Air Vanuatu

✅ Trip Verified | Air Vanuatu is, by a long shot, the worst airline I have ever traveled with, and I will never spend my money on this airline again. It started with our flights from Auckland to Port Vila being cancelled, Air Vanuatu not notifying us and relying on us to fix it, having to spend hours trying to sort out their mistakes. We did that and finally arrived albeit from Auckland to Nadi, 7 hour delay before flying Nadi to Port Vila. We are currently sitting in Port Vila domestic terminal for a flight to Tanna that has been delayed by another nearly 3 hours and again, we were not advised of this until we went to check in for our flight. We were offered nothing by the airline to comfort us during the delay, we are sitting in an overcrowded, run down and boiling hot airport terminal. Air Vanuatu’s customer service staff are great, and I seriously feel sorry for them having to bear the brunt of Air Vanuatu’s leadership’s useless qualities. Get out of the aviation business if you are not committed to your customers and fixing your mistakes. I will never travel with Air Vanuatu again, and likely not to Vanuatu again, which is so sad as it is such a beautiful country, just terrorised by such a pathetic excuse for an airline.

✅ Trip Verified | This is the worst airline I have ever experienced. For my flight from Port Vila to Tanna. during Check-in, the whole process was chaos, their staff do not even bother to ask passenger to wait in line, just people keep jumping the line. Their staff just said the flight will be canceled, not providing any reason. Then I ask staff from another airline, they said due to the weather condition, Ok, I can understand this. Then, they keep the status of the flight delay "not cancel" for three whole days, making you can not cancel/reschedule through your OTA channel. They do not even send you an email to say sorry and confirm the flight was delayed. I had to go to their office 3 times to receive a formal confirmation letter that my flight was canceled. The first time I go to their office, their staff even took more than 30min to confirm my flight was canceled due to weather conditions, in fact, all flight was canceled in port Vila that day. then, the second time and third times I go to the office, their staff is extremely rude, just saying they knew nothing and will contact me later. what is even worse, for rescheduling, they will reschedule my flight from Port Vila to Tanna from 11-Feb to 16-FEB, and do not bother to change my return flight. I ask them, based on your schedule I will arrive in Tanna at 1330 16-Feb, my return flight at 1330. They do not care. later, said that they can arrange my return flight on 26-Feb. I ask them to cancel the fight, they just hang up. They were against my will and put me on the fight on 16-Feb. I apply for an involuntary cancellation, but they reject anyway, please avoid choosing this flight, if you wish to travel in Vanuatu, travel in a group, like 4-5 people, charter a plane, it's only about 30% more expensive

Not Verified | Terrible service. Cancelled or moved all of my flights between Brisbane and three different islands. Left our luggage on another island for 5 days of our holiday. Poor communication leaving us in a hot "airport" with no access to water or food (just packets of chips which we bought and were stale due to the mouse holes in them!!!) for over 7 hours, constantly telling us it would be "10 more minutes". Be honest so people can leave and sort something else out. I got Very sick after this and at 7 months pregnant this is less than ideal - left very out of pocket due to missing luggage and flight changes which resulted in us loosing pre paid accommodation and car hire. No compensation given - returning home we have tried to claim on our travel insurance but air Vanuatu will not respond to any emails, have promised on the phone to send the info we need the same day but consistently failed to do so and now the number goes through to a recorded voice message with no ability to speak to someone

Not Verified | Lost our bags after they were confirmed to be on the plane. Staff have no idea what they are doing, completely unaware of their own policies and will not compensate for anything in accordance with their policies. They will state this policy is outdated and no longer applies. Initially we were told it takes 48 hours to have delayed baggage sorted and to have arrived in country. We'll on 7 night trip the bags have not arrived and nor will they. They are unable and unwilling to trace the bags and plead incompetence when you ask them to do their job. If you call them instead of needing to waste money to go and see them in person, good luck, break out the check book because you're going to need it. Answering the phone seems to be a foreign concept to these guys. And if you email you won't get a response either. Not to mention the actual flight on the way over. 3 hour delay sitting on the runway. Only to be sat in a plane without air-conditioning and no refreshments offered.

