AirAsia Indonesia review by Pearl 2014-02-16

I booked two flights with AirAsia, the first one was from Jakarta to Bali and from Bali to Melbourne. The first problem I encountered was a change in flight (which apparently, on this website, seems to be common and not unusual at all). Jakarta has really bad traffic jams in the morning so giving waking up at 5am to give myself 3 hours to get to the airport was annoying. I have two bags with me when I go to Bali because I ultimately am moving to Melbourne after my holiday. When I get to the counter, I find out I have to pay airport luggage fees (roughly 5 USD/pound) for my extra luggage (one free check in-up to 20kg only) So I end up paying over 200 USD for an extra luggage. Okay. My fault. I did not check the website clearly and it was my own responsibility to ensure I followed the luggage rules. When I get to Bali, I speak to a representative on their website to help me add a luggage to ensure that does not happen again! I IM chat with Mac, a representative and plainly state I have two luggages: one is 20kg free check-in and I need to add one more. After 10 minutes he "upgrades" my bag to 25kg. I specifically ask him, upgrading to 25kg means im adding an extra bag weighing up to 25kg correct? He tells yes this is true. So I pay the upgrade and worry no more. The morning I get to the airport, I find out I have to pay for the extra luggage anyway! the free "20kg check-in" does not apply anymore because I only upgraded the free check-in from 20kg to 25kg! this flight from Bali to Melbourne had two sectors so I had to pay double. I am really disappointed and unsatisfied with the representative that helped me because I was trying to avoid exactly what had happened. I paid over 500 USD to transport my luggage even after I spoke with someone to help me add on luggage. I am an international student and I thought AirAsia was going to be a good option for me to go abroad and save money. It turned out to be the opposite. The unpredictable change in flights and hidden baggage fees just made things more difficult on me.I will not fly with AirAsia anymore nor will I recommend it. I am not upset about the first baggage fee as I take responsibility for that but the second time, the company/representative failed to assist me. Hopefully this company can examine what happened here so that another customer is not cheated from the company's bad communication.