TV presenter savages Qantas over $50 apology fail: 'What a joke'

A TV presenter has savaged Qantas over the delivery of its $50 sorry gift to customers following months of flight delays, cancellations and luggage mishaps.

To restore customers' faith in the airline, CEO Alan Joyce offered Qantas Frequent Flyers a $50 flight discount to make amends.

The airline will roll out vouchers and frequent flyer perks, including lounge invitations and reward seat availability, as additional sweeteners.

Joyce conceded the national carrier had been beset by recent "operational challenges" as customers queued for hours at airports around the country.

However radio presenter and A Current Affair host Deborah Knight revealed the airline added "insult to injury" when she attempted to claim her voucher and found the whole system had crashed.

Slamming the airline on Afternoons with Deborah Knight on 2GB, she said it was "an absolute joke".

"I'm a Qantas frequent flyer so I logged on this morning to try to take up their apology offer. And yes, the wheel of death. The internet just sitting there doing nothing," she said.

"When the message then popped up to say, 'Sorry, we're experiencing some problems with our app and are currently working on fixing this please try again', I thought, 'I wonder if this is just me?'

"I went around and checked with others ... posted something on social media and low and behold the whole system had crashed."

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Qantas website 'crashes' from demand for $50 voucher

Knight then slammed Qantas over the crash, saying they should have been prepared for increased traffic after making the apology.

"Why the hell wouldn't you put the systems in place to make sure that you got it right?" she said during her furious tirade.

"And why are they making people have to accept the offer? Because this is the other thing. There's a deadline. You've got to accept the offer by the end of September and the olive branch is gone. A lot of people will miss that.

"You shouldn't have to accept anything it should be straight delivered to you if you're a Qantas frequent flyer, bugger accepting it and bugger the wheel of death.

"Just make it available to everyone. How the mighty flying kangaroo has fallen. They can't even get the olive branch right. They stuffed that up too."

Qantas was also criticised by Transport Workers Union (TWU) national secretary Michael Kaine, who labelled the $50 vouchers a “stunt” to try to pay customers to fly with the airline.

“The thousands of passengers who have spent hours in call centre queues, following cancelled flights, delays and lost luggage, won't want to waste more of their time attempting to cash in a voucher to buy themselves more of the same chaos,” he said.

“Enough of the gimmicks.”

with AAP

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