Flying to Taiwan for the first time was supposed to be fun.
About 36 hours to departure, I went to Jetstar's website to do a web check-in. The web check-in page read "Welcome to Jetstar's Web check-in service, designed to save you time." How ironic did it turn out to be?
"Sorry but the information you entered does not match any valid booking. Please check you have completed all the fields below correctly and try again," the error message read. I tried - to no avail - my surname, last name, middle name, even clicking on the direct web check-in link included in the itinerary Jetstar had sent me when I first made the booking.
Irate, I called up Jetstar's Customer Service. The guy tells me some flights don't allow web check-in. I tell him that was in my itinerary and from my understanding, my booking allows it. He tells me he tried the web check-in on my behalf and it didn't work (and how is that even my problem?!). I ask that he escalates the issue to his IT/website team/some higher power. I ask him for a solution. He says he has forwarded the issue to them (whoever they are) and if I would prefer to receive my boarding pass through email or SMS. I choose the email option. He tells me my boarding pass would be emailed to me within a few minutes, and receiving my boarding pass would mean I was successfully checked in.
An hour passes and I get nothing in my email except the usual spam. Furious, I call up customer service. This time I am attended to by a lady. I told her what her male colleague said he would do for me, and hadn't done, and she says never in the history of the company (implies perhaps she's a veteran there?) had they ever checked in a passenger over the phone. She advises I post my complaint through their online feedback form. Back to square one, I tell her that I wasn't able to check in online. She then tries the web check-in on my behalf and tells me that it doesn't work (again, how is that even my problem?!). I ask her if there's anything she/they/Jetstar can do. Shouldn't they have someone look into it? She says they will have someone look into it. I ask her for a CaseID. She says they don't have CaseIDs for calls they take through the centre. and that my issue is logged against my booking reference. She asks me to try again, and at the worst, check-in at the airport. I tell her that I would be making a formal complaint on their service, and again she directs me back to the online feedback form.
She apologizes for the experience I had. She asks me if there's anything else she could do for me. I tell that her there's nothing else she can do for me, thank her for offering, and hang up the phone. For the record, while she was polite and all, she didn't really make me feel she was serious about assisting me. 3 hours wasted. Half an hour spent typing this complaint. www.dontflyjetstar.com added to my browser's bookmarks.