weather or not they show up for their flight???...whatever explanations you have about yield management or anyone else in that excuse for an airline not doing their jobs right,it's not a full fare paying passenger's problem...have paid in full for tickets(in this case tickets plus the rest of the package)must have seat to travel...there is & shouldn't be another option unless there's a flight delay or cancellation which wasn't the case here...
Smoke, I agree, the agents should have offered an explanation AND compensation. It's called denied boarding compensation and it is given if the airline cannot get you to your destination within 4 hours of originally scheduled. (It can also be quite lucrative for the passenger.) I also agree that a passenger shouldn't necessarily know all their rights and obligations, but in this case it certainly would have helped. I also agree that it seems reasonable to arrive at an airport 2 hours before an international destination but IF the airlines policy is three hours you can get screwed by not showing up according to their rules. Airlines overbook ALL the time, according to the routes flown because they know from experience that X percent of passengers will not show up for that flight (have you ever changed your plans?) If they fly 1/3 empty, they lose any profitability. I have a feeling that the yield management department in QR is not doing a great job in calculating their overbooking factors. I also suspect that the agents are playing fast and loose with the very specific rules about what to do in an over-sold situation. Denied boarding is supposed to be in strict accordance with guidelines. First, non-rev (industry) passengers come off. Then passengers are offered compensation to voluntarily give up their seats for a later flight. If not enough volunteers are found then award tickets are bumped. Then those who didn't meet the guidelines (i.e., show up late.) Then they take from the bottom of the fare categories. It does NO good to complain to the airline that the flight was oversold, they will say, so what, it's legal. But if you show them that the denied boarding procedures were not followed and you will file a complaint - THAT will get attention and compensation. Again, I suggest, know your rights and know airline procedures. It's in YOUR best interest.
Mandi
Which also brings me to who do they give preference to when they over book? Booking isnt the same as buying the ticket is it? If a plane can carry 200 passengers i'm sure all 200 would have bought a ticket to travel coz their policy is if you have to fly on that day u need to buy a ticket well in advance right? so now they over book by say another 50 passengers who also buy tickets and wont get to travel and they very well know that and will be a kick in the arse to run around for refunds.
Good Fortune always comes knocking at your door...when you are sh*tting in the toilet!! :)
_[]~SMoKE~[]_
I feel really sorry for the original poster. Holiday turn to a nightmare.
The matter here is that the person WAS THERE at the airport 2 hours before the flight so she/he should have had a seat period.
Good Fortune always comes knocking at your door...when you are sh*tting in the toilet!! :)
_[]~SMoKE~[]_
I second you smoke, if they take my money ... means there will be A SEAT empty allocated for me regardless wherever it is in the plane.
To Mandi: I'm sorry but i dont agree with you on this whole "passengers should know" this and that rules. Excuse me? Fine agreed this rule about airlines overbooking, but if a passenger has bought a ticket by paying money and is NOT given a seat i think that is bullshit. A passenger could be delayed here and there but still 2 hours before the flight is an acceptable time to arrive at the airport. I've had such issues with QA before too and yes they do make it look like they are doing the passengers a effing favor.
When u reserve a table at a 5 star restaurant your not supposed to know how to eat with a fork, how the dish is made etc. Not everyone will know these rules of the airlines and its the duty of these airlines employees to explain each and every thing to its passengers. Not everyone that travels by plane knows or even is supposed to know these things. I want to travel to destination A i'm not going break my head by going through airline rules and regulations.
I still dont understand the issue of this overbooking...in the normal world you pay money you buy something. Here you buy the ticket and you dont even have a seat?
