"...Lesson: Bali Airport is a corrupt hole..."

Wrong. Bali Airport is not a corrupt hole: a few individuals are greedy, some people are gullible, and most travellers don't understand how it works. Here's how....

There are five types of operators that offer Fast Track meet & assist services at DPS [and at CGK too]

1. Opportunists - mainly in Bali: who look for and prey on tired and fed-up travellers in the line and offer to help. They are unlicensed airport staff (cleaners, reps, security guys, even it is said a few rogue IOs) etc. Here, just as you should with taxi touts in Indonesia, AVOID THEM!

2. Bonafide Brokers - who actually handle the orders coming from from hotels / agencies - they won't offer to help people in a line (they are not allowed to), they only handle pre-booked jobs. Whilst usually OK, their service may be suspended during spot inspections and VVIP conferences. CHEAPER. DIFFICULT TO FIND. MUST PRE-BOOK. NOT A VIABLE OPTION FOR MOST PAX.

3. Indonesian Organizers - like the on line websites like dot coms BaliConcierge, AirportJakarta, Bali-FastTrack, AsiaFastTrack + others. They manage prebooked jobs for Banks (eg HSBC, Citi, SCB), for top Hotels, and for hi end Credit Card Clients (eg Amex Centurion, VISA Infinite). They typically use one or more legitimate operators - RELIABLE; MID PRICE, usually BOOKABLE ON LINE

4. GroundHandlers like PT JAS or PT Gapura - they typically manage VIP services for airlines, not ad hoc bookings (exception is PT JAS who have recent launched a retail facing service "ASA" with lots of bells and whistles and priced accordingly). They are generally difficult for private travellers to book, may be expensive, but have professional standards and importantly (especially in Bali) they are unaffected by most inspections: they can also penetrate closer to the aircraft door than the local brokers

5. Foreign Networks: like dot com yQnow and dot co dot uk Diamond-Air - they are very expensive and actually provide the same services as local organizers. If money is no object, then their english speaking interface and click based booking makes them useful.

In this author's opinion, the best bet is to find and use an option 3. an Indonesian Organizer. Typing a few key words into Google like "bali fast
track meet greet" will yield some choices.

Bali is not a corrupt hole. These sorts of services are available an hundreds of airports round the world, if you know how to book and want to spend the dosh.