Low Fare Airlines to come under scrutiny
 

Making the airwaves here in Adelaide over the last few days.....


As from next Jan 1st, low fare airlines will become more accountable under new legislation.

Forfeiture of your fare, etc and other harsh conditions for having arrived late at the check-in desk will apparently become a thing of the past.

These penalties will be deemed to be an " Unfair Contract "


One to watch with interest.

Kiss good bye to low fares then.

Seriously... what legislation is this under? If someone misses their flight and they are on an el cheapo fare, why should they not forfeit it?

I think this has been hightlighted by the show Airways, I think the huge issue is people are getting to the airport joining the queue and then once time hits 45mins before departure those pax still in the line miss out, in that case no you shouldnt forfeit your fare, if you rock up at minus 30 then yes there should be no issue with it.

IMO 45mins is ridiculous to be cutting off check in but I also understand that the check in staff for Tiger then have boarding gate duties so I guess that would be the primary reason for doing it.

What a load of rubbish, if you cant get to the airport on time then stiff!
30 min's or 45 in TT's case is not that long a time or unreasonable!

your $40 fare is not worth a LCC waiting for you!

I think staff normally will make a last check-in call for the remaining passengers still in queue. So i guess if you didn't hear it, then there goes your money and stop nagging "i didn't hear" it as shown on the TV show.

I am not sure why Tiger have not retorted to some of those scenes which have painted them as unreasonable with their check-in procedure.

What Airways has not shown in some of these clips is that prior to to closing the check-in, 2 announcements are made to passengers who are in the queue to make themselves immediately known to check-in staff as check-in is closing for their flight. The flight number is mentioned in the announcement, I have heard it.

I can't see any hits for this story in a Google News search.

All airlines - with or without a hard check-in cutoff policy - will make final check-in calls and pull people out of the queue. It was plainly obvious that the pax in the show this week who was claiming that she was in the queue for 45 minutes was lying through her teeth. Note how their travelling companions had no problem getting on and in fact were long since gone... not just checked-in, but presumably went off through security to make sure they didn't miss the flight.

Anyone who's ever worked in customer service knows full well that not only is the customer not always right, some customers will quite happily become BS artists for whatever reason, if it suits them.

Hard check-in times are nothing new, nor are they an unfair contract.

I haven't seen them being unreasonable. The only thing missing from the show this week was footage of them actually doing the late check-in calls they said they did, but they have shown it happen at other times - and of course they do it, they're an airline, they all do.

Have to agree with Michael and the others here.

Why should my flight have to wait for you because you cannot get to the airport on time, well before the check in closure time? Perhaps we should make all trains wait for you, because you wanted that extra five mins sleep, or that drive through breakfast??

This world seems to be made up of discourteous people that thinkt that every one else should be inconvenienced for their benefit.

If you want to turn up late, fly full fare with another airline, and allow us, the majority of people who do plan their lives and arrive early, to enjoy the benefits of LCC.

My only beef with LCC is if there is not enought staff to adequately process checkins within an appropriate time. Waiting in line an hour is not acceptable and it should be a rule that if you are in the queue prior an hour from departure, you should be processed. If not, then tough ****ies.

I had a run in with a LCC, who denied me entry despite processing the group of school children in front of me (about 70+ minders).When I produced a credit card receipt showing the time I paid the taxi(1 hour prior to check in closing), they backed down the plans to deny me boarding. Not much to do at the airport at 7am other than check in....

You should re-read what you wrote. Your very last 2 paragraphs are what is at issue, not people who turn up late. In your case your were lucky that you had something that kind of proved you were there ontime, but alas if you didn't have that no doubt you too would be bemoaning the LLC.

I currently live in the UK and avoid LLC's like the plague and all because of the show Airline and the fact that their prices are generally not that cheap when you take into account all the extra BS you need to do to get to Luton or Stanstead. What Airline showed was how rude and unreasonable EasyJet's staff are, in particular when there is an operational issue causing problems.

