"Good Evening, JetStar complaints desk, please lodge your complaint now"

I'd hate to be working in the complaints section at JetStar. They would be busier than a dog trying to bury a bone in a marble floor at the moment.

Since taking off on May 25, Qantas Airways' low cost carrier has been in the news for all the wrong reasons. Or has it?

The airline, which is attempting to follow the low cost service model used by Ryan Air and Delta, promises to fly passenegers around the country for as little as $29. Cheap. But like all good deals, there is a catch, or in JetStar's case, several catches, all of which have been widely publicised:

You have to check in 30 minutes prior to departure. If you are late, stiff. You will not be able to board the flight and you lose your seat – no refund or free transfer is available and you have to book and pay for a new ticket if you still want to get to your destination

They have a free seating policy. That means no allocated seating; first in, first served.

All other passengers will be given a boarding priority on their boarding pass, this will be based on the time that you checked in.

No unsupervised kids. Passengers have to be able to travel independently.Children requiring supervision will not be regarded as able to travel independently on the basis that they may cause a disruption or endanger themselves or others if travelling unaccompanied.

Oh, and if you live in Melbourne, you might have to use the far flung Avalon Airport out near Geelong.

So, if you can handle all of that, then Jetstar is for you. But , like I said in a previous post, we are slow to catch on to consumer trends in this country, so when people rushed to book the really cheap seats on our Jetstar, they did so without really understanding what they were buying. Let's look at some of the complaints so far:

1. May 27:
Karen Smith reports on Crikey that she tried to book a flight for her 13 year old daughter to fly from Maroochydore to Sydney. But JetStar informed her that they did not have unaccompanied flights for children at all. So she complained to them and her local newspaper.

2. June 2:
Five passengers were left stranded in Hobart because they missed the check in deadline. So they grizzled and complained.

3. June 7:
Angry travellers criticised the discount airline yesterday for its handling of a 4 1/2 hour delay for their flight from Hobart.

4. June 8:
Six passengers were stranded in Melbourne because they missed a check-in time by minutes due toi a delay in buying a pass for the toll road that leads to the airport. Passeneger Stan Bednarek is quoted in the press as being "totally disgusted."

5. June 9:
A British Backpacker misses check-in for her flight from Melbourne because he went to the wrong airport. She too complains.

6. June 23:
Six flights were cancelled after a Boening 717 was grounded with serious damage to its front cabin door following .Victorian travellers who pre-purchased tickets for flights between Avalon Airport and Sydney yesterday were instead forced to fly in and out of Melbourne Airport. Oh, and they all complained about the inconvienience.

So all in all, they aren't really doing anything wrong. They are delivering on what they promise. But all of this publicity isn't helpful, and only prooves that we really do want a Rolls Royce service experience at a Kingswood price (Thanks Trevor)!

Of course all of this is a fantastic for Virgin Blue as disgruntled passengers trudge over from the JetStar counter.

Maybe the people at the JetStar complaints department should change their number to 13 6789

Comments

[Paul]

Mate
You have no idea - Australians don't expect a Rolls Royce, they expect respect and a fair go. Jetstar are treating people with total disrespect and are beinng totally inflexible. Remeber thay are not running an airline for our good they are doing it to make money. They won't make any money treating their customers badly. Currently they are the best publicity Virgin Blue could have.
Paul

[shannon]

Thanks for the comments Paul. I agree, but also disagree Paul. Australians do want a fair go, I agree. But I disagree that JetStar are being disrespectful...aren't the last passengers being disrespectful by being late, particularly to the passenegers sitting on the plane waiting? As for being inflexible, well yes they are, but that is all part of the JetStar offer, which we are free to take or leave.
And if you check some of my previous posts you will see that I question whether an airline that is so rigid will ever work in a market place with such a small population

[LIVID]

I have to agree with Paul.

Granted that inflexibilities that directly aid in minimising operating costs for a budget airline are a necessary evil, some of Jetstar's policies are just downright unfair.

Has anybody ever done this:
- Logged onto an airline's website
- Entered in their desired flight details
- Retreived a list of available flights
- Then decided they want to try another date?

If you hit the "BACK" button on your browser, Jetstars website RANDOMLY CHANGES your destination!

If, like me, you don't verify the destination when confirming your booking, because you assume that a major Australian air carrier's website would not exhibit a flaw as fundamentally absurd as this, you may find yourself with tickets to Hobart, instead of the Gold Coast!

