Absolute Service Failure

On my way to the Cape Town International Airport with a group of friends, we went online to check into our FlySafair flight to Johannesburg as we wanted to ensure that we checked in on time. The website kept logging us out, forcing us to log in several times, each time attempting to check in, but with no luck.<br> <br> The website check-in service clearly was not working at all. We had been relying on this service in order to ensure that we made it onto our flight on time as we were informed that manual check-in closed 40 minutes before the flight. We arrived at the check-in counter 38 minutes before our departure time, and we're totally shocked when the uncooperative, rude staff told us we were too late to check in and that we had to book into a later flight. Due to the total failure of their online check-in service, and the absolute unwillingness of the staff to assist us, we had no choice but to pay the change fee, as well as the cost of the new flight tickets, costing the 4 of us over R3000. This seems completely unreasonable for a mere 2 minutes late arrival, and we felt that the staff could've easily still checked us in without delaying the flight in the least.