One that made me laugh was a flight from Rome to (I think) Newcastle. Sleazy jet for some reason had to cancel the Newcastle flight but could accomodate the PAX on a flight to Bristol. So they put them on, but when the PAX arrived in Bristol Sleazyjet had the hide to try and charge them extra for the next flight.

wow, everyone is too cheap to pay for a full fare airline, but too precious when an LCC doesn't bend over backwards for them...

Simple - the show WANTS you to see that the cutoff time is inviolate. Anyone watching the show is then very aware of their tight restrictions.

I think it is about time that there were restrictions on these practices. There is nothing wrong with having strict terms as long as they are reasonable.

45 minutes prior to a domestic departure with no baggage? Is that reasonable? These restrictions have NOTHING to do with preventing delayed flights at all. If it was 30 minutes with baggage, I might just be inclined to believe it.

To prevent delayed flights the key is when a person is at the BOARDING LOUNGE, not the checkin. If they were serious they would have a "holding pen", like in Singapore, and close access to it 5 minutes prior to departure.

How about for my flight where the Qantas and Melbourne Airport websites showed it as delayed, however the Jetstar website showed it on time? I called the airline, who confirmed it was recheduled for 4 hours later, however checkin would be closing based on the original scheduled departure time, and I would lose my fare if I wasn't there?

That is a completely UNREASONABLE demand by an airline,
and it is time that there was a reasonable level of scrutiny by an external body.

I've flown with easyJet on a number of occasions and found the staff neither rude nor unreasonable. Quite pleasant in fact.

I've never gone through Luton but Stansted is no fuss at all... the Stansted Express operates from a station within the terminal to Liverpool Street in London. Goes every 15 minutes and takes 3/4 of an hour. Stansted as a whole is a very easy airport to go through.

Stansted is very easy BUT very expensive to get to. Often the rail fare to STN is multiple times the price of the air ticket!

I haven't been to Luton either, but i hear it's even worse (expensive and a long way away)

Also, I've never understood why there isn't decent public transport connections to cater for those passengers leaving on 6am flights who might need to be at the airport before 5am. Surely a bus service at the least could operate (or perhaps it does now? never used to).

Probably because they are too scared to book with Tiger after seeing the catastrophe on air and have booked elsewhere.

How much say does Tiger have in the final editing of the show?

Personally, if you book with a low cost airline and you do not prepare yourself to arrive with plenty of time to check in, then bad luck.

But if you arrive with plently of time and you are actually in the check in queue prior to the cut off time, then you should be processed as you have made the effort to arrive prior to cut off.

Just saw on the BBC news that Ryanair had issues at Stanstead this weekend. Apparently 700 people 'missed' their flights despite arriving in plenty of time all because the airlines agent (Swissport) didn't have enough staff to process everyone.

So lots of people have missed their holiday and Ryanairs attitude seems to be "if you checked in on-line and had no bags you would have been on the flight".

Great isn't it. Now I know the majors have staffing issues too, but at least when the problem is caused by their issues they try their hardest to look after you, not tell you to go home and try again another day.

So what's the answer then? LCC's specifically appeal to people/families, normally when they are going on holidays, so for an airline to say as in the post above "if you checked in on-line and had no bags you would have been on the flight" is pathetic, as is for people who arrived on time only to miss their flight because the airline couldn't check them in.

Do we boycott or regulate? All airlines have genuine issues at times, but so few, including the big ones, actually show the slightest care for good customer service outside the aircraft, that I don't think you could "fairly" boycott one and not all.

Government regulation appears to be the only real answer. They've had decades to self regulate and not done anything. Change the access to the check in area in some way so you can determine correctly who arrived in time, and you're not allowed leave without them. Perhaps some sort of rebate to airlines for flights that arrive on time (once had a flight from Melb to CBR depart 20 mins late & arrive only 5 late!)

