All they could do was suggest we call that Melbourne number which turned out to be only a switch-through to the ticketing centre in Malaysia. The reason it cost us so much to call is that we had to wait around 45 minutes listening to the 'Your call is important to us..." messages.
You are contridicting your self a fair bit in these posts, either it was YOU at CNS airport speaking to the staff or it was your friend?
As pointed out earlier, there are 2 call centres, one in melbourne and one in malaysia, both are trained in the same products and have the same authority to do things. They are equal in everything besides the country they reside in. As i said you getting through to a Malaysian agent is only because they were the next ones that were avail to take your call..