Traveller's warning after 'missing flight' by 10 hours over travel agent blunder
A New Zealand woman is warning people to research third-party booking sites, after she was not informed her flight had been moved 10 hours earlier.
Michelle Guest was on a family holiday in Vietnam when she arrived at the airport to fly from Da Nang to Hanoi with Bamboo Airways.
Michelle purchased the tickets through travel booking site Kiwi.com in June for their December 29, 2024 flights.
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Michelle had a flight booked to Hanoi during a family holiday in Vietnam. Getty
In September, Michelle received an email from Kiwi.com that their 8pm flight had been rescheduled to 6.25pm.
Come December 29, she and her family arrived at the airport three and a half hours before their flight as they had a lot of luggage.
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Bamboo Airway's check-in counters were closed and dark but Michelle initially thought nothing of it as they were there so early. As time went on, she managed to get a Bamboo Airways staff member's attention.
"She just said 'no, this flight left this morning at 8:30 am'.
"We were just lucky that she just happened to be kind of lurking around in the office in the back.
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The Bamboo Airways check in counter was closed when they arrived. Getty
"Why were we not told? I was just fuming," Michelle told Stuff Travel.
The staff member told Michelle to talk to Kiwi.com as that was where they had bought the tickets.
"The problem is that Kiwi.com should have informed us in advance, especially if you got a flight that is moved on the same day, like hours and hours beforehand.
"It doesn't matter what you pay, you should expect basic service. Just inform your customers what's going on."
Michelle had been using the Kiwi.com app to be informed of any changes to the flight, as she had done to be notified of the change in September. The company had also previously emailed her changes.
Michelle ended up buying new flights with Vietnam Airlines while at the airport, which cost her family of four $513.
"We were going to Hanoi and we had accommodation booked there. We didn't want to hang out in Da Nang. From Hanoi we were going to Laos."
She had to buy new tickets for another flight. Getty
A Kiwi.com helpdesk employee told Michelle when she messaged requesting a refund that "the airline considered the changes as minor" and that Bamboo Airways did not give Kiwi.com any money back to refund her.
Michelle had not used Kiwi.com before this incident but felt the use of the word 'kiwi' was synonymous with New Zealand and therefore could be trusted. The company is actually based in Prague.
"I just think it's really cheeky to use Kiwi.com when you're not actually in New Zealand."
A Kiwi.com spokesperson told Stuff Travel it has since refunded Michelle.
"We aim to provide the best experience possible for our customers and are investigating why we were not informed of a second schedule change for this flight. We are in contact with the customer to offer our sincere apologies and a full refund has been processed."
In an email to Michelle informing her of the refund, a customer service representative said: " After thoroughly reviewing all communications from the airline, we found that we had not received any additional updates regarding the flight schedule beyond the initial change, which is the reason we were unable to notify you of the final schedule adjustment in a timely manner. It is highly probable that a technical error occurred in this instance, as these communications are primarily automated. An investigation is currently in progress to identify the underlying cause."
Michelle said she advised others to look at reviews and look into any brand they were unfamiliar with before booking.
This story was originally published by Stuff and has been reproduced here with permission.