It's good that the Airlines TV show is showing the disgusting behaviour of some passengers, drunk, arriving late, sleeping through the call etc, but the airlines have allot of disgusting behaviour to answer for as well. And I don't think they will without being forced to.

Stephen unfortunately with just about every industry nothing changes unless they are forced to. The LCC airlines will probably be no different.

Personally I have flown with both DJ and JQ and have found both to be quite good experiences. The only reason I fly JQ now over DJ is that my ears seem to fare alot better on the A320 as opposed to the B737.

That's why I started the post

It is so nauseating listening daily to complaints on talk-back radio.

People are getting sick of it

Hi Ash,

I would bemoan any carrier who did not accept me in this instance, not just LLC. The issue is staffing. If there is enough staff to process what was a full flight with special needs (large group), in a timely manner to ensure all pax who did turn up on time are processed, then there is no argument.

If you turn up late, then that is the pax issue. I have absolutely no issue with that. Pax need to read the little box that says I AGREE WITH THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS before they click the magic button.

The issue is who is responsible for the check in delay. If it is the pax who has not allowing enough time, tough. if it is the carrier then that is their problem to resolve, and not the fault of the pax. There was another counter open, but they would not accept my checkin, despite my complaints regarding the group in front.

Nick, my issue is not about bending over backwards, its about meeting the obligations of travel as per T/cs and almost being denied boarding due to lack of staff. (PS btw I am not precious). The reply I got to my written complaint (which was fair and polite) agreed with my sentiments, and agreed that the second counter should have made some attempt to resolve the delays. There was no 'last call'. It also agreed with my point that the check in staff should have made her supervisor aware of the potential issue when she was told she had 70+ in one group to check in, and they should have organised another staff member to process pax not part of that group.

On the fares issue, I do think that the paid fees should be transferable, however the pax should pay the balance between what they have paid, and the purchase now price of the seat on the next flight.

The morale of the story is get there very early,and you should not have an issue missing your flight.

Then you get the ridiculous situation I was in last week. Booked an early flight ages ago to Canberra with DJ, booked in online and turned up with heaps of time for the flight. No problems until they called for boarding and every second passenger was setting off the alarm when they scanned the boarding passes. One of the checkin staff told me that they had originally cancelled the flight due to other problems and then decided to reinstate it when the problems were solved. Unfortunately, the computer system cancelled all bookings for those who had already checked in before the cancellation and the only bookings that were ok were the ones that had booked in at the airport on the morning of the flight. The result was that this flight went out with about 20 passengers and the rest of us were booked on the next flight an hour later!!
Staff were friendly enough but flatly refused to allow passengers on their original flight even though it was going out nearly empty. There were a few very unhappy business types on the later flight!!

I boycott airlines like Tiger, Sleazyjet and Ryanair myself and as I said it is a direct result of TV shows like this, and of course the fact that the headline fares they offer are at the end of the day not too different from the new world/full service carriers.

I would have no issue with Jetstar, they have learnt quite a lot from their early customer service problems, and of course Virgin Blue is no longer what I would call an LCC and seems to take care of their customers too. The post above with the issues in Canberra seems bad though and I would be mighty ****ed off if I had checked in online only to be denied or delayed as a result of a DJ stuff up. Surley they would have known before hand there would be issues.

The problem that I see is the LCC's do not have the ability or inclination to take care of customers when a problem is caused by their own issues. At least with the majors like Qantas, BA etc if there are problems, cancellations etc they will try to take care of you, and even put you up in a hotel if you get delayed overnight.

Really?

This from stuff.co.nz

Well, come on then, how do we fix this? I know there are allot of airline employees on this board of all trades, what are your suggestions?

As has been pointed out before, taking our frustrations out on the staff we meet while travelling is pointless, because they usually don't know any more than us either. Certainly there are individual cases where they might be able to do a bit more, or even something sensible, but they're also not there to get in trouble and risk their jobs so we can have cheese & crackers.

