Qantas, in particular, failed its customers on many fronts in recent years, not least by making it very difficult to redeem credits for flights that had been cancelled due to the pandemic. The airline’s troubling behaviour paved the way for a 2022 ����Vlog Shonky award.

In mid-March, Qantas settled a class action lawsuit over how it handled flight credits, paying out $105 million to customers (minus lawyer fees) who had found it all but impossible to redeem them.

The Aviation Consumer Ombuds Scheme (ACOS) is expected to start up some time this year. The hope is that it will help restore a measure of dependability – perhaps even civility – to air travel.

The complaints resolution service will replace the industry-funded Airline Consumer Advocate (ACA), recipient of a 2021 ����Vlog Shonky on the grounds that all it did was forward complaints to the airline rather than resolve them. Unlike the ACA, ACOS will have the power to investigate complaints.

It will make decisions according to the rules outlined in the new Aviation Consumer Protection Charter (ACPC), also due to take effect this year. (The associated bills were introduced to Parliament on 1 April.)

“����Vlog has long campaigned for stronger travel rights and an independent travel ombuds scheme with the power to handle complaints and make binding determinations,” says ����Vlog director of campaigns Andy Kelly. “When things go wrong, consumers need stronger protections and an independent body that will take their complaints seriously.”

Seeking clarity on consumer airline rights

Unfortunately, the first draft of the ACPC, released in late 2024, was unclear on important points, including who was going to enforce it. It also lacked what ����Vlog has been calling for since we began focusing on the airline sector – a standardised approach to compensation for meals and accommodation when flights are delayed or cancelled, as well as an industrywide standard defining the overall terms and conditions of your booking.

The draft ACPC seemed to leave all the discretionary power in the hands of the airlines, which was pretty much business as usual.

An updated draft, released earlier this year, was an improvement. This final version remains vague on the issue of compensation, and doesn’t make clear what our rights are in many areas. It’s the kind of ambiguity that could continue to leave passengers at the mercy of the airlines, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction.

One in two travellers experience a flight disruption

In December 2023, we reported that the chances of a flight taking off on time during the holiday season were about 50/50.

The story was based on the experiences of 9000 travellers we surveyed at the time, two out of five of whom told us they’d had a flight cancelled or delayed in the last 12 months. Eighty five percent of those whose flights were delayed said they were not provided accommodation or meal vouchers.

The latest air travel survey data from the federal government suggests that things may have gotten even worse.

It’s based on the airline experiences of 4008 people who travelled between 28 August 2024 and 27 August 2025, and the results are not encouraging.

One in two travellers experienced a flight disruption over the twelve-month period, with delays most commonly ranging from 15 minutes to three hours. Only 31% said they were satisfied with how the disruption was handled by the airline, and 82% said they received no support. A roughly equal number (81%) said they weren’t informed of their rights when their flights didn’t take off on time.

Despite the poor airline performance, only 8% of affected customers complained – a sign that we’ve come to regard airline complaints as exercises in futility. (Only two out of five customers who did make a complaint were satisfied with how it was resolved, and fewer than one out of five had anything good to say about the overall complaint process.)

Transparency around disruptions

In a submission to the federal government in February this year, we called for airlines to come clean about the reasons for delays and cancellations in their reporting to ACOS, in particular specifying whether the disruption was within the airline’s control or outside of it. This information could help inform which remedies may be available for passengers.

But at the moment we can simply be told that our flight is not taking off on time with no further explanation, leaving us stranded for hours in the terminal wondering what other air travel mishaps are lying in wait. It remains to be seen whether the final version of the Aviation Consumer Protection Charter will make air travel less precarious.

“While these reforms [the ACPC] fell short of a European-style compensation scheme, these changes should force airlines to provide fair remedies for cancellations and unreasonable delays,” Kelly says. “The framework will only be as strong as the protections contained in the charter, and ����Vlog will continue to advocate for the strongest possible protections for consumers.”

The post Half of airline passengers still experiencing delays and cancellations appeared first on ����Vlog.

In Europe, the US, Canada and other jurisdictions, airline passengers have long had stronger aviation rights than those in Australia. Here, airlines make up the rules as they see fit, especially when it comes to compensating passengers for frequently occurring issues like flight delays and cancellations.��

It’s been a rough ride for Australian airline customers in recent years. The COVID pandemic took the customer service failures of Australian airlines to a new low. Now the federal government is aiming to pass legislation that would force airlines to do better.��

In 2022, we reported that less than a third of customers who had a flight cancelled because of COVID received a refund. The rest got vouchers that often proved difficult to redeem.

In Australia, the dominant airline is Qantas – whose tagline we rebranded as ‘The Spirit of Disappointment’ when we handed it a Shonky Award in 2022. A ����Vlog investigation revealed that Qantas was holding about $1.4 billion dollars in unused flight credits and future bookings and came up with all kinds of ways to hang on to this money.

Flight delays and cancellations remain a central issue. In December 2023, we reported that the chances of your holiday flight leaving on time were about 50-50.