Secondly, because of Jetstar's concrete terms regarding NO REFUNDS, you will probably find yourself having to fork out
- a $30 change of booking fee (by phone)
- a $20 (each way) change of booking fee (via Internet)
- the difference in fare pricing

OR

- forfeit the cost of said fare, because Jetstar simply DO NOT REFUND - even if the booking was made TWO MINUTES AGO.

Try it - go to Jetstar's site and hit the Back button - you'll get Hobart, Mackay, Rockhampton...

Why should a customer be financially penalised for a design flaw in Jetstar's website???

[Livid]

Have since tested and found that the website behaviour described above is limited to Firefox V0.91 (latest).

Still, the site states:

"Site optimised for viewing in Firefox 0.8, Netscape 7.1 and IE 6.0, 800x600 resolution."

[Lily]

I traveled Jet Star on the 1st of October and waited two hours before the flight time, and then the gate was changed without anyone been told. After that we found it was going to be another hour and a half until the plane was ready (as they where getting a part for the plane from Melbourne. Three or so hours later we were told that it would be another two hours, they were now getting to part from Brisbane. They then gave as a eight dollar voucher for a coffee shop (with drinks costing three dollars or more) for lunch. After lunch they moved the gate again and we waited for another hour before been sent home after waiting five and a hours for a plane. We were told when we asked that the flight was been moved to 8:30 the next day. Then at 11:00 that night I got a call to tell me the flight had been changed again and was now at 6:00am that morning (which ment I had to get up at 3:45am to get to ther airport in time. After having paid $50 for a taxi to get home to night before and another $50 to get back to the airport the computer weren't working because they thought we where already in Rockhampton and we had the wait another half an hour to get though. We then got given twevle dollars for breakfast with fifteen mintues to speed and eat it. The flight was an over all eighteen hours late.

Lily

P.S. Has anyone noticed they don't have an e-mail address on jetstar.com?

[Vance Painter]

My company has had a whole series of problems with Jetstar.

Their complaints section is very poorly run (relies on a callcentre) and they are totally inflexible. They will not pass you on to any Jetstar Personnel totalkabout problems - no matter what!

The latest problem involves a name change of a Director of our company taking a flight to Melbourne (Avalon). His name on photo ID is slightly different from his common name in which the flight was booked. They want $ 60 to change it!

Another previous problem involved the so called 30 minute rule (they closed their counter 45 minutes before schedules with no refund).

My strong advice to any business is to steer well clear of this airline. They may seem cheaper but they are not. All you end up doing is spending a lot of time dealing with all the problems they cause.

I doubt Jetstar will last very long,
Virgin Blue its main competitor offers excellent service and is staffed by reasonable people who know how to run a professional airline.

Importantly they don't seem to have problems accomodating such obvious small anomalies as a slight change in a name on a ticket.

Vance Painter

[steve condie]

We thought we would give Jetstar a go, and see how they compared with Virgin.

The plane flight and service was fine, but the proceedures to getting onto the plane left a lot to desire.

We were only allowed to check in at two counters that opened late, and then had people jumping in front of those of us who had been waiting.

The flight was 1/2 an hour late, and the seating capacity in the departure lounge had been significatly reduced by the barriers for bording. As the plane pulled into the gangway from it's inbound flight, people began lining up at the departure doors for our trip. It took half an hour before we began boarding, and again people were pushing their way through.

We and many others felt like herded cattle in a stampede, and have all said that we will be flying Virgin in future.

At least you can checkin at any counter, get your seat allocated, and be relaxed when you board.

We also felt sorry for the women who missed her earlier flight because the checkin attendant caused her to be late, and then had the hide to tell her she could get the next plane after she paid her new airfare.

I honestly believe Jetstar need to get a few of their staff out in the lounges and listen to what comments are being made about them

[steve condie]

as there is no email address for complaints to Jetstar, you can send them to the mother company
[email protected]

[Paul]

Lets face it Jets Star could well be the worst airline in the history of the world. I hope everyone at Jetstar catches a rare painful disease. I regret every buying a ticket with them. I certainly will never travel with them again.

There is nothing more to be said. Jetstar are a bad bad bad airline and should be sent to the corner to think about what they have done.

[James Williams]

I booked two seats during the $29 dollar sale. I was prepared to turn up to the airport on time, have crap seats, no food yada yada... and then the CATCH I WAS NOT EXPECTING. They rescheduled my flight, not once, but three times. I was due at my destination at 9am - I now get there at 17.45! Enough to make me swear until I was the colour of this website. Jetstar are total and utter crap!

