Not a rant or complaint, just sharing what I thought was pretty poor service along with some bad luck traveling with Qatar Airways.

My in-laws have been in NZ for 6 months, we booked them return tickets last August, from new years eve until 25th June.

Itinerary was Armenia, Qatar, New Zealand and then back again the same way but in reverse.

They got here fine, then for their trip back I escorted them to Auckland (we live in Chch) to help them find their way to the hotel we booked for the night before, and to the airport the next day etc (they are elderly and speak little english).

Due to Iran launching missiles at US the US base in Qatar and seeing the disruptions caused by the closing of air space I was keeping a close eye on the flight information to ensure it was still going ahead.

Google flight status said confirmed the day before and right up until we boarded the plane to Auckland, and the same was displayed on the Qatar Airways website. So we got to Auckland Tuesday evening for the flight on Wednesday, I checked the flight status again at the bag check, and google was now displaying "cancelled" for their flight to Doha the next day, so I logged into Qatar Airways website using the booking my inlaws had and the flight was showing confirmed, I also had not received any emails from Qatar Airways at all saying the flight was cancelled. I figured maybe this was a glitch due to so many flights being cancelled and restarted in Doha.

I tried calling the airline Tuesday night when we got to the hotel but got the usual "this line is busy, please call again later" that Qatar Airways had been playing to anyone who called (I had being trying for days to get through to them about another problem).

The next day we headed to the airport to see on the displays that the flight was cancelled and there was only a handful of angry customers in the check in que being told by Qatar Airways staff the flight was cancelled.

When we finally got a chance to talk to someone they informed us the flight was cancelled, I asked them to put my inlaws on the next flight, they advised they can not do that and said to avoid Qatar as there is 20,000 stranded at their airport amid major cancellations and disruptions.

They suggested refunding the return part of our ticket and booking another flight with a different airline back to Armenia, I informed them the refund amount would not nearly cover the cost of a new last minute ticket to Armenia and also advised them Armenian passport holders need transit visas for nearly all countries. They checked on their visa checking software and informed them to go via China or Singapore as they do not need visas there, I then pointed out there was no onwards tickets to Armenia from those countries and I wasn't going to send my elderly in-laws a an airport and country they have never been to especially when they don't speak english.

The airline gave them a voucher for a hotel and said we need to call the number they had given me to arrange another flight. 

We got back to the hotel and the number they gave me did not work so I tried the NZ number I had been trying without luck for days, luckily I got threw with that number (after 50 mins on hold), they re-booked my inlaws on the next flight to Qatar from NZ with an available connecting flight to Armenia, this was to be on Saturday.

This meant another two nights in the hotel which we forked out $400 for plus the meals etc. I also had to miss my flight back to chch which was supposed to be just after their original departure.

Next was canceling the accom they had in doha along with airport transfers, and re-booking for their new flight details.

I got another flight back to Chch that night.

Saturday arrived and my inlaws checked in and got on the plane, after a long time sitting on the plane they were told to get off as there was technical issues, they were given a small voucher for a cafe in the airport. 5 Hours later the issue was fixed and they were off on the 17 hour flight to Doha.

They have Russian travel insurance but I have my doubts it will cover their further stay at the hotel along with food etc. I imagine we will need receipts and some sort of proof the flight was cancelled?

Anyone else been through something similar? I was going to complain to Qatar Airways, but I honestly think the amount of complaints they must be getting right now will make our issue seem pretty insignificant.

Forgot to add: the airline would only cover one night at the hotel out of curtesy as they said they are not liable because it is a disruption caused by government not the airline itself.