Seems to me the only two options open to we irrelevant and annoying members of the travelling public is to firstly lobby politicians to regulate the pants off the airline industry, while continuing to bash the poop out of airlines in the media.

Alternatively we could start buying shares, until we have enough to sack the morons running the show now and take over the job of stuffing things up ourselves.:p

Anyone lend me a tenner? :D

Raymond - please do not quote the above post in its entirety. It is not necessary -mod.

Simple solution.Do not fly them and let them go broke.One of the reasons i stay right away from LCC's

Unfortunately that's counter productive for us, as then why would Qantas want to offer a ticket even just to the other side of the airport for under $500?

We need the LCC's, with the standard of service they say they offer, we just need that standard enforced in some way.

You don't want to hear the other reasons ;)

What are those reasons then Grant? I tend to agree with Raymond on this one. If we don't like them don't fly them and let them go broke. I sure the hell am not going to buy a ticket on an airline they won't even attempt to look after me if they have some issue. The major carriers will at least make some effort.

As for Stephen B's comments about being ripped off by Qantas and co without LCC's I don't think the market would allow that to happen. Indeed I recall even in the days of just Ansett and Qantas I could still get reasonably priced tickets on most routes, so I feel comments that without LCC's we would get ripped off to be unjustifed.

Of course you are right, but it is the times that things go wrong that customer service and flexability matters. Indeed it seems that this the ONE major area where the really LCC's fall down big time.

The Stansted Express costs £19 one way or £28.80 for a return valid for 30 days, making it just slightly more expensive than the Heathrow Express, which yes, is more expensive than the tube. It's also around the same level as the Gatwick Express. Of course the mainline express trains are a lot more comfortable than the tube and comparing using Stansted to Heathrow is a bit like comparing eating an ice-cream to trying to remove your right foot with a hacksaw... one's reasonably pleasant and the other is just painful and may be met with varying degrees of success. :D

Feel free to let me know where you're getting those < £10 airfares from though, I think we all wouldn't mind a piece of that. :)

Having previously worked telephone customer service in another industry, I absolutely love shows like Air Ways and Airline - most of what we see is pretty mild, with I'm sure in many cases is due to people being slightly moderated by the fact that these are face to face interactions (for some people using the phone means they operate without any kind of self-limiting fuse on the level of abuse they dish out).

One of the first things you come to realise is that the customer isn't always right. It's amazing the kind of lies people will come up with ranging from the simple to the complex, in a bid to get what they want, no matter how much they may have brought a situation onto themselves. Although you avoid calling them on it, if you know they're lying you obviously can't just roll over and go "Oh, yes sir, of course you're completely right, here's everything you want". If they really want to push it then you have no choice, you tell them how it is.

Anyone in a customer service role always has to balance what flexibility they may have up against the needs of the business and it often comes down to a simple case of "if I lean in favour of this customer, will it be worth it? Will it add enough to the customer relationship to build loyalty or word of mouth (or prevent a defection or problematic word of mouth) or will they still be a whining ratbag regardless?" If the latter, it may be no soup for you.

It's otherwise known as not throwing good money after bad. Worse, the perennial ratbags will easily catch wind of any ploy that works and will thereafter attempt to use it as often as possible. If they're a low margin customer, they may very easily make themselves a loss making customer and it's also easily possible that those who are going to be whining ratbags will only keep eating away at your word of mouth until you give them a nice gentle shove towards a competitor, whom they'll quite happily start whining about instead of you after they switch, making it a double bonus. These are only the worst of the worst - but they are certainly out there.

At other times there are business rules where you have no leeway. You might discuss some of them internally and sometimes the powers that be may decide to change them, but in the mean time it's your job to apply them. You can't bend these rules... sometimes there might be a way you guide a customer through an altnerative path of least resistance, but as above, if the option exists, you'll only bother if it adds value. After all, you have other customers to serve, most of whom have done the right thing.