Not Verified | As we were leaving for the airport for our flight to Port Vila, we received a phone call advising that our flight wouldn’t be going ahead and had been rescheduled to the following morning. Despite multiple requests for confirmation and a new itinerary via email, nothing was sent. However, our Qantas app was updated with the new itinerary, as we booked through them, so we felt confident it was correct. So we arrive at the airport the next morning, queue for 2.5 hours to check in only to be told that we are not on the flight! We are, in fact, on the evening flight in 12 hours time. Despite the assurances of the Air Vanuatu customer service team and a confirmed itinerary from Qantas, we had still been given the wrong information. But there were no apologies or accountability taken, just blank stares and “computer says no” attitudes. As such, we now have make a travel insurance claim for the 2 nights accommodation we paid for but could not enjoy because Air Vanuatu are a cowboy operation with dreadful customer service. Most people we chatted to in the queue had similar experiences and had been delayed for over a week, due to overbooking and poor communication. Avoid at all costs.

✅ Trip Verified | We were meant to fly Air Vanuatu at 11:55am 16 December 2022. The day started off with several delays, with finally a cancellation at approximately 4:00pm. Air Vanuatu and Qantas (who we booked with through codeshare) did not contact us to notify us that it had been cancelled. The first we heard about the reason for delays was from our accommodation in Vanuatu, who had been communicating with us. We spent hours at the airport and were told so many different reasons for why the flight was cancelled, as well as all different scenarios regarding what was happening I.e. we may fly out that night; we were definitely not getting on any flight etc. They finally told us we had a hotel to stay at (which they did cover). We arrived the next day (Saturday 17 December) to hear they still had no idea regarding the plane, whilst we were hearing from our resort that the plane was likely grounded until Monday or Tuesday (2-3 days time). In the end, we were told by Qantas that we should rebook and had to cancel our trip entirely. I would not recommend traveling with this company, and have since reviewed their Facebook comments which suggest this happens in monthly basis. The communication was horrendous, and their one staff member was overworked and not informed about the situation. Do not waste your money. If you want to go to Vanuatu, go through Air Fiji or wait until Virgin Australia flies again. Pretty devastating as I imagine Covid has already impacted the country enough.

✅ Trip Verified | The flight was persistently delayed by an hour in all sectors. Sydney-VLI was 737, with good leg space, clean aircraft but run-down, No full meal service, just tuna wrap and coffee and on return sector musli bar and coffee. For the domestic sector ie VLI-Luganville and return no service as being a short flight. The airline still needs to upgrade their professionalism as a team have no idea what they are doing, conflicting messages and information, even though I have got my boarding pass in my hand and when boarding I got an email from them that my flight has been cancelled and I need to board flight later in the evening around midnight. Prefer to stop using online methodology and get to airport and see what is available and insist to board the earlier flight even though you have flight amendment notifications. Passengers were moved to the next delayed flight even though the earlier flights still has empty seats. Don't know why they do this.

✅ Trip Verified | Fiji to Vanuatu. The worst company in the world. They are over-selling tickets. They stole my money and ruined my holiday. They left me stranded in Fiji and were not responsible for anything. I missed 4 flights and paid accommodation because of a change they made and do not acknowledge. I called more than 10 times. Their employees are disrespectful and rude and repeatedly cut off my calls. Don't use this company!

Not Verified | Noumea to Nadi. Arrived at Noumea airport at 6:45am for our 8:45am flight to Fiji, and we were informed the flight we purchased from Air Vanuatu did not exist. We had all the booking information and everything was correct on our side. This forced us to spend $1200 per person on a last minute flight boarding in 15 minutes in order to get to Fiji and make it on time for our flight back to the US. When we tried checking into the flight the night before, it said we needed to in person due to the coronavirus so there was not a bit of suspicion with anything being wrong. The airline has not responded to any of our emails or phone calls.

✅ Trip Verified | Port Vila to Melbourne. They are in the process of modernising their fleet. Mid 2020, they will be taking delivery of the new A320 aircraft, with longer range new engines and improved efficiency. Air Vanuatu has just launched direct services to Melbourne. It is relieving that no international connection was needed, requiring hopping off the domestic flight then transferring onto the international one, which can be inconvenient. My departure gate was Gate 2, a nice simple process as Bauerfield Airport is small in comparison to major airports. Immigration process was quite swift. I like the small size of the airport, as it is partially open air and you embark the aircraft via the forward and rear stairs. My seat 11A which is a window seat. There are no individual flight entertainment screens, only overhead projector screens, however this was no problem for me, as I had downloaded movies prior to the flight. Dinner was delicious. Extra cudos for having wooden utensils instead of plastic. I chose the peri peri chicken with yellow rice and a a Mrs Higgins raspberry and white choc cookie as a complementary sweet. I then followed up with a couple of white wines which went down nicely. The flight was very smooth with phenomenal views over the South Pacific. I loved the cabin mood lighting and the cabin crew uniform which is a lovely light blue. Overall, I had a fantastic flight with no criticisms. I recommend Air Vanuatu and look forward to flying with them again.