Attempting to call your airline and talk to a human being because the automated processes on offer don’t work is yet another issue. Call wait times were off the charts when we tested them in 2021.

Proposed new legislation missing clear right to compensation

In August last year, the federal government committed to establishing new protections for Australian travellers. It proposed a new charter of aviation rights, an independent aviation ombudsman to replace the industry-funded Airline Consumer Advocate (recipient of a 2021 ����Vlog Shonky Award), and a requirement that airlines provide refunds instead of credits. These proposals were well in line with recommendations by ����Vlog in our submissions to government.

Earlier this week, the government took the next step, open to the public as well as industry stakeholders. The consultation will inform the final design of the aviation consumer protection legislation. Submissions will be accepted until 5 October this year.��

The consultation paper once again reflects our recommendations to government, calling for an industry-funded ombudsman scheme with a complaints handling process similar to existing schemes such as the Australian Financial Complaints Authority.

The paper also proposes that customers receive refunds for cancellations in a timely manner and aren’t given a flight credit unless they choose one. These would be major steps forward, but the consultation paper falls short of what ����Vlog has been calling for in several respects.�� 

Chief among them is the lack of clear rights to compensation for delayed or cancelled flights.

“Compensation schemes in Europe have encouraged airlines to reduce avoidable delays and provide consumers with simple cash payments when flights are cancelled or late. This is something Australians also deserve,” says ����Vlog director of campaigns Rosie Thomas.

Another shortcoming is a proposed aviation complaints body that lacks the strong oversight powers of comparable industry schemes.

“Consumer rights are only ever as strong as the complaints processes to enforce them,” Thomas says.

“We’re concerned the proposed aviation complaints body falls short compared with strong, independent ombudsman schemes in other concentrated markets. Banks and telecommunications companies have to answer to an independent umpire and the airlines should too.”

����Vlog will continue to push for stronger protections, Thomas says. “We deserve clear rights when flights don’t go to plan, not a patchwork of airline policies. Our airline giants have called the shots for far too long.”

The post Proposed airline passenger rights missing key protections appeared first on ����Vlog.

It won’t come as news to most Australians that our rights are few and far between when it comes to air travel. In recent years, the chances of our flight taking off on time – or taking off at all – have grown increasingly slim. We’ve been left with little choice but to grudgingly accept the poor service.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought the airline sector’s shortcomings into sharp relief. Qantas, in particular, failed its customers on many fronts, not least by making it very difficult to redeem credits for flights that had been cancelled due to the virus. The airline’s troubling behaviour paved the way for a 2022 ����Vlog Shonky award.

Other airlines have fallen short as well. In December 2023, ����Vlog research revealed that two out of five of the 9000 airline customers we surveyed had experienced a flight delay or cancellation over the previous year, and that the chances of a flight leaving on time that holiday period were about 50/50.

The federal government released a white paper in November last year that charted a course to a more customer-centric future. It called for an independent aviation ombudsman to replace the industry-funded Airline Consumer Advocate, recipient of a 2021 ����Vlog Shonky. The ombudsman is expected to be established in 2026.

����Vlog calls for stronger customer rights charter

The white paper recommended that the ombudsman legislation establish a customer rights charter, spelling out the circumstances under which passengers must be refunded or otherwise compensated. But the current wording of the charter lacks clarity in key areas.

In some cases, the charter may be weaker than existing consumer protections under the Australian Consumer Law or the airlines’ own policies. It wouldn’t protect, for instance, against many of the systemic failures that were on vivid display during the pandemic.

In our submission to government on what the final version of the charter should look like, we point out a fundamental flaw in the current design: it’s not clear who’s going to enforce it. ����Vlog is calling for absolute certainty on how the customer rights charter will be implemented by the Aviation Ombudsman Scheme to resolve disputes, and how an appropriate regulator will ensure compliance.

����Vlog is also calling for the following groundwork to be done to ensure that the final version of the charter provides the necessary protections for all Australian travellers:

• Consultation on disability and accessibility issues with people with lived experience of these issues.
• Developing a standardised approach to terms and conditions, including rights to refunds and rebookings for cancellations or delays, whether or not they’re within the airline’s control.
• Establishing set levels of compensation for meals and accommodation.
• Setting specific guidance for claim times and compensation for damaged, delayed or lost baggage.

“While the draft charter is a welcome next step, it currently lacks the necessary clarity, comprehensiveness and strength to adequately protect consumers when flights don’t go to plan,” says ����Vlog senior policy and campaigns adviser Beatrice Sherwood.��

“If we were to experience another global event like a pandemic, consumers would be no better protected under this draft charter. For example, consumers may actually be entitled to a remedy and compensation for flights cancelled or delayed by weather events under consumer guarantee rights, but may not be under the draft charter. Consumers want, and need, stronger protections when travelling, so this charter is a crucial opportunity to give them that, we just need to make sure we get it right.”

