JOKESTAR's Deceptive Add-Ons and Marketing. Jokestar dictionary: Passenger - "Self Loading Freight'

First, lets deal in facts. Jetstars own CEO discloses that the revenue from Add-Ons now exceeds its TOTAL PROFIT. Second, without the deceptive way of 'fitting up' customers by pre-selecting Add-On's for them, they would not earn enough revenue to continue in business. Third, deceptively charging passengers for these, plus the revenue from addional ticket sales through passengers making non-refundable errors in booking or arriving 1 minute late at check-in, Jetstar would not exist.

Simply put, Jetstar is in the business of earning revenue and profit for its shareholder (Qantas) through deceptive trade practice.

That said, I travel on Jetstar about 12 to 16 journeys per year. Between 2 and 4 of us travel on each journey, so I pay for about 50 flights per year. In addition to this I fly on Air NZ sometimes and for international use either Air NZ, Virgin Australia, or Qantas. V-Australia is light years ahead of the opposition, with Air NZ coming second, and Qantas a very distant 3rd.

With Jetstar, we all get what we pay for. If we get ripped-off through the way their deceptive website pre-selects as many Add-On's as possible (don't forget this amounts to their entire profit) and very deceptively adds them to the total, only adding them in very small gray font on a black background on the far right of the screen whilst keeping our attention on the lefthand side of the screen, then we only have ourselves to blame for not beating them at their own game. (Sorry Jetstar, you're busted. This is a deliberate marketing M.O.)

Now if you don't want to be ripped-off by them, pay attention.
1: Make sure you are on thier email list for fare sale alerts. Soon as you are notified, BOOK EARLY.
2: DESELECT every pre-selected option, especially bagage, insurance, seat selection etc and DO NOT pay by
credit card.
3: If more than 1 of you is on the same booking, they will deceptively try to charge ALL of you for bags. If 3 of
you are travelling and you only need 1 large bag, only pay for 1. You can do this 2 ways. You can open
another browesr page and make an individual booking including 1 bag, and none for the other 2 on the other
browser, or you can navigate around their deceptive website and ammend it from 3 bags to 1 later on in
another page but that's purposely VERY hard to find.
4: DO NOT pay for seat selection. If you are likely to travel again within 6 months, take the cheapest Bundle
from $15 (I see they've just raised it to $17) that includes seat selection choice PLUS you get a $15 voucher
for your next flight PLUS you get free Name Change and flight change. In effect, they pay you $9 to take
their bundle.
5: DO NOT pay insurance, especially if you took the bundle. Averaged out, as long as you take the Starter fares
and don't get fitted-up on the Add-On's you will find it cheaper in the long run to self insure. If you are so
poor that you can't afford another fare if it all turns to custard, you shouldn't be flying in the first place.
5: Don't get sucked in to paying for Carbon Tax. Our Govt introduced this joke of a tax and truth be known,
there wouldn't be a Greens Party member or greenie out there that would pay it on their airfare. They are
just hypocrits who expect others to pay a stupidity tax to fund their own govt benefit.
6: DON'T PAY BY CREDIT CARD. This is one of the biggest deceptions by Jetstar. They are soon to re-name it
as a 'booking fee' to get around the Govt regulations. PAY ONLY BY DIRECT CREDIT from your bank. This is
free and safe. If you don't have the money in your bank to pay for your ticket, you shouldn't be flying. If you
are sailing that close to the wind financially, you have a budgeting problem and unless it's a family emergency
you ought not be indulging in luxuries such as air travel.
7: To avoid paying for luggage, don't be a pillock by fronting up with an oversize bag or one of those really
selfish passengers who front up carrying a backpack, a carry-on, and a handbag you could go camping in the
bush with for 3 weeks. All you do is take up 3 times your fair locker space. You can still take about 20kgs of
clothes and nessesities by doing this:
a) Wear all your heavy gear, coats, heavy shoes, stuff the pockets with your phone, camera, heavy junk etc.
b) Take your laptop and anything heavy out of your carry-on. Leave the 10kg allowance of that for anything
you can't wear. Put your lightweigh jandals and runners in the carry-on, and wear your heaviest shoes.
c) You really don't need half the crap you travel with. I've been travelling all my life, decades of over
300,000kms per year on business trips for 2 weeks at a time. I almost always only ever took a carry-on
and you'd be surprised what you really end up wearing. Wash ya undies out in your hotel room each night.
Yes, I was paying the bills! And by the way, I'm a multi-millionaire.

In a nutshell people, use Jokestar (AKA Jetstar) to your advantage. Don't be ripped off by them. Their service
is crap, their goodwill is zero, their staff are mostly in-experienced (including their pilots) and they are there for themselves, not you. If you want what you pay for, use them. If you want to be treated like a human instead of 'self loading freight', then use another airline. I'm a tight-arse and always happy to get what i pay for. If I'm in the mood to be treated well, I don't fly Jokestar. Because at Jokestar remember, if you don't use their deception to your advantage, the joke's on you.

Peter Clark