Australia currently caps international arrivals at 50 passengers per flight, no matter how large the aircraft is. This has created a potential business opportunity for Qatar Airways (and every other airline serving Australia): buy business class or stay behind…
Qatar Airways Accused Of Forcing Passengers To Buy Business Class Seats To Fly To Australia
An anecdote is helpful here. Rachel lives in Manchester, UK and booked a flight home to New Zealand via Doha and Sydney on Qatar Airways. Her father is terminally ill form lung cancer. Then Australia announced that the 50 passenger cap on flights, meaning Qatar Airways suddenly had an overbooking situation. Speaking to VICE, Rachel said:
“It was only when I arrived at check-in at Manchester Airport that I was told there’d been a cap imposed on the numbers of passengers the airline could bring into Sydney, which had been introduced after I booked my ticket. And the gentleman at check-in told me I wouldn’t be able to fly because my name wasn’t on the list of 50 passengers.”
When Rachel pressed how passengers were chosen for the list, the agent insisted it was random. She was told to call reservations. A reservations agents disputed the notion of “randomness” and said that most of the passengers were those who had booked business class tickets. She offered to sell Rachel a business class seat on the next flight to ensure passage home.
Similar stories have popped up on Facebook and Twitter. Live and Let’s Fly reached out to Qatar Airways for comment and did not hear back (apparently Vice did not hear back either). But upon checking Qatar’s website, indeed only business class seats are available for tomorrow’s flight to Sydney (and the rest of the week is sold out):
Qatar Airways already exempts business class passengers from its mandatory mask requirement:
Business Class customers are asked to wear their face shield and mask onboard at their own discretion, as they enjoy more space and privacy.
Is this classist way of accommodating passengers fair?
This Is A Reasonable Approach By Qatar Airways
There’s something sad, almost obscene, about Rachel not being able to visit her dying father unless she coughs up thousands of extra dollars.
Yet with only 50 passengers allowed on each flight (and a max of 450 passengers per day) and a 14-day quarantine upon arrival, I would suspect that almost all passengers traveling to Australia have a pressing reason to go.
Australia sprung the 50-passenger limit on airlines without warning. How else should they have responded other than by prioritizing their elite flyers and premium cabin passengers?
Airlines are hurting so much already and cannot be asked to be in the charity business. Extracting more revenue on Australia flights is a simple supply/demand issue.
The rub here is that Rachel (and others) already have a contract with Qatar Airways in place. They paid an agreed upon price for passage to Australia or via Australia and Qatar Airways took their money. Offering a refund does not make anyone whole.
Yet Qatar Airways can claim force majeure, arguing the issue was beyond their control. That’s true isn’t it? The key question becomes whether Qatar Airways will prioritize these displaced passengers going forward, if passengers are willing to wait, or continue to sell pricier premium cabin seats, in effect permanently displacing those who purchased economy class tickets prior to the Australian restrictions.
CONCLUSION
This is a tough issue in that Australia’s limit on international arrivals has created a bottleneck for travelers and a headache for airlines. I’d like to think that airlines would give some priority to those with life/death emergencies, but with many likely in the same boat, it seems that ticket price or airline elite status is the only reasonable tiebreaker.
image: Qatar Airways
Matthew, what about the fact that Rachel is heading to New Zealand? Surely she should not county toward the 450 daily max or 50 per plane to arrive in Australia? If so, that’s stupid.
Fair question, but she counts.
No doubt Qatar airways forcing people’s to buy business class seats. Even in cargo sector Qatar airways charged Express rates.
It’s not only Qatar airways, even all airlines doing same.
I brought my ticket through a travel agent twice and they have cancelled so they can sell expensive ticket to other people they have gone so greedy we should boycott greedy airline then taking vantage forcing people to buy expensive ticket if they can’t afford to run the service I think everybody should boycott buying the tickets
It is a positive steps that Qatar Airways carried keep going on and God bless you all.
Hi Qatar airways also cancelled flights many times specially if you bought cheap tickets maybe they switch my tickets with expensive ones and cancelled our again and again Qatar Airways is a mess right now
My foot positive there just gone greedy useless Beggars They thinkto be pretending the king of the United Arabs these Arabs always been a thief they stab you behind your back And are messing about with every customer thathow bought the tickets
They are also doing this for Pakistan , they sold the economy tickets saying we will fly every day and then blamed the air space closure and enforce them to buy business
Sam can you clarify a bit more on this? Do you mean flights to Pakistan or flights to Qatar from Pakistan?
As far as I know, there is no restriction on how many people can enter or leave pakistan, if you know of such a restriction can you clarify a bit more on this policy (or link to it)
Just wanted to support your reasoning 100% on this one. Qatar may be doing things differently than other airlines but at least they have a clear line of reasoning: prioritising safety (the whole “staff wear full suits and HIA in full-tech mode”), comfort, connections (flying even in the depth of the cancellations) and proffit.
TBH because of the Gulf states situation with Qatar, I do think that the flights are still cross-subsidised by what is in their belly as a means of maintaining essential supplies for the country, and that for UL-haul particularly with 50 pax it wouldn’t make economic sense even at the high C prices otherwise.
Which just shows that if they can make this work and keep moving people where they need to be, kudos to them.
Qatar airways recently did that with me in USA. I bought an economy class ticket for Pakistan from States. They cancelled the flight and right away sent an email to pay more and upgrade to business class.