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Like so many businesses large and small these days, Qantas wants you to know that it cares about the future of the planet.��

To that end, it directs a stream of its marketing toward those of us who want to do what we can to help ward off climate catastrophe, or at least prevent it from getting too much worse.�� 

Qantas passengers can choose to fly ‘carbon neutral’ for instance, and the airline says it’s on board with ‘sustainable aviation fuels’. The airline’s overarching promise is that it’s on course to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.��

Net-zero is an ambitious but fuzzy term. Generally, it means a business pulls off the miracle of taking as many carbon emissions out of the atmosphere by other means as it puts into it, which would be a very tall order for an airline.��

The Climate Council has gone on record to say that the mechanisms companies purportedly use to get to net zero emissions – such as – are highly questionable.

Still, these commitments sound like a good thing, given that Qantas spread around 17.6 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) across the globe in 2023–24. The annual emissions of bigger airlines, of course, would be even higher.��

Climate Integrity files greenwashing charges 

Australian advocacy group Climate Integrity says Qantas’s claims are too vague and unsubstantiated to mean much. On those grounds, the NGO filed a complaint in October this year with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) calling out multiple instances of potential greenwashing.��

The charges are straightforward: Qantas has no solid basis for the green claims in its marketing materials because its reliance on fossil fuels remains gargantuan, which will continue to be the case for the foreseeable future. In addition, they claim Qantas’s net zero plan lacks clear targets and that it has yet to unveil a scientifically credible transition strategy.��

For Climate Integrity, instances of alleged greenwashing include language such as “your contributions are used to purchase carbon offsets from accredited, high-integrity projects worldwide” and “carbon offsetting allows us to help compensate for these emissions by purchasing offsets that remove, reduce or avoid emissions in the atmosphere”. They claim these assurances are not backed by credible evidence.��

Idyllic images of turtles swimming at the Great Barrier Reef on Qantas reports is another example of potential greenwashing, according to Climate Integrity, since it gives the false impression that the airline is acting sustainably and reducing environmental harms.��

The organisation’s case hinges on a hard-to-dispute reality: For the time being, air travel is one of those instances where we have to press pause in our efforts to reduce our carbon footprint.

“A Qantas customer choosing the ‘fly carbon neutral’ option for their flight might think that the climate impacts of their trip have been compensated for or significantly reduced,” says Climate Integrity director, Claire Snyder. “But this is not supported by science, and therefore distorts customers’ perception of the sustainability of flying.”

In the end, it’s a jet-fueled vehicle going somewhere around 925 km/hr that we’re travelling on.��

“The science is irrefutable – the burning of fossil fuels is the single largest driver of climate change and Qantas has a long-term reliance on fossil fuels,” Snyder says. “Greenwashing at this scale creates a false sense of progress and undermines the urgent action necessary to reach zero emissions by 2050.”

Airlines in the EU called out for greenwashing

The Climate Integrity complaint to the ACCC follows a big airline greenwashing case in the EU earlier this year. In March, a Dutch court ruled that the Dutch arm of Air France-KLM had misled customers about its environmental commitments. Making claims to use more biofuels or plant trees “only marginally lessen environmental impacts and give the wrong impression that flying with KLM is sustainable”, the court found according to reporting by Reuters.��

Derik Broekhoff, a senior scientist at the Stockholm Environment Institute who wrote a report that underpinned the KLM case, says environmentally-minded consumers shouldn’t be taken in by green-sounding terminology.��

“Carbon neutral is not the same as zero emissions. Using carbon credits cannot turn an unsustainable flight into a sustainable one, and consumers still need to be mindful of their travel choices,” Broekhoff says. “It is not accurate for airlines to claim that purchasing carbon credits will compensate for fossil fuel emissions.”

Especially if the volume of those emissions means the airline won’t be in line to meet the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial temperatures.��

Following the Dutch case, consumer protection authorities in the EU went on to investigate the alleged greenwashing practices of 20 other airlines. The practices on notice include: 

• leading customers to believe that paying an additional fee to finance environmental projects outside of aviation or supporting alternative fuels will reduce their contribution to CO2 emissions 
• using the term ‘sustainable aviation fuels’ without providing evidence of how they’re reducing the environmental impact of air travel 
• throwing around catch-all terms such as ‘green’, ‘sustainable’ or ‘responsible’ in a general way without supporting evidence 
• claiming that the airline is moving towards net-zero greenhouse gas emissions without verifiable commitments and independent monitoring
• providing CO2 calculators for specific flights without reliable proof that they’re accurate 
• showing CO2 emissions comparisons of flights without showing sufficient and accurate information on the basis of the comparisons.

