Upon arriving at Sydney Airport, Jetstar terminal yesterday to go to Bali via Melbourne we were told by Jetstar staff that we need to go to the Qantas terminal, although we were told when we made the booking that we must go to the Jetstar terminal... this was the beginning of a series of monumental stuff ups!
We proceeded to the Qantas check in, used the e check only to find our tickets would not print so we lined up a the service counter... 15 minutes later when we finally got service we were told to go to a different counter and line up again. At that counter we were told we would not be going to Bali - the plane has been delayed and we had to spend the night in Melbourne and leave for Bali the next day.
Considering we only booked our tickets the previous day for a spare of the moment holiday and were only going to spend 3 days in Bali therefore spending the night in Melbourne did not seem very appealing to us.... So I called Jetstar from my mobile and was on hold for 20 minutes so instead I decided to run back to the Jetstar terminal. That was one of the most frustrating customer service experiences I have ever dealt with (or lack thereof).
Basically we were told we had to go to Melbourne and we would find out in Melbourne what is going on; they also could not assure me that we would be looked after with a hotel etc in Melbourne. I also need to point out that I asked there and then for a refund to book the tickets at a later date (with Garuda of cause)... they could not help and insisted we go to Melbourne.
After arriving in Melbourne we were in good spirits - we figured we would have a movie night and some good room service and get up nice and early for our flight to Bali. I can't tell you how disappointed we were when we were handed a $16 voucher at the airport for dinner by Jetstar. We felt let down by the Jetstar staff who did not seem at all sympathetic.
By this stage we were getting annoyed... our shot holiday had been cut even shorter... and we just wanted to go back to Sydney and get a refund for our flights as we had serious doubts that the plane would be leaving at 8 the next morning.
We proceeded to the Jetstar service desk who tried to palm us off to another service desk... but persistence paid off and they finally got a manager to come and speak with us.
The manager was in no way going to pay for our return trip to Sydney all he could do was try and get us a later flight home from Bali... or give us a refund for the flight to Bali but we had to make out own way back to Sydney. He left us to make some inquiries and came back half an hour later. He could not get us a later flight home from Bali and decided he would give us a full refund and pay for our flights home. We were a little shocked at his complete turn around in attitude and accepted his offer to go back to Sydney via Qantas.
We used our $16 vouchers (on some wine that ended up spilling all over me - not my day). Went to board the flight and that little machine would not accept our tickets - the flight attendant told us we had to go to the Qantas service desk. By this stage we were just so over it that we laughed all the way to the service desk expecting the worst... instead they handed us two business class tickets!!!! Considering they were not going to pay for our flight home we were shocked.
All in all I would not fly with Jetstar again and I am going to return to Bali in late January via Garuda = )