In the case of something like a check-in cutoff - I'm sure everyone here understands why all airlines have to have one at some point... there is work that needs to be done after check-in closes. For a low cost carrier, they need to keep those turnarounds tight too. On top of this for a carrier like Tiger that has so few aircraft, the knock-on effect of delays are going to really kick them hard - for the entire day. I can easily understand that they don't have scope for leeway... and clearly it is one of those hard business rules that the frontline has to work with.

It's made plenty clear and isn't something that would impact my decision to choose to fly Tiger or not.

Having more competition can only be a good thing me thinks. I remember the bad old days when two certain airlines charged the same exorbitant prices to fly within Australia - price fixing maybe?

I've flown 4 business trips this week - 3 with Tiger and 1 with Virgin Blue. You just have to treat LCC's with a bit of intelligence and forward planning as if you were catching a bus. Afterall, you get what you pay for. Check in early, read the info about baggage weights and excess charges etc. I found the Tiger experience completely uneventful - which is how it should be. The flights were all on time and the only surprise was the rather long walk from Melbourne terminal T4 to the apron where the aircraft was parked. Again, you get what you pay for so i can't complain. Virgin Blue was also good - not as good as TIger though. More expensive and the flight ended up running 30 mins late and this was after they cancelled my original fight and put me on a later flight. Still can't complain though - they did offer me the choice of other flights. Again, you get what you pay for.

Pat

Is it possible we have lumped DJ & JQ who have in my opinion very professional and well run businesses in with TT who have a relatively lacklustre record and definaed them all as bad LCC's???

I think we have to re-classify the term LCC into two subgroups....

Low Cost Airlines - DJ & JQ

Ultra Low Cost Airlines - TT

Tiger is a whole new breed of low cost.

Pat,

that wasn't price fixing, it was the regulations that some earlier posters are asking for.

I'm not an expert on the regulations at the time, but understand that pricing and the timetable amongst other things was set by the federal government. But also in those days we had regulated exchange rates, regulated interest rates on mortgages and deposits, and the list goes on.

Whilst the markets are not perfect, they allow for these operators to provide us with the ability to choose a low cost product at a higher risk of things not working out as we want them too. However those same markets will dispose of any entrant that prices themselves outside of the service they ultimately provide. Would anyone choose to fly Tiger if they were charging $600 for a Sydney / Melbourne sector?

Whilst some are catered for by $20 fares, personally, I choose to spend more on the airfare in the knowledge that the carrier can normally put me on another flight within a hour if they have problems. I also hope they have worked out that every 15 minute delay to my departure costs them another Bourbon ;)

But to their credit the LCC's have brought down fares on the legacy carriers. Yesterday, I booked a flight on QF for tomorrow between 2 capital cities for under $90. That wouldn't have happened pre-2001.

I think Nigel is right regarding TT, JQ and DJ...TT are a whole new brand of low cost carrier. I watched air ways for the first time last night, and was quite astounded at the attitude of the head ground staff member they kept showing.

Really, I don't think I will ever fly Tiger.

I'm going across to Adelaide and Melbourne this weekend, all JQ.

Per-Adl $79
Adl-Mel $69
Mel-Per $139

No checked baggage, but $287 return to fly across the country to 2 destinations, how much cheaper do you want it?

you're doing a dis-service to your fellow Australians, these people have families and mortgages like Ansett employees had, at least Ansett employees got most of their entitlements thanks to fare paying passengers like myself.

time to think of the bigger picture, Ray.

I think it's pushing it including JQ in with DJ

Put JQ in with TT as in my opinion, DJ is defintely a cut above JQ based on my own experiences of both

Wow.... branding JQ with TT, thats a bold statement.

There is no way on earth JQ staff or customer service is in any way comparable to TT.

But they are both a long way below the service level you get with DJ...

While we are on the topic is anyone else sick of this recent trash JQ has been advertising on TV. Makes me wanna puke:eek: