Customer disservice

What ever happened to good old fashioned customer service? Please excuse my whinge over the latest episode of disservice - minor in the scheme of things but still annoying.

I recently had a need to fly the same route with Qantas twice in one day, as I do from time to time. Qantas have some error checking logic for crediting points, which stops automatic credit if a given route has already been credited on the same day. The actual flight numbers are ignored. There is a certain logic to this, in that most often an attempt to credit 2 flights on the same route on the same day will be where the passenger has been checked in to 2 flights but only taken one of them. For example, the first flight was cancelled or delayed at little notice and bumped to the second after check in, or the passenger simply misses the flight.

In the past I have been able to wait 4 days (for they will not process missing mileage until at least 3 days have elapsed), phone in and get the credit applied manually and instantly.

For some reason the current case was treated differently. Despite the teleconsultant seeing my flight details she was unable to manually credit and asked me to mail in the boarding passes - to Australia. I don't live in Australia. So due to a limitation in their software I have to jump through hoops to get the credit. It isn't even for a lot of miles. Since they used to be able to manually credit, is the change due to a lack of training on how to do it, or lack of empowerment to make a decision to apply the credit, or enhancement of the software? Whatever it is I don't think it is fair to make the customer go through extra effort to get the credit, particularly when they can see I took the flights.

Perhaps they'd just rather I fly a competitor next time I'm in the situation of my schedule requiring same day repeat flights?