Bestjet collapse leaves angry customers thousands out of pocket

Bizarre email indicates that flights customers paid travel company for will not be honoured

Travellers who booked flights through Australian budget airfare company Bestjet have been left thousands of dollars out of pocket after the business collapsed just days before Christmas.

Queensland-based Bestjet and its subsidiaries, Wynyard Travel Pty Ltd and Brooklyn Travel Pty Ltd, went into voluntary administration on 18 December.

The news has left thousands of Australians angry and unsure of whether they’ll ever see their money again.

Neil Hall and his wife, Annette, paid $10,600 for two business class flights from Brisbane to Milan with Etihad on 11 December. They received a tax receipt and assumed the flight had been paid for.

The couple had never flown business class before, and decided to splash out after Neil was made redundant.

“It was really to celebrate 38 years of work, and just spoil ourselves on an overseas trip,” he said.

They had no idea Bestjet had gone into administration until 22 December, when they received an email which “set off alarm bells”.

Littered with spelling errors, the email, purporting to be from Bestjet, accused airfare ticketing consolidator CVFR Travel Group, of “acting illegally” with the support of some airlines, and claimed bookings made prior to 11 December had been paid for.

“CVFR has worked with airlines to cancel your booking so they can get a full refund but the WON’T refund the money to you, they are also covered by insurance,” the email read.

“CVFR will keep your funds and make you submit a chargeback even though your booking is confirmed, e-tickets have been issued and the airline has received your funds.”

The bizarre screed purported to include the email addresses of top travel industry executives, including the chief executive of Virgin Australia, John Borghetti.

After email was sent, the company’s administrator, Pilot Partners, sent an email to customers advising them to ignore “unauthorised information”.

“The administrators have no control over notices and statements issued from the company’s server, bestjet.com, and customers are advised to ignore them,” Nigel Markey of Pilot said in the statement.

CVFR also issued an emailed statement calling the claims “false”.

“The claims made on the email are false and designed to distract affected passengers from contacting Bestjet and deflecting blame for your loss away from Bestjet,” the email read.

“If you received the email then you were a Bestjet customer and they are responsible for your loss. Bestjet going into administration is unfortunate for its customers and creditors alike.”

It prompted Neil Hall to contact Etihad, who confirmed a hold had been placed on their spot but that the ticket had not been paid for. Their booking was eventually cancelled by the airline on 31 December.

“We’ve never flown business and it was sort of a once-in-a-lifetime thing to celebrate the start of something new for us,” he told Guardian Australia.

“It’s obviously quite a large amount of money and not an everyday purchase, put it that way. It’s certainly hit us pretty hard.”

The circumstances around the company’s collapse are still unclear.

Bestjet was sold to McVicker International on 2 November. Australian Securities and Investments Commission records show that business was only registered in October.

Bestjet’s previous owner, Rachel James, is the wife of the former boss of Air Australia, Michael James.

Michael James was banned from managing corporations for three years after Air Australia’s collapse in 2012, which left thousands of passengers stranded overseas and creditors almost $100m out of pocket.

Bestjet lost its accreditation with the Australian Federation of Travel Agents after it came to suspect Michael James was an employee of the company. A creditors’ report lists him as both a secured creditor and former employee of the company.

In a statement to the creditor, Robert Bruce McVicker, the director of the new owners McVicker Investment Group, said the company had been placed into administration after representations to the former owners “failed to materialise”.

“Since we acquired Bestjet in November, we have worked with the former owners to improve the business and customer service experience,” he said.

“Representations made to the company failed to materialise and, unfortunately, we have been left with no choice but to place the business into voluntary administration to determine the best course of action for customers and suppliers, and to see whether Bestjet can continue to trade.”

Creditors will hope for answers at a meeting held by the administrators, Pilot Partners, on Wednesday.

Kate Ryder set up a Facebook group for customers to share information after she lost $3,150 on a flight to Paris for the Fifa women’s world cup final. The group now has 700 members, and Ryder estimates that the losses of its members alone could amount to about $2.4m.

Ryder, who works casually as a registered nurse, said the discovery that the tickets had not been paid for was “devastating”.

“It’s a big deal to lose that sort of money, I’ve had to rebook our seats and pay an extra $1,200,” she said.

“I was furious, it seems like a scam to me. The government needs surely needs to close a loophole to stop these sorts of things happening in the future.”

Neil Hall, too, would like something positive to come out of his loss.

“The thing for me is that, obviously it’s bad for me, but I would like to see some sort of assurance we don’t have companies doing this to make sure people aren’t put in this position.

“I’m concerned about us but I’m also concerned for others in the future.”

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