[Mikey]

I recently flew Melbourne to Cairns with Jetstar for $99 ... yes, $99. Brand new planes, they went around and took orders for mini pizzas for $6.50, I ordered one and they brought it to me when it was done. Paid $10 for a personal TV screen thingy ... movies, music videos, sitcoms, you can watch what you want, when you want. What could be better than that?

Yes people whinge "oh I don't get a seat", but on a Virgin Blue plane all 180 people wait while the person sitting in seat 1A puts their luggage in the overhead locker ... on Jetstar, you can go and sit where you want so it doesn't block up the aisle, so you can board quicker. Its great :)

[Marilyn Chestnut]

I recently travelled to Cairns, flight was supposted to leave Tullamarine at 12.45pm. Upon arrival at the booking desk some of the passengers were advised that 25 other passengers were going to be dropped off at Maroochydore and we might be delayed for approximately 30-35 minutes depending on wind. This information was totally incorrect. Not only was our flight delayed for 1/2hr before take off but we spent over 5 hours in a plane that should have taken 3hrs 20mins. Obviously Jetstar didn't want to send a half full flight to Maroochydore and because their flight to Cairns was not full they dumped them on us and inconvenienced around 60 people. I was disgusted along with most of the other passengers, we all had other plans once we got to Cairns at 3.20pm which ended up being 5.20pm. Believe me I have travelled with Jetstar before but will seriously consider Virgin Blue in the future as I don't want to be treated with such total disregard!!! Be AWARE - the money is all they care about not the service!!

Maisie

[Karuna Nainani]

I would like to cite an instance of indifference demonstrated by the Jet Star team on 2nd December, 2005 at Tullamarine airport, Melbourne. We (3 of us) were waiting to check in for our flight to Cairns scheduled for am. Being aware of the ‘check in 30 minutes prior’ criteria of Jet Star, we reached the airport an hour and a half in advance to check in on time.

We kept our ears and eyes wide open for any announcements and displays for the flight including numerous trips to the counter which kept displaying other flights. Ultimately, we got up 5 minutes before the ’30 min check in time’ to figure out the problem. To our disappointment, we realized that the counter as well as the signage displaying the schedule was hidden behind a massive commercial advertisement which was impossible to be viewed from any major passenger seats, entrances etc.

After numerous requests to the person in charge, Mr. Winnie, who denied accepting any of these reasons which were quite evident, even refused to accommodate us 29 minutes prior to the departure time. I think it is highly inconsiderate of Jet Star to treat passengers in this manner. Not only did we forfeit the entire cost of the flight fare, which in this case, for no fault of ours we lost an entire day and peace of mind.

Quoting other passenger’s feedback at the airport, I completely agree with the fact that Jetstar are treating people with total disrespect and are being totally inflexible. I think you guys are running an airline merely to make money.

[Renee]

I had extremely bad experience with Jetstar..

I am getting married in the Whitsunday’s in April and booked flights online well in advance to Proserpine Airport from Brisbane for myself and fiancé. I recently received an email stating that the flight times had been changed and IT would now be flying later. This does not suit us as we are departing on a charter boat.

I called the Jetstar office to let you know this was not suitable; I was on hold for 15 minutes before my call was answered. I asked if I could change the flight so it would be returning to Brisbane. I was told that I couldn’t. I then asked for a refund and was told I would be waiting for 5 weeks for the refund to be processed. I asked to be put through to a team Leader and was put on hold for another 20 minutes, I hung up the phone.

Again I tried today to talk to someone about this and spoke to an extremely rude lady. Her telephone manner was absolutely shocking. She even yelled at me at one stage to tell me speak up on the telephone, instead of possibly saying she was having trouble hearing me as it was a bad line. I asked if it was possible to change the flights to someone else’s name as there were other people in our wedding party that were arriving into Airlie beach earlier. She told me (very rudely) it was going to cost $40 per person to change the names. I asked her if is was also correct that it would take 5 weeks for a refund and she said that it was correct (once again very rudely) Again I asked to be put through to a supervisor. She would not put me through to a supervisor. I had to be so persistent and demand 5 times to be put through. I was put on hold while she obviously spoke to the supervisor.

