Difficulty in aligning flights with involuntary flight changes

I wanted to see if anyone has had the same experience as me with Qantas bookings as this has never happened to me before.

I have two international bookings with Qantas, one a paid fare and one booked on frequent flyer points.

The paid fare is SYD - SCL - EZE return flying J. Qantas retimed the SCL to SYD return leg to the following day but did not move the starting EZE to SCL leg. As you now need a visa to enter Chile and I was running out of time to have a visa issued, I called Qantas to see if they could reaccommodate me on a same date EZE - SCL - SYD flight. I was told that they could not move me to the same day as there were no available J seats in my original booking class (i.e cheaper business seats). After pressing the fact that it was an involuntary flight change and waiting some time, they did book me on an economy EZE to SCL leg on the same day.

I had a similar problem with a points booking DPS - CNS - SYD on Jetstar metal. Jetstar retimed the DPS to CNS segment to arrive in CNS after the original CNS - SYD flight was due to depart. When I asked for this flight to be moved to the same day, I was told they could only be done if there was frequent flyer seat availability. In the end they booked me on a DPS - CNS - BNE - SYD flight as that was the only frequent flyer seats available.

I have never experiened a reluctance to change flights due to involuntary flight changes due to the original J booking class nor due to requiring available frequent flyer seats. Is this a new policy, or are Qantas just making it difficult for us to change flights where there are involuntary flight changes?

This is just more of the same from Qantas. They do as they please, could not care less about frequent flyer customers. Loyalty to them means paying for flights to earn points, not having the temerity to redeem those points.

Yes, this has happened to me twice in recent months with Qantas. On both occasions, the first leg of a booking was retimed to leave after the second leg. Then I wasn't able to change it online for whatever reason so had to wait hours in their phone queue to sort it out. Qantas is an absolute shambles and couldn't care less. Meanwhile, the CEO keeps getting paid more and more.

In the last few months I have also had flights cancelled at last minute with Qantas, and an involuntary flight change which was no longer convenient (eg, half a day later than my original booking). When I presented an alternative (in same cabin class on same route, CBR-SYD), I got told multiple times by QF's FF service line reps that it was not possible to accommodate my preferred alternative flight, because it was not the same fare bucket as my original ticket. Of course, had QF not cancelled the flight at such short notice, it was likely I would have been able to book the same fare bucket at the time I purchased my original ticket many months before the date of travel.

However, practically, I ended up getting my preferred flight, by calling the QF FF service line about 5 or 6 times and demanding that I be put onto my preferred flight, until someone eventually gave in. I had people hang up on me multiple times, too, saying they would put me on hold and speak to the manager, and then terminate the call. That is my general way of working with Qantas customer service now - you just keep calling them until you get through to someone who accepts your request. I was not rude, I just told them I did not accept that it was out of their power to put me onto my preferred flight (albeit different fare bucket). I feel really sorry for those other QF customers who let the airline push them around, and accept as gospel what some 'customer service' rep on the service line tells them. Welcome to Qantas in 2022. Thanks Alan!

Is this the new normal for QF customer "service" - hang up?

Worlds worst "tier 1" airline by a mile