An Oddity at the Jetstar Booking site.

[Renato1]

I was exploring options for some place warm to go during winter, and thus was checking Jetstar for flights from Melbourne to Nadi in Fiji. Curiously, there were no flights going there this July.

Next day I thought about it and tested for flights in March and December, and there weren't any flights going there at all - but plenty of flights coming back from Nadi to Melbourne.

I rang up Jetstar and asked why there were no flights going from Melbourne to Nadi. She checked and confirmed that on her computer there were no flights going from Melbourne to Nadi for the entire year, and plenty of flights coming back. She said that that she would raise it as an issue and pass it onward for action.

I notice that the maintenance on the booking system, which was due to be completed at 3am this morning, still hasn't been completed now, which is 13 hours past that time. Let's hope they get to the bottom of the computer bug.
Regards,
Renato

 

[jetpack]

Could it just be that the the Nadi flight leaves Sydney too early to allow for connections from Melbourne?

 

[Renato1]

Could it just be that the the Nadi flight leaves Sydney too early to allow for connections from Melbourne?

Thanks, but I doubt it. I'm pretty sure Jetstar used to show direct flights - but even if they didn't, they should still show a way of getting there, since it lists Nadi as a destination from Melbourne at the front page, when one picks destinations.

Another curiosity - when I use my regular Maxthon Browser, it shows the Jetstar site still being down for maintenance.
But when I use Edge browser, the site works fine - and still shows not a single flight from Melbourne to Nadi, including 21 other people looking at that date for flights.

Must be some frustrated people around.
Regards,
Renato

 

[JohnK]

Apparently there were issues with some flights not appearing on search engines after the upgrade/maintenance on Saturday.

Webjet was displaying a message on searches yesterday.

 

[Renato1]

Apparently there were issues with some flights not appearing on search engines after the upgrade/maintenance on Saturday.

Webjet was displaying a message on searches yesterday.

Not having a good time it seems.
The missing flights to Nadi started before the upgrade, and still haven't appeared as of right now.

It's funny when one does a cheap flight search - most of the top ten results show one of many carriers getting one to Nadi, and Jetstar as the carrier for the return flight.
Regards,
Renato

 

[Mattg]

Could it just be that the the Nadi flight leaves Sydney too early to allow for connections from Melbourne?

This certainly looks to be the case. As far as I can tell JQ does not fly the MEL-NAN route. (All the return options are via SYD.) The SYD-NAN flights departs at 08:55, and the first flight from MEL arrives at 07:45 - well short of the 2 hours minimum connection time for this transfer.

If for some reason you feel an urge to fly Jetstar MEL-SYD-NAN (when there are perfectly good airlines flying direct), I think you'd need to fly to SYD the night before and book on separate tickets.

 

[Renato1]

This certainly looks to be the case. As far as I can tell JQ does not fly the MEL-NAN route. (All the return options are via SYD.) The SYD-NAN flights departs at 08:55, and the first flight from MEL arrives at 07:45 - well short of the 2 hours minimum connection time for this transfer.

If for some reason you feel an urge to fly Jetstar MEL-SYD-NAN (when there are perfectly good airlines flying direct), I think you'd need to fly to SYD the night before and book on separate tickets.

Thanks, but regardless, there is something wrong with their website.

Either Jetstar do have some kind of flight from Melbourne to Nadi, in which case that flight should be listed in the search results.

Or Jetstar do not have some kind of flight from Melbourne to Nadi, in which case Nadi should not be listed as a searchable option at the start of the search procedure.
Regards,
Renato

 

[JohnK]

Does the website need to be smart enough to detect that MEL-SYD flight cannot make same day connection to the SYD-NAN flight and not allow that search option?

If you search for MEL-SYD on 13 March and SYD-NAN on 14 March the flights appear. Not sure how you get more than 2 flights on a JQ multi-city booking but book them separately and you may find NAN-MEL cheaper as a one-way?