Woman forced to shell out £2,400 for new plane tickets – because of a simple flight booking mistake
A WOMAN has been slapped with a £2,400 bill due to shortening her name on a plane ticket.
When needing to book flights from Brisbane to Melbourne, and finally London, Kate and Phil were over the moon when they found cheap tickets through third party site Student Universe.
Initially they paid £1,254 each for their tickets to board flights on Virgin Airlines and Qatar Airways, and all was well until they arrived at the airport.
Upon arrival, they were told they would need to cough up £2,400 due to an administrative error after Phil booked Kate’s ticket under the name Kate, instead of her full name Katherine, reports the New York Post.
They were told that they would need to contact Student Universe to have Kate’s name changed on their booking – but instead were forced to cancel her ticket entirely and stump up the massive fee to book a new one.
Speaking to Australia’s 9 News, Phil, said: “It was an administrative error, I think I married Kate in church and not Katherine.
“They didn’t have time, that was their reasoning, to issue a name change on the ticket — but they had time to sell us a new ticket.”
As the mistake was made by the couple themselves, there was little they could do and had to accept the fee, even though Kate “begged” the agency to help.
Student Universe said in a statement that they were just following standard airline regulations.
Booking site expert, Quentin Long, told the news channel that making sure the name on your ticket matches your passport is essential.
He added: “It’s not just about security it’s also about visas, it’s about inter-government agencies, it is really, really important.
“You’ve got to be across the details, there’s no shortcuts.”
This comes after one woman was caught on camera delivering an X-rated rant at Ryanair staff before screaming at them to “get out” of her way.
She was filmed while shouting out at staff before gathering her things are storming off the plane.
As she left, the “welsh” sounding woman can be heard calling a crew member a “w****r”