Qantas “unlawfully” withheld refunds for COVID-19 cancellations, class action alleges

Federal court proceedings against Qantas have been lodged on behalf of hundreds of thousands of Qantas customers whose flights were cancelled during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The class action, lodged by Echo Law, alleges Qantas “breached the law by failing to be transparent and immediately issue refunds to customers when flights were cancelled”.

“Instead,” said Andrew Paull, partner at Echo Law, “Qantas held onto its customers’ money and pushed out travel credits with strict conditions, which we allege it was not entitled to do.

“It now needs to be held accountable and refund that money with interest.”

An Echo Law media release claimed the major disruptions to air travel, and resulting cancellations, are no excuse for Qantas to “take advantage of its own customers and effectively treat them as providers of over $1 billion in interest-free loans”.

Regarding the credits, the statement said “Qantas customers have also often been required to pay the airline more than their original booking to use their credits on new fares and have been pressured by the airline to do that or lose the value of their flight credits”.

Furthermore “there are many customers who for various reasons will not use their flight credits before they expire at the conclusion of calendar 2023, at which point the credits will ‘expire and their value will reduce to $0′”.

It’s another development in a saga of dwindling service standards, labour battles and PR headaches that have chipped away at the national carrier’s reputation for years now.

The class action’s allegations include:

• Qantas engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct
• Qantas has been unjustly enriched by holding customer funds that it ought to have refunded
• Qantas engaged in a system or pattern of unconscionable conduct.

“While Qantas has talked in recent weeks of giving customers the ‘option’ of requesting a refund, this is both too little and too late,” Paull said.

“That money ought to have been automatically returned to customers, in most cases more than three years ago, and we are seeking both refunds of all remaining credits as well as compensation for the time customers have been out of pocket.”