Good Fortune always comes knocking at your door...when you are sh*tting in the toilet!! :)
_[]~SMoKE~[]_
in the past have alot of mishaps , problems , delayed with that QR. Crappy airlines. We never touch the airline for years now. Always fly with Emirates.
i work for a travel agency my self as asst sales manager and we alwayz advise to clients not to book with qatar airways holidays bcoz they have really cheap policies to make extra money the policies which they tell to passangers no hotel or airlines have same policies and if u have some refund issue so forget about it for years u will not get it . if u need my advise fly emirates , the right people to fly with and u will definatly feel the difference and what qatar airways holidays offer not a big difference then booking hotel and tickets and transfers , it won't give much benifits ...
i had the same experience even though i took the boarding pass online 6 or 7 hrs b4.bt by luck i gt a seat...n dey said it ws by luck!!;)
I cannot say that I have had bad experience with QA, but then again it has not been anything special.
I have not flown First, but for that I have to recommend TAM
over 3 years of my flying points and even though I kept all the boarding passes it didn't do any good.
I've only been on Qatar Airways once and luckily had no problems, although I also thought the self-promoted 5 star rating was undeserved.
It is a bit of a concern when an airline's bad service gets a whole blog devoted to it though. see www.qatarairsucks.com
Oh, and greentea, you are right to be hesitant about booking using Qmiles. In case of overbooking, mileage tickets are the first to be "bumped." It's best to use these tickets at slow times on less-traveled routes if possible. Please read the fine print before making a decision!
Mandi
Nope, gadarene, I don't work for QR and in fact, I've only flown with them once. But I do know the rules of commercial aviation and at one point or another I've heard people say they will never fly such-and-such an airline again because of a bad experience, i.e. I probably won't book Malaysia again. Let me reiterate - QR has every legal right to overbook. But I believe their employees may not have followed international rules in this case of overbooking. The other day I read a thread that claimed the same about Etihad. Airlines do have rules, it's just that the lower-level airline/airport employees may not be following them. Is this the airlines fault? Well, yes, ultimately. But I'm not willing to forgo a whole airline because of one bad employee. My point was, if you know the rules you can forestall some of these problems. Fortunately, it isn't too hard to be smarter than some of these employees!
Mandi
i read complaints about QA in here esp from people who have booked using QA's promo... that is why i am hesitant to book a flight using my QA accumulated points from my privilege club membership
@ mandi,you work for Qatar Airways mate?... :) please no offence meant mate,i just feel really bad for these people & while it's never happened to me(probably because i avoid flying QR on work or on holiday as far as possible)i can just about imagine what it might be like to have to give up a holiday because of the ariline's bungling...They're a crap airline who've obviously payed for that 5-star rating they keep tom-toming about & the organization functions like a kindergarden with staff expected to behave like they're students of the said kindergarden(no i don't work there but have friends who do)...@ milica,fly emirates or any anything else next time mate...will involve the inconvenience of a stopover but at least you'll actually get to where you're going on the date that you planned to get there...
All Airlines overbook their
Planes -everyone knows this if they are well travelled.
To be certain to be on a plane you always has to be early or to pay for Business or first class
Happened to me a couple of years back .....its disgusting as they told me i was late when i was at the counter 2 hrs prior to departure. They always overbook their flights and then try to blame the passanger...very common problem from Gutter airways.
Aana free, jaana free,
Pakde gaye tho khana free.
PS, this really doesn't have anything to do with Qatar Holidays unless QR was claiming there was something wrong with your tickets. It sounds like a simple overbooking situation.
Mandi
All airlines overbook, it is allowed by law. There are some things you should know in order to make sure that you are not denied boarding. 1) Check in on-line and print your boarding passes up to 36 hours before departure. 2) Arrive 3 hours early before an international flight - that's the rule. Politely inform the agents that they must offer compensation to volunteers giving up their seats so that you may be accomodated. If you are not given seats you are due denied boarding compensation AND the price of your tickets if you have complied with the rules. I'm going to guess that they are going to shaft you with the fact that you only got to the ticket counter two hours before departure. But that shouldn't affect your compensation.
Mandi
And there are some people who still believe the advertisements!
If what you said happened as you said it, Qatar Airways is a criminal organization and should be shut down by the government of the Islamic State of Qatar!
Have QA said you will get compensation for the lost holiday?
happened twice with me and after that i used Emirates airlines. Bought a ticket from a travel agent then confirmed it with QA and the next day at airport i was told seats not available.