I called so many times at their Qatar helpline and waited for almost 20 minutes every time and no one responded to that call.
Before that they kept bothering me with emails to verify my card payment and told me if I will not do that they’ll cancel my ticket and charge more.
That was very weird experience of booking with Qatar. Though I heard it’s one of the best.
But what I experienced was entirely different and pathetic. They are threatening and keep sending emails and afterwards cancelled the flight, asking for more money and now no response to re-book another flight.
They most certainly are doing this. I had an economy ticket for July 18 and they bumped me on Jul 16. I had to call multiple times until someone finally put me on a flight on Aug 9
Meanwhile they continued to sell business class tickets July 18 through August 8 (and I almost paid for one!) but at the last minute decided not to.
Yes, economy class passengers will be bumped again and again for business class making their tickets useless.
While this is a burden on economy passengers Qatar has made the best decision for its business. Maintaining a schedule using a widebody with only 50 economy passengers to Australia would be insanity. Of course they are going to prioritize the 50 most profitable passengers. The real complaint here should be with Australia. They should either shut down the border to all from certain destinations or allow all from certain destinations. Australia putting an arbitrary numerical cap on arrivals is what caused this class discrimination. Australia should be the one to complain to about fixing the problem they created.
The situation is much worse now as the caps were lowered in Sydney to 350 per day. On some days there are 10 international flights landing so only 35 people on the plane. The Australian government is well aware of the impact and hardship caused by the caps and not taking any responsibility.
Was a frequent flyer with Qatar and won’t fly with them ever again.
Had our flights booked from Frankfurt to Perth 15 days before flight. Whole family(2 adults 2 kids) had to travel across whole of Europe to get to Frankfurt. We arrived in a hotel and recieved email that our FLIGHT is canceled. Well it wasn’t our flight but our tickets. So we were stranded in Frankfurt and Qatar told us we can book business class 15 000 eur (25 000 aud) for all of us – we didn’t do it of course. We flew with Singapore airlines instead. Keep in mind that if you book with Qatar you will be waiting for your refund for 4 weeks…
My daughter has contracted COVID-19 twice, yes twice, in UK hospital since March, has undergone surgery & is now at risk of becoming homeless with no support or income. She had been in UK for a planned 2 years to gain helicopter pilot quals. Previously serving NSW police officer for 16 years. Now, when she is finally well & can travel home, the Aus Govt has affectively stripped her of citizenship rights to return home because of imposed incoming international flight restrictions – ridiculous per flight numbers. She has flight booked, but given the recurring pattern of cancelled flights, we are not confident. The Aust Govt, our own Govt, has in effect slammed & locked Australia’s door in the faces of its own good citizens who just want to come home. The PM has made it clear that he doesn’t care about these Aus citizens – WE ARE NOT IN THIS TOGETHER
Obviously they are. What other options are there?
Qatar flies an A350-1000 to Sydney.
That has 46 business class AND 281 economy class seats. Only if they sell enough tickets for that configuration can they cover the cost of the flight and have a profit margin, too.
There is no chance in hell that the same flight is profitable even with only the 46 business class seats. If they start taking economy passengers they are burning money!
Qatar can’t be expected to pay for the return of foreign citizens just because Australia turned totalitarian. Qatar remain the heroes of the corona crisis for flying at all!
Well said Max.
The Australian government needs to be pressed to take care of its citizens and residents. It needs to ensure they can get home in a timely and affordable manner which means raising the arrivals cap considerably or removing it altogether.
I get why Qatar Airways are doing this as they have to cover there costs, if they don’t they too will stop flying to Australia. The issue here is the Australian Government and the State Governments (Thanks to Western Australia who started it supported by the Australian Government) who are charging for the 14 days of Quarantine. I have to return home this week and have not the funds to do so as given I have to buy Business Class seats and then pay $3,000 for 14 days quarantine, I have not chance what so ever of returning to Australia. Yes you can get loans but not for this amount and anyway, due to a serious incident in Scotland, I am now disabled and unable to work so impossible for me to pay it back within the 3 months / 14 days. It’s complicated as to what happened but the bottom line is I have no way to return to Australia and no way to survive, full stop.
The Australian Consulate has been hopeless and won’t assist in any form, unless of course I am a criminal.
I’m just curious of the outcome of this story. Did the passenger find her way to NZ?
It appears she is still in the UK.
Can anyone tell how many passengers are bumped off the flight with confirmed tickets from Qatar airlines going to Australia in Feb 2021.
I just spoke to Qatar airways and the service officer told me that it’s their policy to prioritize Business class passengers as part of the 50 passengers. But my friend just flew with Qatar about 8x wks ago from Doha to Syd. And said there was a total of 3x people on the entire flight, all of whom were sitting next to each other in business class. My sister flew
Emirates (Dubai to Syd.) a few months ago after 8x months of cancellations and she had 5x people total on the entire flight. The 50 limit is clearly a lie to the public as only a few people are arriving in Syd. On each flight.
My husband still hasn’t met our 9x month old son because of visa delays and now Qatar is telling us to buy business or he may not be coming anytime soon.
We can’t afford a business class at the moment so they expect us to suffer some more.
I am now facing same issue. I bought ticket which was later reschedules a few days before travel. I saw at the website the flight was still there but I was told you can get in the same flight but we only have business class available which will cost 2480 extra. They gave me one single option which was reaching the destination 1 day late because of which I needed to rebook extra journey costing me less than 2480 but still significant.