The supervisor was almost as rude as she was. I explained the situation and his answer was “That’s correct you will incur a $40 charge per person and we can not change the flight to a returning flight” however this time he said that the refund would take 3 weeks to process. I explained that I could not wait three weeks for a refund as we would need to book new flights. Through no fault of my own was I changing the flights so I could not understand why there would be a charge to change the flights or why I could not change it to a returning flight. He then said there was nothing Jetstar could do. He was so rude about it and offered absolutely no explanation. I asked him for his name or team number (I was sick of having rude people speak to me like this and not know who they were) and he refused to give it me. All I got out of him was “Chris”. When I asked him why he would not give me his team number or last name his response was “Because I don’t have too” I even told him that we are booking for the whole wedding party (16 pax) the flight to Brisbane on the 19th of April at 1705 with Jetstar and asked him if he would prefer I would take my business to Virgin. His answer to that was “that’s fine”

In the end I have tickets that are useless to me, no refund and the worst service I have EVER experienced.

6 months ago a similar thing happened with Virgin Pacific with my flights to New Zealand, the flights were changed and they were no longer suitable. The lovely lady I phoned was so helpful and the flights were changed at no extra charge and I even had a laugh with her. She was so helpful and friendly; she even asked me if I would prefer to fly out of the Gold Coast instead of Brisbane. The end result was I wrote in a letter to commend her service. Jetstar got a letter of complaint.

Its a great start to my wedding.. thanks alot Jetstar.

I would ...
NEVER BOOK JETSTAR AGAIN!!!

Renee

[Niky]

jesus christ! listen to yourselves! well you pay low money.. what do you want? the world? what exactly do you expect from a budget airline? if you want service.. fly Qantas.. or maybe your all cheapskates who want everything for nothing! you cant expect a BMW or Mercedes when you pay for a nissan.. god.. think about it.. jetstar doesnt promise excellent service.. they promise you a bum on a seat.. read the print! and they get you there safely.. what more do you want for a $40 airfare..

[julian]

so true, how can you say that all they care about is the money.. the main reason why they delay planes is for safety or technical reasons.. fair enough their terms and conditions suck.. but you gotta look at it in the long run.. petrol prices are bloody expensive.. yet their still flyin us places we'd have to pay over $500 return for on other airlines.. give em a chance..

[tianne]

I have to say. i flew jetstar the other day from sydney to the goldcoast, the flight was full, and there were screaming kids with almost every adult. check in didnt allocate me a seat (which i was upset with at first, but i found it a lot easier to find a seat than i thought - and i got the seat i wanted too..) when the flight took off, they came around and offered me a t.v screen which was $7 along with things off the menu (i thought they were free and wasnt prepared to pay for them, but i gathered i only payed $150 for my fare, (which was an extreme saving), i was happy to pay for the items. The flight was smooth, i found the leather seats comfortable - and a tad more roomier than Qantas economy. i pressed the call bell, and the flight attendant came over with a smile and took my rubbish. the flight landed before i knew it. i found no problem at all with the service, or jetstar itself. and im happy to say that i will definately be flying jetstar more often, (than their overpriced owners - Qantas)..
thanks for a good flight jetstar

Tianne Walker.

[Steven Hardwick]

The Ferry taking me and ten others was late get into Hamilton Island. Missed Check in by 30 seconds. All ten people had to buy new tickets with Virgin. The woman at the desk nearly laughed as she delivered the bad news. If she had of turned her head to the left she whould have noted that the ferry was not berthed and thus late.Common sense should of prevailed. I will never fly Jet Star or Qantas. Treat me like a paying customer. Not like cattle. 7 dollars a kilo for excess bagage is a bit over the top. Budjet my arse.Sting operation of the highest order. No longer a customer. Steven Hardwick

[Lewis]

Im too angry to really express my feelings about jetstar... they simply SUCK...

[Katherine Meier]

I will never travel with Jet Star again. We were traveling with our small baby and were four minutes late for check in. No consideration was taken, they were extremely rude and there only suggestion was pay $120 for next flight at 7.30pm which was four hours later. Try to keep a small baby in an airport terminal for that long without getting abused by other passengers for your histerical child. I would like to put this question to them. If the flight was delayed for a few minutes would I be refunded if I siad the flight was to late. I don't think so. We are a family of six and I have made it a family policy to never travel with JetStar and every person I meet I will tell them my story. Even travel agents discourage people from flying JetStar. i wish I had have aked people before booking with them. Virgin Blue were much better anyway.

[dipsii]

Shannon I am writting to you to see if any of your visitors have experienced the same trouble 4 of us did this week at Darwin Airport.

My husband and my self booked a jetstar flight from Darwin to Melbourne and my brother and sister in law booked a flight from Darwin to Brisbane. All of us travelling on Tuesday 23rd May this week,.

Our tickets said that we were travelling at 02.00, so we arrived at the ariport at 12pm on the 23rd May for check in, only to find that we had missed our flights and that they were at 2am in the morning.

