SAA’s day light *******!

Today my mother and I tried to book flights to New York through SAA, we decided to book two individual flights seeing as only she’s returning. Prior to booking there were two seats available that we opted for, my mother booked her flight, it cost us R37 000. When we tried to book my flight the flight status changed to fully booked?? We then called the SAA customer service contact Centre and spoke to Thabile... after being put on hold countless times we told Thabile that we need to cancel this flight seeing as there was no seat for me. The contact centre staff were extremely inefficient, the keep you on hold, there’s no accountability and no proactive problem solving. We specifically asked them to cancel this flight and were told that there are terms and conditions that we should have read and adhered to. All we want to do is cancel this booking, get a refund and book on an alternative airline that has the efficiency we expect as paying customers! That R37000 is OUR money and consequently we expect to receive a certain level of service and client centricity! No wonder SAA is entrenched in debt, the staff are ***********, they quick to refer you to terms and conditions and to point out technicalities as opposed to helping clients solve the problem! As SAA’s customer service continues to deteriorate it’s no wonder they continue to rely on bailouts - which is OUR money -. This experience and behaviour is not what we expect from a state owned enterprise which used to be a reputable business. We expect upper management to deal with this matter efficiently and respectfully.