Jetstar International Sale(s)

[TedE]

SYD-HNL for $598 return earlier today on Jetstar in Feb (right when I needed to go to HNL). Happy chappy .

 

[ethernet]

IT Guru here. Yes it IS possible to have a reliable booking session, even when flooded. You give the pax a transaction number, and say due to high demand you are number xyz in the queue, and you give graphical feedback of the progression.
Some telephone call centers have it from the 1980's, and probably the Melbourne Cup/TAB have put it back in their 'new' system. In most instances the IT director won't know the difference between load testing and stress testing - but is never shown the door when found out.Take a number, join teh end of the queue - how easy is that!

We think Jetstar has something like load balancers. But when all servers are busy and the toy database swamped, and 'memory leaks' fragment the works, the whole thing dies.(apparently like some ambulance dispatch systems).

The solution is to set some threshold values, to cope with non-linear/exponential demands. It boils down to the outsourcer not having those skills - or the client not willing to pay for gold-plating.

Take NYSE How Linux Mastered Wall Street | PCWorld They dumped MS and went Linux when they figured out real life performance.

Personally I had such a negative experience, I flipped over to Air Asia and bought another fare from them - they lowered some fares in response. I bet you Jetstar does not send special campaign/promo prices to those who dropped out. They are not passionate about getting sales, which is why I wont touch their shares. IT dummies.

 

[shellthom]

IT Guru here. Yes it IS possible to have a reliable booking session, even when flooded. You give the pax a transaction number, and say due to high demand you are number xyz in the queue, and you give graphical feedback of the progression.
Some telephone call centers have it from the 1980's, and probably the Melbourne Cup/TAB have put it back in their 'new' system. In most instances the IT director won't know the difference between load testing and stress testing - but is never shown the door when found out.Take a number, join teh end of the queue - how easy is that!

We think Jetstar has something like load balancers. But when all servers are busy and the toy database swamped, and 'memory leaks' fragment the works, the whole thing dies.(apparently like some ambulance dispatch systems).

The solution is to set some threshold values, to cope with non-linear/exponential demands. It boils down to the outsourcer not having those skills - or the client not willing to pay for gold-plating.

Take NYSE How Linux Mastered Wall Street | PCWorld They dumped MS and went Linux when they figured out real life performance.

Personally I had such a negative experience, I flipped over to Air Asia and bought another fare from them - they lowered some fares in response. I bet you Jetstar does not send special campaign/promo prices to those who dropped out. They are not passionate about getting sales, which is why I wont touch their shares. IT dummies.

Another take on it that I have heard is the person responsible for the sale might get kudos for holding an event so big it crashed the system. Like that first year they held click frenzy and it went down in the first minute therefore they hailed the event a success. They weren't worried about how much was actually sold just that it directed enough traffic to the site to crash it thus exceeding all expectations. Thats just another take on it. I don't know if they have capacity or skill, but I would think after years of complaints when their sales are on they would do something, this sounds like a feasible reason why they would argue against it.

 

[Aussie_flyer]

Whay annoys me the most is that the inventory is not held whilst you enter passenger and payment details which then results in an error when you submit payment as the sale fare class is no longer available.

 

[shellthom]

Whay annoys me the most is that the inventory is not held whilst you enter passenger and payment details which then results in an error when you submit payment as the sale fare class is no longer available.

and yet they literally let you hold sale fares by allowing bank transfer as a form of payment. I would think they could hold seats for 3-5 minutes while your forced through the painful "lets add all these extras, and you have to pay attention to remove them" screens as well.

 

[travelislife]

Whay annoys me the most is that the inventory is not held whilst you enter passenger and payment details which then results in an error when you submit payment as the sale fare class is no longer available.

Yep, this is one of the biggest flaws with their system. It should be like the ticketing agencies (well not their fees!) where once you grab the seats you have a time to complete your information.

As I was saying earlier I seriously don't think Jetstar cares that the site crashes or that bookings drop out due to this problem. They know they will sell out of all the pre allocated sale fares. People will complain. But they will still come back the next sale and keep driving traffic to the site. That's all Jetstar seem's to want to do. I am sure they lose some normal sales from it though as well where they hook people in to go to the site but then people can't even search for normal fares.

 

[drivatruk]

wouldn't waste yr money on Star Class anymore

With the intro of the 787 i feel Star Class has gone backwards.

The new seats are a fail. I don't consider a seat that doesn't let your relax with your feet off the floor a business class seat. There are armrest struggles with the person next to you. The iron bar thats meant to be your footrest digs into feet after 30 mins or so. The a330 was a lot better. Business class to me is all about seat.

Premium Cabin feel gone.

Poor design see economy pax disembarking before star class and getting the jump at customs.

I like the lunch time flight home from Bali to Melbourne so i tried Jetstar but no more

Air Asia now has similar flight times and a better seat for the price.

Sale fares

Star class sale for SYD/MEL to Bali, until 20 July. $699 OW.

 

[clifford]

wouldn't waste yr money on Star Class anymore

With the intro of the 787 i feel Star Class has gone backwards.

The new seats are a fail. I don't consider a seat that doesn't let your relax with your feet off the floor a business class seat. There are armrest struggles with the person next to you. The iron bar thats meant to be your footrest digs into feet after 30 mins or so. The a330 was a lot better. Business class to me is all about seat.

Premium Cabin feel gone.

Poor design see economy pax disembarking before star class and getting the jump at customs.

I like the lunch time flight home from Bali to Melbourne so i tried Jetstar but no more

Air Asia now has similar flight times and a better seat for the price.

Yes, I agree, I much prefer the 330's. Unfortunately they will be gone to a better life soon. Air Asia X business class does indeed murder JQ, and is generally cheaper.

As mentioned previously, I did manage to snag a cheap flight to DPS (AUD 100), with the intention of getting a cheap flight DPS-SIN. This I've now booked with 3K (Jetstar Singapore) for the princely sum of IDR 619,000 (approx AUD 59). Saves a bit over a direct flight and allows one to have a couple of nights in Kuta...