Our tickets did not say am or pm and we just looked at the time and thought it was 2 in the afternoon that the aircraft would be departing.

None of us thought for 1 minute that we would be travelling at 2 in the morning.....I do not know of any Australian Capital city where domestic flights go out in the early hours of the morning like that.

The long and the short of it all was that we all had to pay another full fair to get home to our destinations. My husband and I could not go jetstar as the flight was full on the next nights 2am journey and we had to pay a full fair on Virgin if we wanted to get home.

There was no one from Jetstar at the airport that could offer us any help or that was willing to listen to our concerns. We were simply told to contact Jetstar by writting to them at their PO Box number in Melbourne. We could not call them on the phone and we could not email them, as they have no phone number, ( only a reservations number ) and they are not willing to discuss complaints.

Whilst at the airport, we got talking to a lot of other passengers who did exactly the same thing.and turned up expecting to fly out in the afternoon only to find out that their flight went in the early hours of the morning. The staff at the airport were all saying that this happens every single day with jetstar. Qantas were also telling us that they hear the same story everyday.

A lot of airline travellors were simply stranded in Darwin, because they could not afford to pay the high fare again to get home. But were Jetstar sympathetic....no they were not....no one could help us at all.

I would just like to let everyone who is going to travel Jetstar to please make sure that you read your times of departure properly and make sure that you understand if it is am or pm.

I think that just a simple am or pm on the departure times would save a lot of people money, time and tempers. After all both Qantas and Virgin have am and pm on their times.

I am very unhappy as this cheap holiday to Darwin for a couple of days turned into a very expensive holiday, that if we had have know all of this we would not have gone.

Thanks for listening to my concerns.......Dipsii.

[Karen Levine]

Dear shannon,
i flew jetstar from rockhampton to sydney quite a few months back. on arrival to sydney i found that my bag was not on the carousel, i walked over to the lady in their baggage services section. she was friendly and prompt and reassured me that she would locate my bag. After investigating she discovered that another passenger had picked up my bag. she tried to organise for the man to bring the bag back to the airport so that she could complete paperwork and do a swap over with the bags. the man that took my bag couldnt make it back that evening and i had a wedding to go to the next day. i was upset and didnt know what to do. the lady - her name was jayne, took matters into her own hands, took my address, drove to the man's house, collected my bag, swapped them over and delivered my bag to me at 11pm that evening! she did all this in her own time. and drove pretty much to the other side of sydney! i have written letters to jetstar's head office to commend her on her extreme efforts! well done jetstar for having wonderful and caring staff! ill see you on board again soon. thanks again jayne!

[Steve Dobson]

It really is quite simple, Jetstar = Cheap and nasty Airline, Cheap and nasty staff, cheap and nasty rules! Are you starting to get the picture? Possibly NO definitely the worst airline I have flown with. Never again. Pay a little extra for Virgin Blue it really is worth it.

[Mike Crawford]

Hi,

3 weeks ago we missed (less than 5 mins late) an early morning JetStar flight from Brisbane to Newcastle due to heavier than normal traffic getting to the airport (via courtesy coach). Never in my life have I been confronted by such an unhelpful staff member at the counter. We opted to fly Virgin Blue for over 5 times the JetStar price (each) rather than give them more money. Having a 5 min window for late passengers might save this airline but I for sure will be spreading the word far and wide, not complaining about price, but ridiculous "zero tolerance" and "poor attitude". I have been following comments on JetStar on numerous web sites and obviously I am not alone. NOTE: For those of you that may say "you get what you pay for" I reply Everyone is entitled to respect and empathy for free. Empathy is not to be confused with "sympathy". Very clear to me why JetStar don't have a customer complaints email address. The smallest knowledge of Public Relations would go a long way. Lastly, I did notice that JetStar's check-in counters were near empty while Virgin Blue's were very busy. Maybe word is finally getting to the important ones out there, the People!

[Lloyd Barrett]

As with Mike Crawford above I was refused entry to a Brisbane -> Newcastle flight and forced to pay an extra $70 to board a flight several hours later. The difference is that I was not late. In fact I was arguing with the women at the counter at exactly 31 mins before the scheduled departure time according to the clock in the terminal. I had been waiting pointlessly in line a further 3mins before this and there was no announcement of a closure - in fact I was told that the plane had already boarded. So I'm thinking of contacting consumer affairs because they did not deliver on the service outlined on their contract and made me pay more merely because they wanted to take off earlier than scheduled. It's extortion! Never fly Jetstar!