Mytrip's questionable service fee and SA Airlink's waiting period.

On 03 September 2023 my wife and I wanted to book two flight tickets, online and through Mytrip (agency), from Port Elizabeth (Gqeberha) to Johannesburg. The tickets were for a date in December 2023.

The online process ran smoothly. We eventually entered the credit card details and as we committed to the payment, a window popped onto the screen indicating something about “not successful”. We assumed that the process and payment did not go through. As Mytrip's website indicated that there were only two tickets left for the particular flight, we immediately started to repeat the online booking process. This time there were no pop-up windows and the payment went through.

However, minutes later I received the SMS from my bank stating that the first payment effort was indeed deducted from our banking account. This was followed by a second SMS confirming that the second payment also went through ! So, the first online effort was indeed successful, although the pop-up message made us to believe that it did not go through. We had paid for four tickets instead of two !

I started with a process to attempt to cancel the erroneous additional booking and payment without delay. Finding the correct page on Mytrip was extremely difficult and confusing. I, eventually, had an on-line chat with one of their consultants. He accepted my difficulty and undertook to escalate the reported incident for eventual reimbur*****t. However, Mytrip would withhold R675 service fee per person (ticket) ! As the flight tickets cost R1 200 each, we would loose more that half of our own money. To me this is ludicrous ! Furthermore, we would have to wait around four months for the reimbur*****t. This, because of a confusing online pop-up window. Enquiries to Mytrip seems impossible as all e-mails from them are “no-reply”, while internet provides no clear contact details for any efficient contact with them. Indeed very frustrating !

SA Airlink is the airline in question. The relevant order number is MHFZDJ (Mytrip). We are still waiting for the reimbur*****t.