Webjet customer problems

Some people are having problems with webjet.com.au practices such as posting expired prices for flights and charging the difference after purchase. If anyone’s experiencing problems with Webjet please let us know.

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Sixteen hours online to resolve my rebooking and still Webjet can’t manage it!

I purchased three tickets for a round trip holiday to Bundaberg from Sydney over the Easter Holidays 2020. These tickets were purchased through Webjet online on Dec 15, 2019. These flights were cancelled by Qantas due to the COVID-19 border restrictions. I subsequently requested a refund via e-mail from Webjet, who only offered a credit. I received no further response from Webjet. On July 2 2020, I filled out Webjet’s online form requesting to use our travel credit for travel over Easter 2021. I received no reply from my request. I then contacted Webjet on July 29, 2020 through their ‘Message Us’ feature on their website. Booking these flights took over four hours of my time online. At times, I had to inform the Webjet customer service officer about the information that I could clearly see on the Qantas website. I was finally able to rebook these flights, with an additional charge above my credit of $39.72 from Webjet for all my trouble. Had I received a refund, as I had a legal right to, I could have booked these same flights for $1,572 that day. With my credit and the added charge, I paid $281.12 over the price of the flights available on that day.
Tuesday, Mar 23 at 16 minutes past midnight, I received a notice from Webjet that all our flights needed to be changed and that I had 48 hours to reply or the new flights would be considered by them as accepted by me. Twenty hours later, I responded that we did not accept our departure from Sydney being moved from 10:05 to 6:05, when there were other options, such as a 13:05 departure with Qantas showing seats still available. Having not received a response from this e-mail, I again reverted to the ‘Message Us’ feature on the Webjet website, as Webjet only accepts phone calls if the departure is within 72 hours. I have now spent two eight-hour online sessions with Webjet’s customer support people and they have still been unable to rebook the flights as requested. In my opinion, this ‘service’ is unprofessional and does not meet any minimal expectation of travel agent service. I’ve now lodged a formal complaint through Fair Trading NSW.

Update: Fair Trading NSW contacted Webjet about my case. Webjet agreed to pursue a full refund from Qantas. It’s now been a couple of months and there has been no refund so far. Appalling!

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I booked a flight through Webjet and United Airlines has canceled one leg of my trip. Since then I’ve spoke to many agents and I get nowhere. Webjet says that United hasn’t put me on another flight. I find this very concerning. I’ve never been notified that my flight was canceled, I found out by looking at my booking online.

Welcome to the Community @Fran

How far away is your booking, indicating more or less urgency to get it sorted?

Would those be Webjet agents, United agents, or both? Would you define ‘getting nowhere’ - I presume you mean about getting that cancelled leg sorted? Or is it about the absence of notification also? Did they commit a date for resolution? In my experience and a reasonable expectation is a few minutes should be all it takes, or a few hours, not more to sort something unless there are no seats on any alternative, and they might be stalling hoping for a cancellation. If the booking was through an airline consolidator ticket it adds complexity.

Do you know if United actually cancelled the flight leg, or Webjet never completed the booking process with United and thus the flight ‘reservation’ timed out and got dropped from your itinerary?

It reads as if you are able to contact them but they are unable to resolve your issue. I note there are no complaints contacts on their web site, but sometimes using social media gets better results. If you are on Facebook try messaging them at www.facebook . com / WebjetAU (remove the spaces I added to keep Discourse from trying to link the page).

This site that tries to provide complaints contact details also comes up empty since all the contacts appear to be their routine customer service. Have you asked for their complaints department to get it sorted, and if so how did they reply?

We have not travelled since 2019 but your experience is out of the norm. Even with the pressures of COVID if a booking is in order, while communications might get sloppy when a flight leg is cancelled it is always replaced, and when done by an agent say United stopped flying that route - the agent should have found another carrier. If no airline is flying that route now it could be an explanation, but still should be crisply communicated.

Most of us can deal with problems when we know what is happening, and the absence of information you need creates angst, and is a bad look on webjet.

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Thanks for your help.

I will check with United if the flight was canceled. I’ve tried to get the complaint department and the customer agent doesn’t answer how to proceed. I was thinking of calling Fair Trade NSW.My flight is in a month but I don’t want to wait until there is no ticket left.

I am astonished that I had to check my booking to realize that my flight was canceled. Is this legal? I strongly recommend to the Choice community not to book through Webjet…

Probably not terribly helpful, but

There is a topic about pre-paid problems arising from COVID-19 that might be helpful, but it is very long and broad and probably not helpful in your situation.

Also check the T&C of your booking with Webjet to see if that suggests options for you to pursue.