Qantas, the airline that announced they made a cheeky $2.5 billion profit last financial year, have been facing some unexpected turbulence for their decision to expire unredeemed Qantas and Jetstar points at the end of the year.
The value of these unredeemed points, you ask? Together Qantas and Jetstar tallied up a cool $570 million – OR enough money to fly from Sydney To LA and back 23,750 times, in first class.
The decision to arbitrarily expire this whopping amount of loyalty credits was met with outrage from the public, especially due to the fact that these were flights that were cancelled by the airlines during the pandemic.
However, after receiving a huge backlash, and a few days of CEO Alan Joyce being ripped a new one at a Senate hearing, Qantas have changed their decision and will no longer be needlessly expiring the points. Crazy how they thought they could get away with it.
Should the expiration date have remained, at the end of the year this would have seen the unclaimed $570 million added to the value of Qantas. So you can see why they hoped to stick this landing.
Qantas, babe, next time we say we want you to “secure the bag” we mean the luggage you lost. Not this.
In a win for the people, the airline have now announced that Qantas customers with COVID flight credits can cash them in for a refund. Meanwhile Jetstar passengers will not able to bank their points, but instead will have them available indefinitely.
Anyone looking to cash in their Qantas COVID vouchers can do so immediately using the Qantas Find My Credit website, and will be asked to provide their name, email address, booking reference, and voucher number.
This announcement comes as the infamous airline cops even more heat from the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission who are taking Qantas to court over allegedly advertising tickets for flights they had already cancelled. Looks like the L’s keep coming for the flying kangaroo!
