‘Cheap flights mean nothing’: Passengers call out new airline

A new airline branded as “Australia’s new, and only independent, low cost airline servicing regional domestic routes” has come under fire after it cancelled multiple flights with minimal notice provided.

Branded as “Australia’s low-cost airline”, Garden City passengers are already abandoning Bonza after customers believe the service failed to deliver on its promises after a handful of flights to and from Toowoomba were cancelled.

Less than four months since Bonza’s first Queensland flight took off and just over a month since it first landed at Wellcamp Airport, a Toowoomba couple have raised concerns over the airline’s reliability.

Bonza CEO Tim Jordan (centre) with members of the cabin crew at the first flight by the carrier from Melbourne to Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport.

The two passengers who have asked to remain anonymous, were due to fly out of Wellcamp on May 21, to watch their son play representative sport in Townsville.

But they sadly never made it to the game after Bonza cancelled the flight less than seven hours before it was due to depart.

It was one of four flights to and from Toowoomba cancelled over the weekend.

The passengers have also slammed the airline’s communication process after the only correspondence they received for the cancellation was a text message which they initially believed to be spam.

“We booked these Bonza flights because we wanted to support a regional airline and ensure they can keep going,” one of the passengers said.

“The message said the flight was cancelled due to maintenance issues, but I suspect the real reason was there weren’t enough people on the flight.”

With no way to contact Bonza directly, the passengers were forced to use the chat feature on the airline’s phone app, but it took over an hour to connect with a representative.

While Bonza confirmed a full refund for the flights would be delivered within 21 days, the two passengers were left out of pocket by $1500 as they were unable to cancel their accommodation and car hire bookings.

The couple said the airline did not provide any alternative options and there was no availability on flights departing from Brisbane due to the late notice.

Although the customers have been left disappointed by the loss of funds and inconvenience caused, the female passenger said missing her son’s game was her biggest concern.

She said by sharing her experience publicly, she hoped it would assist other passengers in the future when making domestic travel arrangements.

The first Bonza flight from Melbourne lands at Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport on April 17, 2023.

“From what we can gather and have seen posted on social media, this is not a single event and people have complained about other Bonza flights being cancelled,” she said.

“In future we will never book a flight leaving Toowoomba again – cheap flights mean nothing if they can’t offer you another flight.

“I hope no one else relies on a regional carrier just for it to be cancelled last minute.”

The incident comes after the flight time was pushed back by about an hour, two weeks before it was scheduled to depart.

Bonza chief commercial officer Carly Povey said it had been a challenging weekend for the airline with unexpected maintenance checks required on the aircraft scheduled to transport passengers from Toowoomba to Townsville.

She said as a result of the maintenance checks, the plane was not available until Monday morning.

“We also experienced some crew illness,” Ms Povey said.

“Unfortunately this led to cancellation of four flights to or from Toowoomba Wellcamp on Sunday, with customers offered the opportunity to fly the following day, Monday, or receive a full refund.

“Any customers requiring accommodation or transport to or from an airport, or food and drink, will also be refunded by Bonza with all information relating to this provided to customers.”

Bonza chief commercial officer Carly Povey.

Ms Povey said communication with customers was made through SMS and the chat function to improve response times, but due to the “significant disruption” at the weekend, wait times spiked from the average response time of 120 seconds to one hour.

“We know that this might seem odd to some customers but had we relied on traditional call centre style communication the wait times would have compounded, likely at least four fold,” she said.

“To those customers impacted, on behalf of the entire team, I am deeply sorry we disrupted your travel plans.

“We know that we didn’t deliver on our promise and we do not take this lightly.

“We will take all and any learnings needed, regardless of whether the root cause is within our control the solution is always ours to own.”

Bonza CEO Tim Jordan. Photo: News Corp Australia

Expert aviation consultant and former Qantas chief executive Dr Tony Webber previously raised concerns about Bonza’s proposal, despite his desire to see it succeed.

“I think it’s going to struggle – it’s admirable, it’s great they’re taking an interest in regional tourism,” he said.

“Some routes will work, but the majority won’t have the demand for what they’re offering.

“If the routes they were picking were successful, you would’ve thought the bigger airlines would’ve scrutinised them.

“A lot of these routes are experimental, so there’s a lot of risk associated with demand.”

Bonza chief executive officer Tim Jordan quashed these concerns in April and said he was confident in the company’s ability to fill seats.

“We’re delighted to launch this new route, which will link Toowoomba and Townsville directly providing a timely boost to both regions’ tourism economy,” he said.

“We would encourage all of those people within the region to take this opportunity to go and explore and to stop driving down the hill and jump on our wonderful purple aircraft.”