Holidaymakers hit by flight changes

Press, 29 March 1980, Page 1

Holidaymakers hit by flight changes

T By LES BLOXHAM, travel editor

Extensive changes to Qantas’s winter timetable for flights between Christchurch and Australia have upset the holiday plans of thousands of South Islanders and cost some travel agencies huge sums in lost business.

Four of the airline’s five scheduled services a week to Sydney, Brisbane, and Melbourne have had their flight days changed from next Tuesday. About . 12,000 passengers who were holding bookings on flights through to October have been affected. Many have’ already been rebooked on flights leaving q day or two earlier, but those unable to change their plans are being offered full refunds.

” Few travel agencies have escaped the shock waves created by the rescheduling; Staff have been forced to work long hours overtime getting in touch with clients, rewriting tickets, amending accommodation and other ground arrangements, and rewriting itineraries. In addition to that ex-

pense, some agents have also suffered severe financial losses through cancellations.

L. D. Nathan Travel, of Cathedral Square, appears to have been worst hit with an estimated loss to date exceeding $40,000. The agency’s retail manager (Mr Max Lucas) confirmed yesterday that his cancellations included a group of 42 from Kaikoura.

Settlers Travel, : a much smaller agency in New Regent Street, had a group of eight worth $lO,OOO pull out because the rescheduling would have added an extra two days to .their Australian holiday.' “They were not prepared to meet that extra expense,” said the manager, Mr David Oakes.The group had originally booked last October for travel in July. ' At least two travellers who held confirmed 'tickets on Qantas flights in June are known to be contemplating legal action--for breach of contract their travel agents. Another traveller,, Mr G, Allen, of Christchurch, complained bitterly to ‘‘The Press,” and then sent a terse cablegram to the

chairman of Qantas (Sir Lennox Hewitt). Mr Allen said that he and his wife, a teacher, were booked to fly from. Christchurch to Melbourne on Friday, May 9, the end of the school term.

“Now we are told that, the flight is leaving two days earlier, which is out of the question if my wife cannot get leave,” he said. The Allens’ problem is further compounded by the fact that their Qantas flight home from Sydney has been rescheduled from May 21 to May 20.

The Christchurch manager of Atlantic and Pacific Travel (Mr C, R. Wood) said his company had processed hundreds of changes, but had received 1 only a few cancellations, . Mr Lindsay Barron, a joint director of Scholes Oakley Holidays (Christchurch), believes Qantas is not taking its-Tasman responsibilities seriously enough. “We are very. unhappy about the whole situation which has Required an awful amount of extra unnecessary work,”- he said.

Viscount Bolingbroke, managing director Of Bolingbroke Travel, was more philosophical: “Thank God is doesn’t happen too often . . The Christchurch office of Qantas has not escaped unscathed as a result of the decisions made by its masters in Sydney. The airline’s staff also has been working long hours, copping the wrath of both agencies and clients. The manager (Mr D. S. Menzies) has given in assurance that they were doing everything possible to meet the needs of passengers. He said that while the airline traditionally had two changes Of schedule a year, the most. recent had been compounded by particularly heavy bookings during the off-season winter months. “In previous years we have, had only 20 or so passengers affected on each flight, but this year

we are holding .as many as 300 bookings a flight,” he said. “Our staff .alone have had to . advise •' between 2000 and 3000 people of changes to their flights; it’s no small problem.”

Qantas’s regional director for New Zealand (Mr Peter Chown) has expressed regret about the rescheduling which, he said, had been caused by “fleet logistics.” He' said that it was the airline’s policy to change flights normally in April and October, and bookings should never be considered as firm until the final schedules were announced. Fortunately, Ait New Zealand’s Tasman schedules remain virtually untouched for the winter months.

However, the comparative ease with which Qantas has changed the flights of thousands of travellers . raises an interesting thought. 'Will the airline still in all honesty be able to demand penalty payments from advance.purchase ticket holders who dare request a change of flight in the