I was booked on a flight from Auckland to Wellington a few weeks ago. The flight was initially delayed from its scheduled 8:35pm departure until about 10pm. When the flight arrived in Wellington, it made two attempts to land but because of high tail winds and wind shear, it was unable to land. The pilot then flew back to Auckland and we arrived about midnight. It took over twenty minutes for two aborted attempts so the total time in the air was about 2 hours 20 minutes. Note in over 25 years of flying into Wellington this is the first time I have been on a flight that could not land and this time it tried twice.

Clearly while weather conditions are out of the control of the pilot  I was initially surprised that the flight crew announced that they were planning to open the drinks trolley en route to Auckland but still expected the passengers to pay for refreshments. As a courtesy to the passengers because of the inconvenience I would have thought at least the drinks could have been complimentary. Ultimately this point became irrelevant since they did not open the drinks trolley.

Upon nearing Auckland we were informed that there were no further flights possible that night and that Auckland passengers should go home and others would have accommodation arranged for them.  As you can imagine the airport was deserted at this time with minimal ground staff so there was a considerable delay in processing all the passengers who needed accommodation and new flights.

By the time I was able to have accommodation booked for me, it was nearly 2am and the only flight they could book me on was a 17:30 flight later that day. With my business commitments this was unacceptable to me so I was forced to book an early flight with Air NZ so I could return to Wellington in time. This cost me $320!

On the morning of 28 March I called the Jetstar customer service team to ask about the sector I was not able to take and was told it would be referred to the Customer Relations Team with my potential options being either a refund for the sector or a voucher. I would be contacted by that team in due course.

On 5 April I called again and was told the Customer Relations team normally responds in 10 working days and that time had not yet elapsed.

I called again today (11 April), now 12 days since my original call not having received any callback from their team. After spending nearly 20 minutes with their call centre and elevating the issue to a supervisor I was told, they would raise the matter again with the Customer Relations team and to expect a call in 3-5 days.

Im my view this is poor customer relations. Should they call me in that timeframe it would have been over 15 working days since my initial complaint. I don't know what service levels they are trying to achieve in terms of customer response, but these targets are very modest to say the least.

All I can say it, this is my first experience with Jetstar and is likely to be my last.   Be warned - when you travel a budget airline you get what you pay for.