Airlines not the only culprits 

Climate Integrity’s complaint to the ACCC was lodged by the Environmental Defenders Office, a Sydney-based NGO that files legal cases whose aim is to preserve and protect the environment. The complaint alleges that using terms like ‘sustainable aviation fuels’ in marketing materials, without definitive evidence that Qantas is using them, is inherently an act of greenwashing, which is illegal in Australia.��

And it’s not just the airlines that are playing fast and loose with environmental claims. A Climate Integrity report prepared by the Institute for Sustainable Futures at the University of Technology Sydney and released in March this year highlights a range of other major Australian corporations – including Rio Tinto, BlueScope Steel, Woolworths Group, Coles Group, and Telstra – whose net zero pledges were found to lack scientific rigour and lag behind global best practice.��

The report came on the heels of a 2023 ACCC investigation which found that the environmental claims of over half of the 247 businesses (57%) analysed included potential greenwashing violations.��

‘Doing what we can’ says Qantas

A Qantas spokesperson acknowledged to ����Vlog that “aviation is a particularly hard-to-abate sector” when it comes to reducing CO2 emissions but the airline has a responsibility “to do what we can with what’s available now”.

“High-integrity carbon offsets are key to us meeting net emissions reduction targets until sustainable aviation fuel and low and zero-emissions technologies are more readily available,” the spokesperson says.��

Qantas pointed to its launch of a $400 million climate fund with Airbus to help speed up the establishment of a domestic sustainable aviation fuels industry as well as the development of nature-based fuel options.��

“The journey to net zero emissions won’t be linear and one airline will not be able to solve this alone,” the spokesperson says, adding that the airline’s goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050 is backed by a “robust carbon offset and sustainable aviation fuels procurement plan”.

But with sustainable air travel likely still a long way off, should Qantas be making so much of its environmental commitments in its marketing to customers today, and assuring us that it will achieve net-zero emissions by mid-century? 

The airline admits that the science behind its mitigation efforts is a work in progress and that “like all aspects of decarbonisation, targets, availability and effectiveness may change”.

(Photos courtesy of Climate Integrity.)

The post Is Qantas greenwashing us with its carbon claims?  appeared first on ����Vlog.

Australia’s largest airline has been ordered to pay $100 million in fines for selling tickets to flights it had already decided to cancel and for taking too long to tell ticket holders it wouldn’t be running the services.

The Federal Court ruling yesterday comes after Qantas agreed in May to provide $20 million in compensation to tens of thousands of consumers affected by the years-long scandal.

The airline has also admitted senior managers knew axed services weren’t immediately being removed from sale, or that customers weren’t being promptly updated when flights were cancelled.

Qantas has agreed to change its operating and scheduling systems to prevent further breaches of consumer law.

Penalties to serve as a deterrent

The court ordered the $100 million fine after the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) and Qantas jointly submitted that it would be an appropriate deterrent to prevent Qantas and other businesses from breaking the Australian Consumer Law (ACL) in the future.

“This is a substantial penalty, which sets a strong signal to all businesses, big or small, that they will face serious consequences if they mislead their customers,” says ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb.

The ACCC took Qantas to court in August last year, alleging its sale of the tickets and failure to quickly inform customers once flights had been cancelled had misled consumers and constituted a breach of the ACL.

In May this year, Qantas admitted it had misled consumers and agreed to compensate them to the tune of $20 million.��

Qantas also joined with the ACCC to ask the Federal Court to consider issuing the airline a $100 million fine for breaking the law.

At the time, Qantas CEO Vanessa Hudson apologised, saying the carrier had “let down customers” and adding that it was investing in technology to ensure the same issues don’t occur again.

Aviation ombuds scheme to help protect consumers

The admission came after ����Vlog spent years calling out Qantas for poor service. In 2022, we gave the airline a Shonky Award for its delays, poor baggage handling and onerous rules for redeeming flight credits.

����Vlog deputy director of campaigns and communications Andy Kelly agrees the $100 million penalty will act as a “strong deterrent”.

He adds that the federal government plans to establish a service separate from the airlines that would resolve customer complaints and help improve Australians’ experiences with carriers.

“The proposed aviation ombuds scheme will further strengthen and clarify consumer rights when flying and make them easier to enforce,” he says.

The Commonwealth is currently consulting on what the scheme will look like: “����Vlog is calling on the government to ensure it’s effective, fair, accessible and transparent,” Kelly says.

Hundreds of thousands of travellers affected

Since its May admission, Qantas has been communicating with almost 87,000 consumers who are eligible for a slice of the $20 million in compensation.

These are travellers who, between 2021 and 2023, made bookings on the flights the airline had already decided to cancel, or were re-accommodated onto these services after the cancellation of other flights.

They’re in line to receive payments of between $225 and $450, depending on whether they had booked or been allocated to a domestic or international flight.

Another 883,000 additional travellers are also believed to have been misled by Qantas not promptly informing them when a flight had been cancelled, but these consumers aren’t receiving financial compensation from Qantas under its agreement with the ACCC.

Most of those eligible for money should have already received emails from Qantas and Deloitte and the ACCC is warning consumers to beware of scammers calling and claiming to be able to help them get payments.

The watchdog says to hang up on anyone ringing out of the blue to help you with a payment or refund.

The post Qantas ordered to pay $100 million in fines for cancelled flights appeared first on ����Vlog.

