A Jetstar Pacific passenger who was denied check-in after his name failed to show up on the airlines system livestreamed his demand for an official apology from the budget carrier. 

Doan Vu Thanh Hoang bought a last-minute ticket from south-central Vietnam’s Cam Ranh City to Ho Chi Minh City last Friday.

According to his 21-minute livestream, he had paid VND1.6 million (US$70) for the Jetstar flight departing at 7:20 pm.

However, as he arrived at the check-in counter, Hoang was told that his name was not showing up in the airlines booking system, with the ground service agent suggesting that he might not have paid for the ticket.

A Jetstar employee later confirmed that his ticket was valid, but failed to apologize for the mix-up, citing system errors, according to Hoang.

“I’ve bought my ticket, but when I arrived at the counter I was told that it hadn’t been paid for,” Hoang said in his livestream, which attracted thousands of viewers at its peak. “They shooed me out of the check-in counter.”

“What I want is an apology, not money,” Hoang added. “I may not be rich, but I expect my dignity.”

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At one point during his Facebook broadcast, a ground security officer intervened, asking him to end the livestream.

As of Wednesday, the footage had been viewed over 1.8 million times and shared by nearly 17,000 Facebook users.

A still image from the Facebook livestream of Doan Vu Thanh Hoang on Friday, November 17.

A Jetstar representative who responded to Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper’s request for comments said the airline “regretted” that such an incident had occurred.  

According to the representative, its check-in counters at Cam Ranh Airport are manned by the airport’s ground service staff and not its own, and Hoang’s ticket being purchased at the last minute could have meant that the system may not have been updated in time for his arrival.

The misunderstanding would have been resolved quickly if Hoang had visited the airline’s ticket counter to confirm his ticket status, the representative added.

Jetstar Pacific Airlines, based in Ho Chi Minh City, is a budget airline majority-owned by Vietnam’s state-owned flag carrier Vietnam Airlines, with the Australian-based Qantas Group owning 30 percent holding.

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