Qantas Airways’ “ghost-flight” scandal deceived nearly one million customers by selling tickets for tens of thousands of flights that never existed, according to court documents that shed light on the extent of the misconduct and the airline’s awareness of the issue.
In May, Qantas settled the lawsuit by agreeing to pay A$120 million (US$106 million) in fines and compensation for selling tickets on flights that had already been cancelled. The airline admitted to misleading customers by not informing them that their bookings were for non-existent services.
The revelations contributed to the early resignation of CEO Alan Joyce in 2023, though at the time it was unclear how much Qantas knew about its ticketing failures. The case was brought by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, which had sought a record penalty exceeding A$250 million.
A statement of agreed facts, released on 26 September and published on the Federal Court of Australia’s website, indicated that Qantas’ senior managers were collectively aware of the impact on passengers, though no single individual had full knowledge of the situation.
“Qantas was aware of the way in which its system operated. Consumers suffered harm as a result of Qantas’ contravening conduct,” the filing said.
The managers involved were not named, and Qantas did not respond to an email inquiring if current CEO Vanessa Hudson, who was group CFO at the time, was among them. Hudson took over as CEO in September 2023.
The filing also revealed that while Qantas could have immediately stopped selling tickets for cancelled flights, it failed to do so. The airline has since updated its systems.
Between May 2022 and May 2024, Qantas continued to sell tickets for 71,000 flights that had been scrapped. About 87,000 customers purchased or were rebooked on these phantom flights, with 884,000 passengers left uninformed on time about the cancellations.
On average, Qantas continued to sell tickets for 11 days after a flight was cancelled and took just as long to notify passengers of the changes, according to the court documents.