‘Dead cheap’ trip through Qantas-owned holiday website TripADeal ends in $3.2K shock

When an Aussie couple booked a dream holiday, including scoring business class flights for just $1,000 ($644 USD) each through a travel site owned by Qantas they were ecstatic – but things took an unexpected turn when they later learned an extra $5,000 ($3,200 USD) could be added to their bill.

Rod Gaynor had booked a holiday with travel website TripADeal, which included three nights in Fiji, an 18-day cruise through the islands down to Sydney and business class flights back to their home town of Perth.

In total, the retirees paid $12,000 ($7,700 USD) for the trip, which included $2,000 ($1,300 USD) for the business class seats.

“I said to them: ‘That’s ridiculous, that’s dead cheap,” Gaynor recalled, but is now warning people to always read the fine print when it comes to these types of deals.

When the couple’s flight details dropped two weeks after booking their August holiday, they were shocked to discover they had been dumped in economy class seats on the Qantas flight back to Perth.

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“Naturally I contacted TripADeal and they were unsympathetic and quoted from the T&C’s that they were able to do this,” he told news.com.au.

Gaynor was told by TripADeal any upgrade purchases are subject to availability and aircraft configuration.

But the Perth man investigated the aircraft and discovered there were 12 business seats available on that flight.

Still the 68-year-old said TripADeal would not put them in business class and initially flat out refused to even refund the fare difference.

He was then told by the company: “As the business class upgrade for the Sydney to Perth flight was over the net pricing built into the deal, unfortunately this was a part of the reason we were not able to provide the upgrade for this flight”.

But when the retired schoolteacher pointed out the failure to provide a refund was “actually illegal” after seeking advice from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commissions, he said the company suddenly “backflipped”.

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He was told he would receive a refund as a “gesture of goodwill”, despite the company stating it had honored two other flights in business class.

“TripADeal changed their tune and said we will give you a refund of $350 ($225 USD) each and we understand you are upset,” he said.

“But they said your costs went above net pricing, it’s built into our deals and flight pricing can be quite volatile and is subject to what is available on each airline.

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“The company used net pricing as an excuse instead of configuration once they got busted for that.”

While he has now received the $700 refund, Gaynor claims TripADeal never intended to honor the business class flight deal and believes he isn’t the only customer who has been caught out.

He said TripADeal offered the couple business class seats on the Qantas flight for an extra $2,377 ($1,500 USD) each or through Virgin for $1,266 ($815 USD) per person.

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“That’s $500 ($321 USD) extra with Virgin so they already knew from the very beginning that it would be economy on way back,” he claimed.

He said the deal from the start seemed “silly”.

“It’s not so much the difference between economy and business class, it’s the idea they are deliberately cheating, which upsets me,” he claimed.

“I can’t imagine how may times it’s happened and every time I’ve pushed them and shown my research and maths they backflip. I think they assume you accept it.”

The offer to pay more money for business class seats even made him “laugh”, he said.

“That’s just rubbish,” he said.

“TripADeal never ever had any intention to provide what they promised. It’s like the old days when Qantas were selling seats on planes that were never going to take off and they got busted as well.”

But after news.com.au contacted TripADeal, the couple were issued business class seats for the Perth flight.

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A TripADeal spokesperson said the company sincerely apologises to Gaynor for what has been a frustrating situation.

“Due to a servicing error Mr Gaynor’s booking was not ticketed correctly. We have since confirmed his seats in business class and will ensure the rest of his experience with us is seamless,” they said.

But Gaynor said after TripADeal’s “blatant” disregard for customers, he would never use a travel deal website again.

“I had to keep pushing every time over every detail,” he added,

“At the end, I asked if they can arrange seating so I can get extra legroom and they said no you have to go to airline and then the airline said you have to get the travel agent to do that and we went back to them again. So its like extracting teeth, every little bit of it, they make it harder.”

News.com.au understands TripADeal does not offer seat selection and where possible a customer is encouraged to manage their booking through the airline directly to select their seats.

Gaynor said he had made a complaint to the Airline Customer Advocate, a resolution service for customers of major Australian airlines, and had left negative social media reviews after his “frustrating” experience.

Qantas acquired a majority stake of the Byron Bay born business TripADeal in 2022, enabling its Frequent Flyers to earn and use their Qantas Points, before snapping up the rest of the business in the middle of 2024.

At the time it said it wanted continued exposure to the growing $13 billion ($8.3B USD) online holiday packages market.