In a forward-looking white paper that charts a new era in airline travel, the federal government has committed to establishing a number of flyer protections that have long been lacking for Australians. The absence of such rights has made air travel an especially iffy prospect in recent years.��  

Among the proposed measures is the establishment of an independent aviation ombudsman service with the power to compel airlines to pay compensation when warranted, a move ����Vlog has long endorsed.

It could mean flyers will get their money back when airlines fail to meet their basic obligations, such as when flights depart unreasonably late – or don’t take off at all.

An end to self-serving self-regulation

External dispute resolutions with positive outcomes for travellers would be a giant step for aviation consumers. The current industry-funded Airline Customer Advocate (ACA) service, ostensibly set up to resolve customer disputes, has fallen well short and was the recipient of a 2021 ����Vlog Shonky.

Several ����Vlog investigations have highlighted that the ACA was never more than a powerless complaint-forwarding service that has done nothing to improve the industry’s rough treatment of its customers.

The ombudsman legislation will set out a customer rights charter, spelling out the circumstances under which passengers must be refunded.

Airlines will be required to report valid reasons to the ombudsman for delays or cancellations and the independent service will be able to refer cases to the ACCC when the reasons don’t stack up.

The government’s commitment to cleaning up the industry has been a long time coming.��In December 2023, ����Vlog research revealed that two out of five of the 9000 airline customers we surveyed had experienced a flight delay or cancellation over the previous year, and that the chances of a flight leaving on time that holiday period were about 50/50.

“When flights are delayed or cancelled, consumers must currently navigate complex terms and conditions to understand what their often disappointing rights are,” says ����Vlog director of campaigns Rosie Thomas.

“The Aviation Customer Rights Charter has the potential to give consumers clearer and stronger rights. At a minimum, we want to see clear rights to automatic refunds, similar to requirements recently introduced in the US.”

The final airline ombudsman scheme is expected to come into operation in 2026, with an interim ombudsman service set up before that.��

Refunds instead of credits

Another seismic shift in the way airlines will have to treat passengers is the proposed abolishment of flight credits in lieu of refunds, an airline tactic that has left countless customers out of pocket and led to a 2022 ����Vlog Shonky for Qantas.

Earlier that year, we reported that the airline was hoarding around $1.4 billion in unused flight credits and future bookings, which many customers were unable to redeem. As part of the new customer rights charter, passengers will have money refunded directly back to their credit cards or other payment platform.

Better treatment of people with disabilities

The government paper also promises to establish enforceable standards for the treatment of people with disabilities, an apparent response to the many reports of the mistreatment of such passengers and the industry’s long failure to accommodate their needs.�� 

Among the proposed measures is a database airlines can refer to outlining the specific requirements of such customers.��

In all, the government’s proposals call for a range of fundamental air travel rights to be imposed on an industry that has long avoided providing them without facing consequences.��

“����Vlog has been campaigning for fairer travel rights for years, and we know that making a complaint about an airline is frustrating and often far too slow,” Thomas says. “Last time we surveyed consumers about airline cancellations and delays, we found that of those who pursued a refund or compensation for a cancelled flight, one in five had to wait over six months.”

The post Mistreated Australian airline customers finally get some rights appeared first on ����Vlog.

If you’re someone who likes to vent about frustrating customer service or even just pose queries to businesses on X (formerly known as Twitter), watch out.

A scam that sees impostors posing as seemingly helpful company representatives in order to steal money or sensitive personal information is targeting consumers on the platform and has big brands and even X itself concerned.

A platform people turn to for help

Despite suffering something of a fall from grace in recent years, X remains one of the most popular social media sites in Australia.

It’s also a forum where big companies and government agencies continue to offer assistance to Australians on a daily basis.

Prolific user Jon Dee, who is also a former NSW Australian of the Year, has been on the platform for over 15 years and says tagging a company’s profile in a post used to be “the best way” to get customer support.

However, when he attempted to reach out to Qantas last year to enquire about missing luggage, the response he received was quick, but not as helpful as it first seemed.

“It wasn’t Qantas itself that got back to me first. It looked like it was, but on looking at it closer, I realised it was a scam account. It was asking for information like name and phone number details,” says Dee.

Helpful replies phishing for sensitive information

Jon had found himself the target of a scam that has consumer organisations, big businesses and even X itself concerned.

A search on X reveals various accounts impersonating major businesses, but airlines seem to be a particular target.

Trawling through the platform, we found multiple accounts impersonating major Australian carriers, namely Qantas, Virgin Australia and Rex.

These profiles often had names, photos, handles (the words or numbers following the @ symbol) and descriptions that closely resembled those of the company’s official X account.

They were also active and replying to users who were sending posts mentioning the airlines and looking for help with issues such as compensation for delayed flights or missing luggage.

In the seemingly supportive responses, these accounts asked aggrieved travellers to contact them via X’s direct message function or to provide a WhatsApp phone number or email address.

To add to the confusion, these replies were similar to those that legitimate airline accounts will often post in response to unhappy customers.

Following a scammer’s requests to share contact details or message them directly can result in being sent links to phishing websites, where you’re asked to fill in bank account, bank card or other sensitive information.

