Airlink Arvostelua 71

I traveled with Airlink on June 9, 2025 (heading to Kenya) and missed my connecting flight at OR Tambo due to their inbound flight delay. Although the delay was only 12 minutes, Airlink staff at the airport offered zero meaningful assistance. I was directed to a distant office, faced language barriers, and was even told to pay for a golf cart to get to the gate faster. No one rushed me or tried to help despite my urgent requests.

The airline refused any compensation, citing that the delay was beyond their control and offered only an open ticket valid for a year or a refund per their strict fare rules (mine was non-refundable). They provided a delay letter for insurance claims but made no effort to address the financial loss or inconvenience.

This was by far the worst customer service I have experienced with an airline. Their dismissive attitude and lack of support caused me stress, missed commitments, and unnecessary costs. I will think twice before flying Airlink again and advise others to consider more reliable carriers.

NEVER BOOKING WITH THEM AGAIN!

Airlink have terrible customer service they are always very rude especially at the check in counter especially at Or tambo International airport. The only friendly people in the whole establishment are the flight attendants.My experience with Airlink was on a flight from Johannesburg to Maputo I had booked the flight 24 hours before right ? So I had my sick late grandfather who had just had amputated his foot a 3 days before I had requested a special assistance from them ,which they had a terrible rule for if you had not ordered 3 days before then you would not get one . But even tho I sent them an email and they sent a confirmation email they did not supply one only because of Lift (which we had a flight from Durban to joburg with which was incredible )were we able to get one and the lady by the counter of Airlink wanted to charge us for extra baggage while on we booked a ticket that allowed 43 kg and we only had 24 kg if I had not come back from the toilet in time then they would have charged a 47 year old woman and her 78 year old sick father money they had no right charging sick behavior ,besides the point then they made by sick grandfather walk all the way from the bus up the stairs all alone only with me a 15 year child helping him alongside my 48 year old mother who is also sick providing no help what so ever and just looking at us while they had 2 people there only a kind passenger came to our rescue if not then he probably would have fell since I was unable to carry him anymore this exhaustion made him get much weaker which eventually accelerated his death . All and all terrible would never recommend them to anyone I would rather walk then ever fly with Airlink ever again.

I’m a pensioner and Airlink Cape Town refused me to check in as my final destination was Lusaka. I didn’t have a return ticket SA. Never once did I have to produce a ticket before in the ten years I have being visiting my son in Zambia. I asked to speak to a supervisor and proceeded to wait 25 minutes before I decided I was going to miss my first part of my flight to Johannesburg first. Most stressful experience I had. I’m most definitely not a happy bunny.

No apology email or explanation how to receive refund for flight not reaching Kimberley because of bad weather, that was diverted to Bloemfontein and eventually came back to Cape Town.
I was not the passenger but paid for the ticket and it was my email and credit card used for the ticket.

I had to phone the call centre and was then told to send an email and that an admin fee of R506.00 (i.e.18.76% of the ticket price) would also be deducted, but I need to pay full price again to rebook.
I deduce that if I did not contact the Airlink call centre I would have eventually just lost the full value of the ticket as nothing was digitally sent out explaining procedure, before me making a call 12 hours after the flight returned to Cape Town.

Airlink could have charted a bus from Bloemfontein (for those passengers that urgently needed to reach Kimberley. and preferred not to return to Cape Town.
The distance by road between the two airports is 168km.
Cem Air I will give you a turn to rebook my friend as he still needs to get to Kimberley after this fiasco.

I am deeply in pain concerning the bad treatment and lack of customer care I got from @Fly_Airlink and my colleagues (6 in total) inconvenienced. We travelled on Sunday 18 May 2025 from Nelspruit to Johannesburg with their flight and on our way to Port Elizabeth on another flight.

At first the flight was 30 minutes delayed only to learn in Johannesburg that bags had to be offloaded from the flight that left Nelspruit and put on other flights (15:30 and 17:00). When leaving jhb, @Fly_Airlink staff could not tell me or could not give me assurance that my bag will be delivered to Graham's town on Monday (which is 124km away from PE). Now we arrived in PE, even those in PE cannot help because the policy doesn't allow them to deliver beyond 100km.

