Air Niugini cancelled with no way to contact?

[djtech]

Hi all,

A bit of a panic post here. Have some family members that were booked to travel from Brisbane to Hong Kong tomorrow connecting in Port Moresby. Unfortunately, they just got an email saying PX8 the flight to Hong Kong has been cancelled, but was offered no alternative flight. The kicker is that their call centre closed at 6 and they only sent the email at 8. What is the correct course of action? If it was me, I would rather not fly and get stuck at Port Moresby, but would that forfeit their chance of getting reaccomodated to Hong Kong?

Any thoughts on how to handle this is welcome.

 

[AIRwin]

Travel insurance?

 

[djtech]

Travel insurance?

Hoping to use this as a last resort. IIRC they booked with the AMEX Platinum Edge card.

 

[Austman]

Are they on PX24 BNE-POM?

If so, it's probably best now to turn up to the airport in BNE and let them handle it.

Philippine Airlines seems a viable alternative. But who knows?

It's probably not going to be a great result.

 

[Jester38]

Appreciate that this response is far too late for assistance on this matter (and Austman suggestion the best) but more for general information.
Air Niugini are really struggling at present re flights (with them declaring in September that, on average, only 55% of scheduled flights run each day primarily due to aircraft shortage) but they do the rebooking pretty well if you have booked directly with them.
It must be costing them a fortune but they are regularly rebooking on other airlines and/or putting people who have commenced flights up in local hotels. Just experienced a number of delays/cancellations in early Dec and they happily put me on QF out of POM same day to BNE due to a missed domestic connection.
If you are travelling on PX either domestically or internationally, be prepared to have some time up your sleeve as the aircraft shortages are not about to resolve in the short term.

 

[djtech]

Thanks all. In the end, they went to the airport and found a few people in the same situation. They were rebooked to leave the day after on exactly the same itinerary. All in all, a good result!

 

[Jester38]

That seems to be the story with PX right now. They do get you there - it might not just be on the day you have booked