In some instances of this scam seen overseas, scammers may claim that providing these sensitive details will deliver you compensation for interrupted travel.

Either way, the information they’re asking for can be used to steal money or impersonate you and gain access to your online accounts.

What about other social media platforms?

Pages and profiles pretending to be major businesses or government agencies have been an issue on other popular social media platforms too.

For example, the Australian Tax Office (ATO) has urged people to steer clear of fake ATO accounts on Instagram, while Qantas says it works with Facebook to shut down profiles impersonating it on the platform.

However, our search for fake airline profiles only turned up results on X and not any other popular platforms.

This scam is also common on X overseas.

In a separate matter, Qantas is currently paying compensation to consumers after it admitted to selling tickets to flights it had cancelled. Scammers have been calling people, falsely claiming to help them get payments.��

The ACCC says to hang up on anyone offering to help you with a Qantas payment or refund.

AI-powered bots key to global scam effectiveness

Last month, ����Vlog’s UK sister organisation, Which?, sounded the alarm that .

Just as we’ve witnessed in Australia, these accounts interact with unhappy customers, and even sometimes hijack the threads of their conversations with the airline’s legitimate representatives.

Major international carrier Emirates has warned its customers to beware of fake accounts and it appears X itself is not immune – the company recently noted it was observing a “new trend” of accounts impersonating its own support page.

Many of these accounts are believed to be bots – profiles powered by a piece of computer code which tells them to respond to certain words, such as the name of a company, when people publish a post mentioning them.

This automated process means that, as in Jon’s case, a fake account can sometimes respond more quickly to an X user’s query than an authentic account, which may be human-operated.

But it appears not every post about an airline will trigger a scam swarm – ����Vlog didn’t receive any suspicious responses when we sent posts tagging airlines, even though scam accounts were responding to others at the same time.

In any case, associate professor at Melbourne University’s school of computing and information systems Toby Murray says generative AI programs such as ChatGPT have made the bot-building process easier.

“[AI] could help me write the code for my bot and then … my bot can use [it] to help it automatically write its reply messages and make them look less suspicious,” he explains.

Murray had his own run-in with a fake customer service account impersonating the CEO of Australia Post in February, after he wrote a post tagging the company.

He says bots are likely targeting companies such as postal services and airlines that regularly respond to complaints and queries on X and encourage stakeholders to message them on the platform.

“It’s easier to impersonate someone in that sense, because the organisation in question has a history of engaging that way,” he says.

The account that responded to Murray is no longer active and ����Vlog didn’t find any other accounts pretending to be Australia Post when we searched X.

For our part, ����Vlog is pushing for new laws to make AI companies more open about, and responsible for, the content their platforms create.

“We need robust regulations for AI, including strong transparency and accountability measures for ‘foundation models’,” says ����Vlog consumer data advocate Kate Bower. “These are the large language models underpinning generative platforms like ChatGPT.”

Qantas says it reports fake accounts to the relevant social media organisations and works to have them taken down.

Virgin Australia encourages social media users to report suspicious accounts to it and the platform where they appear.

Qantas doesn’t plan to stop offering customer support via X, and Virgin Australia hasn’t indicated if it plans to change how it engages on the platform.

Rex didn’t respond to a request for comment.

X failing to protect users

The current tussle with automated scam accounts comes despite X’s owner Elon Musk promising to “defeat spam bots or die trying”, just prior to taking over the platform.

Computer experts say Musk hasn’t delivered on his promise and the bot problem has become worse due to changes to X’s verification system.

Until April last year, it was common to see a blue tick next to the name of a prominent account, such as that of a major company. This was meant to guarantee users that an account was who they said they were.

“When you were talking to a specific company, because they were verified, you knew you were dealing with the actual proper company,” Jon Dee recalls.

However, users wanting a verification tick now have to pay (as well as meet certain requirements designed to weed out impostor profiles) and not all official business accounts, including major Australian airlines, are currently verified.

Associate professor and sociotechnologist Ritesh Chugh from Central Queensland University says the upheaval has confused X users and made it harder to tell fake accounts from legitimate ones.

“I don’t think that was a good move,” he says of the changes to verification. “Elon Musk came in promising to get rid of bots from Twitter, but I’m noticing people leaving X because of this problem.”

Both ����Vlog and experts like Chugh believe digital platforms should be legally required to do more to protect users from scams.

“Companies like X have some of the best tech resources in the world, and it’s time they put them to use,” says ����Vlog senior campaigns and policy adviser Alex Söderlund.

Söderlund says a federal government plan to set rules for businesses to protect their customers from scams should also force tech firms like X to do more to help users.

“It’s really important these codes result in mandatory minimum standards with enforceable obligations. Big tech companies won’t do more without the government making them.”

X didn’t respond to a request for comment.