I was expected to make means on meeting the driver half way. No matter how much I tell them I am only in Graham's town till Saturday and not familiar, they were unable to bend the policy to 1 confirm the possible time I will get my bag and 2 to ensure my bag gets to where I'll be the following day. So it became my problem and nobody wanted to take responsibility. All my colleagues 's bags were loaded onto the 13:30 flight from Nelspruit to Johannesburg. But mine was left behind. I am dumbfounded at the level of insensitivity. My bag had my everything and on me I only haf my handbag and laptop. Airline could breach its policy and go beyond just 24 km to ensure that I get my bag. Ehat puzzlef me the most was the lack of accountability. Jhb staff did not pick up the phone when I wanted to speak to them (from PE). And the manager on duty in PE (siyolise) was not willing to listen until I asked for her meanwhile she was seated right there but letting the junior staff handle the matter. When she eventually saw a need to speak to me she was unable to help...also telling me about policy. When I asked her for someone above her level she told me it was Sunday the branch manager (sithabiso) does not take calls on Sundays. Now the jhb people were not answering the phone and the branch manager doesn't take calls on Sundays. While we arrived around 17h00pm, we ended up leaving around 21h00 no matter my colleagues efforts to try to convince Airlink staff members at PE. Out of all this I blame management of the airline because no staff member would play such a game if management would not support it. Till today, there hasn't been any effort to make mends on the matter

How on earth can Gatwick Airport let them get away with it! I'd thought I was paying a legitimate drop off fee on the official Gatwick airport site. I paid £10 then thought nothing of it until I read recently that drop off charges were increasing to £7. This is a despicable case of sharp practice and the airport shouldn't permit it.

Ripoff. Do not use these people.

Payed by airlink for a drop off at Gatwick got charged £10 . And have been given a £100 ticket for non payment . CPN are saying they don't deal with airlink . Plz don't use them 😡

Total rip off they charge me £10 instead of £6 for drop off with out even mentioning they are charging £10.once you paid you will realise they charge more.hopefully they pay my charge to the legit company.Please everyone don’t hurry like i did n fall for this dodgy company.very unprofessional.

What a rip off to charge £10 for a £6 fee. I thought this was the official site and went to pay by Apple Pay so had clicked before seeing the charge was £10 instead of £6. They bank on people not realising or doing things in a hurry. Cowboys.

Airlink will charge you £10 instead of £6 for the Gatwick drop off. I was rushed, stressed, scared of forgetting to pay and getting slapped with a £100 fine, so I just paid it. £10 for a few minutes spent at the drop off is a disgusting vile rip-off!

Flight was delayed by 10 hours. Stuck in Jomo Kenyatta airport (horrible place) overnight with no offer of food, accomodation or compensation.

Airlink staff lied about the delays, consistly saying it would depart shortly. Later found out there was an issue with the plane and they had to fly a new plane from Joburg (4 hours away) to Nairobi, so the staff must have had knowledge.

If you are really relaxed and in no rush to get to your destination, then this is the airline for you.

I flew from Kimberley to Cape Town. At the baggage claim in Cape Town I immediately opened my luggage to be sure I collected the correct bag. I was disappointed to notice that someone had been through my bag, with items removed from their containers and everything left in a big mess. Unfortunately, one valuable item was removed from the bag. I complained at the Airlink office in the domestic arrivals area where they apologized and explained that luggage handling is outsourced, and said that I would not be compensated.

Like with so many other reviewers, Airlink lost our luggage on the way from Cape Town to Walvis Bay. This was the second leg of a trip from London Heathrow; the first leg was with BA.

Once the luggage was finally located, three days later, we were on a train, getting further and further away from Walvis Bay. Thanks to the extreme efficiency of our local travel representative, and absolutely no thanks to Airlink, we manage to get the luggage delivered to us but at enormous cost. We hoped Airlink would compensate us, at least in part, for the delivery charge.

Airlink went out of their way to make the claim process difficult. Firstly they ignored our claim, then they wanted our claim form notarised by a commissioner for Oaths (as considerable cost which we could not claim back), then they wanted a letter from our bank manager confirming our account number was correct (more, unrecoverable cost) and they also insisted on a detailed list of everything that was in our luggage despite this being totally irrelevant to our claim.

