I bought an airline ticket from J.S. Pujji - Lowest Airline Travel (aka Discount Travel Bureau) via the internet for one-way travel from South Africa to Los Angeles, CA. There are a limited number of airlines that fly into and out of South Africa, and over the Christmas season space tends to be scare. I chose this agent, as he was able to book a ticket on the day I needed to travel and his price was the lowest.
Following his instructions, I sent a check overnight on October 20th. When I had not received any reply by November 12th, I started calling and leaving messages. This would become a pattern over the next few months, the business phone would almost never be answered, the cell phone would usually be off, and when it was on, it seldom got answered. Response to messages was erratic to say the least. Emails were completely ignored.
On those occasions when I did get through, there was often some other crisis that needed to be dealt with. "Call you back in 10 minutes" was a common comment, that was seldom honored, and if the call was made at all, it would be much later.
On almost ten separate occasions Mr. Pujji promised to take care of the ticket during the next few days, the next day or within a few hours, as the case may be. This never happened. When it became clear that the ticket would not be issued before I left the US, he undertook to arrange a "prepaid ticket advice" or PTA.
At this point, it started to affect my vacation. Not only did I have to make expensive intercontinental phone calls (only to hear more of the same hollow promises), but I also had to do so during office hours ET, which is not convenient in other parts of the world.in addition, I had to find a local travel agent that could deliver the ticket Mr. Pujji could not. Unsurprisingly, the last minute ticket was more that twice as expensive as the original.
Upon my return to the US, Mr. Pujji agreed to reimburse me for the full price of the last-minute ticket (more than $2,000). The fact that he did so without any argument made me suspect it was another hollow promise. That was more than two weeks ago.
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