While no one likes to show up to the airport only to discover that one's flight has been canceled, the anger grows significantly stronger when customers suspect that it was done intentionally by the airline.
Over the last week, Australia's national carrier Qantas Airways (QUBSF) -) has been dealing with the outcry over a consumer lawsuit accusing it of selling tickets for more than 8,000 flights it never intended to run.
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In the lawsuit filed in Australian court on Aug. 31, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) accused the airline of "false, misleading or deceptive conduct" around continuing to sell tickets for flights scheduled to depart between May and June 2022 for an average of two weeks after they had been canceled.
'Penalty should be in hundreds, not tens of millions,' consumer group says
Travelers who booked the flight then had to go through a lengthy and complex process of claiming a refund and in some cases were reportedly offered Qantas travel credits instead of a refund to their original source of payment.
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In the more extreme example cited in the lawsuit, some flights were still displayed online 47 days after being canceled by the airline. In many cases, the destinations of the flights were still under strict pandemic-related restrictions that were publicly known before the flights were removed from the site.
"We are going to seek a penalty that will underline that this is not just to be a cost of doing business, it is to deter conduct of this nature," ACCC Chairperson Gina Cass-Gottlieb told local news outlet ABC Radio while adding that the "penalty should be in hundreds of millions, not tens of millions."
According to Reuters, Australian consumer laws could potentially allow for a maximum penalty of 10% of Qantas' annual turnover which between June 2022 and 2023 was $19.8 billion Australian dollars (roughly $12.35 billion USD).
While any of the accusations are yet to be proven in court, Cass-Gottlieb brought up the $125 million AUD fine that Volkswagen (VLKAF) -) was ordered to pay in a lawsuit regarding Australian consumer laws and diesel emissions.
Chief executive responds to outcry, claims the airline 'listened'
News of the Qantas lawsuit has predictably caused an outrage among the Australian public. Qantas shares fell nearly 2.5% in the day after the news broke. Stock went from $20 at the start of the week to a low of $18.47 before bouncing back slightly.
While Qantas has been telling media outlets that it will respond in court along with general comments around how that period was one of "unprecedented upheaval for the entire airline industry," it did respond to the outcry by removing the Dec. 31 expiration date for claiming a refund for those canceled flights.
Customers with canceled Qantas flights will be able to use their credit to get a full refund while those with flights from the budget offshoot JetStar will be able to claim travel credits for another flight at any future point in time.
"These credits and vouchers will never expire," outgoing Qantas CEO Alan Joyce told customers in a video message. "We're doing this because we've listened."