How to spot a fake customer support account on social media

Has a business responded to your request for customer support and you want to know if they’re the real deal? Use these tips to tell if the account is trustworthy:

• Check how many followers it has: scam accounts have very few or no followers. Legitimate firms that have lots of customers will have thousands.
• Look at when it was created: Impostor accounts get shut down often, so any that are active are likely to be months old at most. A authentic business profile will likely have joined the platform many years ago.

Have you been affected by a scam or seen one you think people should know about? Contact the author.

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Bonza fell into voluntary administration in late April after the leases on its aircraft were cancelled by the US investment firm that had funded the venture.�� 

Tens of thousands of customers, many in mid-trip, were left with no flights and no refunds in sight. It was an especially hard landing for customers who were led to believe refunds were on the way.

On 30 April, shortly after it became clear that Bonza was on the brink of collapse, affected customers received text messages from the airline saying they’d get their money back within 21 days. All they had to do was fill out an online form within 24 hours.

That hurried promise was quickly revoked. Administrator firm Hall Chadwick announced the next day that processing refunds for customers was not on the cards at the moment – and it may never be.

On 7 May, Hall Chadwick said the lessors of Bonza’s aircraft, 777 Partners, will likely move the fleet to another airline.��

Customers considered ‘unsecured creditors’ 

Airline customers would be considered unsecured creditors by administrators trying to figure out how to salvage what’s left of the business. They would generally be the last in line to get their money back. Secured creditors such as banks, on the other hand, get priority treatment.��

In the case of Bonza, the hierarchy of compensation is complicated given the number of creditors apparently owed money, which would include airports and ground staff, refueling services and, of course, Bonza employees, who are in a particularly tight spot. Of 323 employees, 302 were stood down in early May and told their April wages would not be paid. In total, Bonza owes money to about 58,000 creditors, including customers.

One standard remedy for customers who have paid for services that were not delivered is a credit card chargeback, but it’s an iffy prospect in the case of Bonza. Chargebacks depend on the card issuer getting the money back from the bank associated with the failed business. Given the extent of its debts, that could be a very tall order in the case of Bonza.��

Travel insurance is another option, but also probably a long shot. In our most recent review of travel insurance policies, relatively few insurers offered cover for insolvency of a travel provider.��

In a general response to customer enquiries, Hall Chadwick says, “The administrators confirm that the processing of refunds cannot occur at this time. Customers who have had flights cancelled should contact their financial institution or insurance providers to discuss the available options.”

On 3 May, Hall Chadwick announced they “are still working with a number of key stakeholders to provide funding in order to resume flight operations and will continue to do so over the weekend”.

An initial meeting between the administrator and creditors has been scheduled for 10 May. Somewhere between four and six weeks after that, a second meeting will be held where creditors will vote on whether to execute something called a ‘deed of company arrangement’, which generally results in a better return to unsecured creditors than a liquidation. Alternatively, the creditors can vote to end, or liquidate, Bonza airlines for good.��

If refunds for customers are not forthcoming, millions of dollars in flight payments will go to Bonza’s other creditors – an outcome that would be especially galling in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis.

Key info for Bonza customers

• Bonza’s fleet is currently grounded, and the lessors of its aircraft have indicated they’ll likely move the fleet to another airline.
• The status of flights from 29 May onwards is unknown.
• Stranded passengers have been instructed to contact Qantas on 13 13 13, Virgin Australia on 13 67 89 and Jetstar on 13 15 38 to make alternative bookings.

Need for a compensation scheme

In our view, paying for a travel service and ending up with nothing is not an equitable outcome. In a 2021 ����Vlog report on the travel industry that we submitted to the federal government, we recommended looking at the establishment of an industry-funded last-resort compensation fund. The pool of money would cover customers when a travel provider goes bust.��

A previous Australian travel compensation scheme was retired, in part, because it was determined that travellers could be reimbursed through credit card chargebacks and travel insurance. In our view, this is an ineffective remedy.

How to get in touch about refunds 

• Administrator Hall Chadwick has set up a hotline for Bonza customers that it says is available from 7am to 10pm – (03) 8678 1600. However, when ����Vlog called the phone rang out.��
• Customers can also email Hall Chadwick at bonzacustomers@hallchadwick.com.au
• Administrators should make a ‘proof of debt’ form available to customers seeking refunds, but the Bonza case hadn’t reached that point at the time of publication.��

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Few things are less certain these days than the flight you paid for taking off on time – or taking off at all.��

In a recent survey of nearly 9000 ����Vlog supporters, two out of five respondents said they’d had a flight cancelled or delayed in the last 12 months.

Based on this snapshot, your chances of getting what you paid for from an airline for some flights are only slightly better than 50/50.

Of those who had suffered the terminal torpor of flight delays, 85% were not provided the decency of accommodation or meal vouchers.

“As we head into the Christmas season, a huge number of people will be relying on flights to visit family and friends. Unfortunately, our survey of people from across the country has found consumers still face a number of difficulties when dealing with the aviation industry,” says ����Vlog senior campaigns and policy adviser Bea Sherwood.

No reason, no refund

Well over half of those we surveyed (63%) reported that when their flight had been cancelled, they were not told why.