Finally, and I mean EIGHT MONTHS later, they condescended to pay a few pounds for “delayed luggage” with no recompense for the delivery costs. This left us almost £600 out of pocket, even ignoring the cost for the bank manager letter and the Commissioner for Oaths signature. It was obvious from the start that their processes were designed to be unhelpful, and I simply cannot believe that they were so busy that it needed to take them over a month to respond to each email. Even their final payment took over 4 weeks to come through (and was initially wrong).

The flight was ok. But they completely destroyed a full aluminium suitcase from Rimowa. I flown with this case a couple times round the world, some little damages but nothing serious. One time with Airlink and they must have put hydraulic pressure or similar to it. It was squashed terrible and was no good for further use. Damage was reported and accepted and then the odysse started. No reply for weeks with dozens of emails from my side. Finally an answer and offer for compensation of USD 90 ! > what a joke for a case which is around 1'600 USD to buy. And now again 4 weeks into the process they still not paid even this far too small amount. Avoid this airline !

We had a terrible experience with Airlink and would give them a negative score if we could. My partner and I wanted to book flights to Richards Bay and made sure we were online at the same time to book seats together. However, we noticed a massive price difference: two tickets booked together cost over R10,000, while single tickets were just over R2,400. This made no sense.

We decided to book separately. My partner’s payment went through, but when I tried to pay, their system gave me an error message. When I refreshed, the ticket price jumped to R3,600. After switching to my phone’s internet, I eventually found a ticket for R3,050. Their system error cost me the chance to book at the original price.

Our trip got worse. The flight to Richards Bay was delayed by 30 minutes without any explanation. While the onboard staff were friendly and the flight itself was good, the return flight was another disappointment. It was delayed by 20 minutes, and when we arrived, we discovered our suitcase didn’t make it because the plane was “too heavy.” This was shocking, especially since we had paid for extra luggage.

The staff at the counter didn’t give us much confidence either. When asked about guarantees for receiving our suitcase, we were told that “left-behind” luggage gets loaded first on the next flight, but if that plane is too heavy, more luggage might get left behind. This seems to be a normal practice for Airlink, which is unacceptable.

Airlink has a monopoly on flights to smaller towns, and it shows in how they treat customers. Their pricing is unfair, the booking system is unreliable, and they clearly prioritize profits over service. If you can avoid it, DO NOT fly with Airlink.

Airlink is nothing but a scam. This is my second trip with them where my luggage is left behind. Mind you the first time I never got my luggage back and was still not compensated for that.

Today my luggage was left again, the Airlink representatives that we thought could help the situation were extremely rude and dismissive, and told me “there’s nothing I can do about it, that’s how it is.” Our bags were left behind and this was not communicated to us prior, during or even after the flight. We had to scramble the airport asking for luggage before someone finally said they have been left behind.

furthermore they are refusing to send our bags seeing this was their incompetence. Personally I took a flight from Jhb to Bulawayo and had a bus booked to take me to Harare 3 hours later.

I don’t understand why I should have to fork out money to collect my luggage that they decided to leave behind without communicating with anyone. I have paid the ticket, luggage and extra luggage, yet I should have to pay to collect my bags because they decided to leave bags behind.

I would not advise using Airlink for any travel as they do nothing but cause inconveniences to passengers, multiple times!

My mother and Father came to visit us from OR Tambo to Cape Town 11 October 2024, we asked assistance for a wheel chair only from Check in Counter to the plane as my father is 84 years old and cannot walk to far, however he is able to climb stairs and move in the aircraft freely it is only the long distance walking which he cannot do as he's lungs are not very strong anymore and he is battling to walk far. After numerous emails to Airlink and Airports South Africa, Airlink refused to assist as they said my father was to heavy for the wheelchair, we told them that my mother will assist hom as she is 14 years younger they still REFUSED. We then moved to plan B to try and arrange our own wheelchair for him but as soon as my mother and father got to OR Tambo they refused this as well as they said if she assisted him she cannot get on the flight, he was then forced to walk and delayed the plane as he had to sit down every few seconds the pilot saw this and Radioded Cape Town International Airport to make sure they give him a wheelchair when they landed. Thank you Captain for this. They need to go back to OR Tambo Int on the 27th and I am still struggling to get him assistance. This is TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE and I will make sure everyone knows of the struggle, we had to give my father Oxygen because he was so out of breath when they arrived. Who is paying for this?????? ALL BECAUSE no one wants to assist