Our National Airline

[willedoo]

Don't check in anything fragile. It's enough to make a leprechaun blush.

 

https://twitter.com/RachaelHasIdeas/status/1598617082908012544

[facthunter]

Everyone wanted airfares to be cheaper than the bus. A race to the bottom on quality. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

The only thing I found surprising in the video was how one of the handlers was picking up and throwing the odd suitcase with force onto the belt.. and yes, he should have been fired as that looked like it was intentional to try and cause damage. Otherwise it looked normal to me.. and is the assumption on on how I pack my luggage. Apart from that fella who was throewing with force, it didn't look like a sackable problem to me.. maybe a little re-education.

 

They have been stood down pending an investigation: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-12-03/baggage-handlers-filmed-throwing-luggage-stood-down/101730590

 

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

While on the subject of QANTAS (Queer and Nasty Travel Air Service is an acronyum that has been bandied about a bit), my last 2 flights to Aus have been with them in their A380s. It was more cattle class than any other airline or aircraft I have flown (admittedly, I haven't flown cattle in any other A380 - and looks like I probably never will - so can't compare other airlines and similar types). On the last flight out, I pointed out to the flight attendant that my seat had a fault in that it would not stay in the inclined position. She muttered not to worry and enjoy the relaxing takeoff. So I pointed out to her that isn't it a safety issue in which she said no, to which I asked why are we asked to put our seats up, then? She had no answer, but wouldn't move me. I didn't think of hinting that I may work for CASA.. that may have changed things.

 

The service was hard to describe.. it wasn't bad, per se.. but they acted with a certain arrogance and if they were gods gift to the world. They provided enough sustenance of dubious edible and nutritional quality, but it was almost thrown at us (a bit like the bags above, I guess).. As it's now a privately owned company and has moved its maintenance largely to Asia, I no longer think of it as a national carrier. At least it is traded on the ASX. My airlines of choice are Singapore, Cathay (or was.. not sure, now), or American (yep, American.. I have flown them a lot to the US and Aus, and they are actually quite good.. and had the best legroom and space in economy for years). QANTAS was only used when there was no space as they weere rarely cost effective, their service was lacklustre at best, and they always seemed to squeeze more people on..

 

Same with British Airways - I stopped flying them years ago for the very same reasons.

Edited December 3, 2022 by Jerry_Atrick

[Old Koreelah]

I was recently jammed in 380 cattle class for almost 12 hours, after a low pressure alert had the pilot turn back from the runway. Instead of the “short time” promised, replacing two wheels took close to three hours. No offers to get us off to stretch our legs. Not fun while learning to walk with a new hip. Their handling of my wheelchair was nothing like what was promised. Now video of that baggage handler deliberately trying to damage people’s bags.

 

Seems that lots of us support Q for patriotic reasons. With a foreign CEO treating his staff like expendables and so many jobs offshored, my loyalty is wearing thin.

 

 

[old man emu]

If I still was a 👮‍♂️ I would have no hesitation charging those baggage handlers with Malicious Damage and putting them before a Court. Who knows what may have been broken in those bags as a result of the deliberate (that's where the "malicious comes in) throwing of them. 

 

However, one thing we can be glad about is that each of those baggage handlers had been OK's to wear an ASIC tag.

[Old Koreelah]

We might blame much of this poor performance in low staff morale: people who simply don’t give a toss about their company or it’s customers. Management’s job is to raise that morale. Management should be penalised as much as the tosser.

[red750]

We ought to go to their house and throw their treasured possessions around like that. Maybe they were trained by Ausfailure Post.

[facthunter]

I wonder if there's any other Airline that Hates it's CEO so much?   Nev

[red750]

This sort of behaviour is becoming more widespread.

 

Fedex driver dumps packages beside road.

[facthunter]

I've had mates who worked for DHL and I have not had or heard of problems.  Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

Maybe as an employee your mate had no problems, but after being a client of theirs for a short while, we nicknamed them Drop it, Hide it, Lose it.. and went to FedEx where we had no probs for about 5 years

Edited December 4, 2022 by Jerry_Atrick

[facthunter]

Quite a few who worked for them and many customers. Your comment is the only adverse one I've heard.  Nev

[willedoo]

Because of the smuggling issue, you would think all baggage handling areas would be covered by CCTV. If the baggage handlers signed a work agreement agreeing to video reviews of their performance, it would be harder for the bag abusers to get away with it. A problem would be the grey area - determining which actions are unacceptable, and which are acceptable. There would be a thin line there.

[willedoo]

2 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

Maybe as an employee your mate had no problems, but after being a client of theirs for a short while, we nicknamed them Drop it, Hide it, Lose it.. and went to FedEx where we had no probs for about 5 years

The only dealings I've had with them was getting quotes. I was looking into buying a KM-1M ejection seat from the Czech Republic. The quote from DHL in the Czech Republic was around $6,000 freight. DHL in Australia wanted $3,000 more than that; same company, same package. Needless to say, I didn't use them. Later on, I imported a seat from Germany with DB Schenker and it was only a few hundred dollars freight.

[facthunter]

UPS is the worst. (USA). Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

Obviously my experience isn't necessarily a scientific expose of how good, bad, or otherwise DHL are (or were), but after 6 months of them losing or materially missing the overnight delviery of documents for about 1/2 of our deliveries, the final straw was where we sent a paper contract to Aus as the company wanted originals and not a fax signed copy of the contract. It was sent on overnight (2 day guaranteed) delivery to Melbourne. The package  took 2 weeks to "turn up". And by that, they mean to be able to track it's last known whereabouts. According to them, somehow, a document that was placed in a plastic sachel, and then in a waterproof plastic sachel got wet.. As did most of the other docs/parcels in that delviery, which to me represented some sort of mishandling or accident. So, what the do? At their Nth Melbourne depot (from memory)), they decioded to put all of the docs and parcels that were damaged outside the front of the depot in the sun to dry out, with a sign "Do not touch".. Suprisingly, everything went missing..  I am not joking., Not only to they live amongst us, they manage to get employment.

 

We almost lost that contract, but after the third day, I deicded to send a new set of docs with our signatures via FedEx. 28 hours later, the company confirmed they had them, and we said an email of fax acceptance from them would do (as the jurisdiction of the contract was England and Wales, and by then, courts accepted emails as proof of agreement). We never used DHL again.

 

There were other peopleI know who had the same nickname (i didn't think of it).. Their network within Europe was fine, but getting stuff to the US, Aus, SAF, and the ME was a nightmare.

 

I am not a logitsics company expert - I have no idea how good or bad UPS are, but they were ubiquitous in the US.

 

I have had a couple of issues with Fedex where they lost stuff in transit, but they were able to tell straight away, and it all eventually turned up.

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by Jerry_Atrick

[Bruce Tuncks]

When I went overseas, the best thing that happened was that my luggage was lost ( Between  Adelaide and Melbourne, by Quantas as we later found out ) . We got $50n each, which didn't buy much  even then, but this stuff was a LOT easier to cart around than the suitcase the wife had packed.

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

That was 50 dollars...  I dunno where the "n" came from

 

[spacesailor]

My wife was paid $300 as cosmetics are expensive. 

And that was their offer !.

I didn't quibble at all. 

spacesailor

[facthunter]

The "n" came with the "U" in Qantas.  Nev