It appears that flight cancellations have become so routine that the airline doesn’t even bother to explain.

And of those who attempted to get a refund, 47% received it within a month, but 20% didn’t get their money back for over six months.

“The fact that people continue to experience such significant difficulties with air travel is simply not good enough,” Sherwood says, adding that the survey findings “do not bode well for the upcoming busy Christmas and New Year period when airports will be flooded with travellers flying to visit loved ones”.

����Vlog calls for new rights

The time for a close look at what’s gone wrong with the aviation industry has clearly come, which is why ����Vlog and the Consumers’ Federation of Australia have made several commonsense recommendations in our submission to the federal government’s Aviation Green Paper – a consultation process that invites feedback from across the aviation sector, including from airline passengers.

Our recommendations include:

• minimum compensation arrangements for delayed or cancelled flights
• clearer rights to refunds
• minimum requirements for travel vouchers and credits
• minimum requirements for customer service.

We also want to see the establishment of a new independent travel and tourism industry ombudsman whose remit and powers far surpass those of the industry-funded Airline Customer Advocate.

Qantas reaches new lows

When you look at the recent history of Qantas, it becomes easier to understand why we’ve all been living in air travel hell for so long.

In August, the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) took Qantas to court for allegedly selling seats between May and July 2022 on about 8000 flights that had already been cancelled.

The ACCC alleges that, on average, tickets were being sold for more than two weeks after Qantas had cancelled the flight.��

In some cases, tickets were available for up to 47 days after the flight had been cancelled.

Qantas then took an average of 18 days to pass along this information, and in some cases up to 48 days.

In defending itself, Qantas says that you are not actually reserving a seat when you book a flight, but buying something they ambiguously call a “bundle of rights”.

The ACCC’s case is founded on the simple notion that it’s false, misleading or deceptive when you don’t let customers know in a timely manner that the flight they booked has been cancelled so they can make other arrangements.

Instead, you leave them in travel limbo, a sort of layover on the way to travel hell.��

Financial and emotional impacts

ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb summed up the feelings of many when the Qantas court case was announced.

“There are vast distances between Australia’s major cities. Reliable air travel is essential for many consumers in Australia who are seeking to visit loved ones, take holidays, grow their businesses or connect with colleagues. Cancelled flights can result in significant financial, logistical and emotional impacts for consumers.”

In its submission to the Aviation Green Paper, Qantas says a mandatory compensation scheme for passengers is likely to lead to higher fares. And the airline warns against a significant industry shake-up.��

Chief corporate affairs officer Andrew McGinnes says the airline’s submission “calls for careful thought around permanent policy changes in response to what was an unprecedented and temporary shock for the aviation industry as it came through the pandemic”.

Yet it was the airline’s treatment of customers as the pandemic lifted and flight credits proved difficult or impossible to redeem that led to it receiving a ����Vlog Shonky award.��

Surely a shake-up is in order.��

“����Vlog looks forward to the federal government’s final Aviation White Paper,” Sherwood says. “We hope it will set out a clear plan to strengthen consumer protection in the aviation industry.” 

Sensible reforms such as an independent ombudsman scheme “will ensure people no longer have to deal with the emotional, financial and logistical hardships so many travellers have experienced over the past few years”.��

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But there was a catch – the same one that applied when ����Vlog filed a complaint about the airline’s tactics with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) in April 2022.��

At that time, Qantas was sitting on approximately $1.4 billion dollars in unused flight credits and future bookings, but using a credit was not easy – or even possible – for many. (The airline now holds about $800 million in unused credits.) 

Conditions for using credits 

Then as now, some customers who’ve had to cancel flights due to the pandemic can only use their credits for flights that cost the same or more than their original fare if they originally booked after 30 September 2021.��

For instance, for some customers, if you have a $500 credit for a Sydney to Melbourne flight and the price is now $475, you wouldn’t be able to use the credit to pay for it, even if you waived the $25 loss. Instead, you’d have to buy a new ticket and leave your credit untouched.

It’s also not possible to transfer your credits to another person or use the credits for multiple bookings, a restriction that would be affecting many customers.

If you have $10,000 worth of credits for an overseas trip you had to cancel because of COVID and can no longer take, for instance, you can’t use the credits for multiple domestic flights.��

And restrictions on the use of credits is not the only problem with Qantas’s credit redemption system.��

Most complained about company 

����Vlog has heard from many Qantas customers who’ve had to pay significantly more when using a credit for the same flight, and getting in touch with the airline to sort out issues is often a time-consuming and frustrating process.��

It’s no surprise, then, that complaints about the airline to the ACCC in 2021–22 were 68% higher than the previous financial year, or that Qantas was the most complained about company to the regulator in 2021–22.��

����Vlog head of policy and government relations Patrick Veyret�����������“����Vlog gave Qantas a 2022 Shonky award in large part for its unfair flight credit system, which has let customers down time and time again over the past few years.

“Flight credits should work like gift cards. People should have the choice to transfer the credits to other people, as well as split the credits over a number of transactions.”

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