I recently had an experience in which I gave up and bought a J ticket on a competing airline because the system used by TG (as well as PG and some other airlines) was extremely exasperating. This is not new, but in the past after a few attempts of entering the correct information, it used to process purchases for me. Now, the system prompts me to call my bank, which is a tedious inconvenience.

Instead, I decided to go to expedia.com to purchase tickets to SGN. Of course, the J fare TG loads into expedia is much more expensive than even the highest fare on TG’s own website.

So, I was actively trying, for about half an hour to buy two one way J tickets on TG as my preferred airline. I wanted to pay a premium over VN to fly TG. Then they made it a PITA to ticket online. So TG lost the business I was expressly trying to give to them as my preferred airline, and I ended up with VN J tickets.

I apologize for this rant, but I really think this system is ridiculous. It asks for all kinds of verification information, and then even upon completion of that process it still will not approve the ticket purchase. Does TG not realize that making this transaction difficult will drive business away from them and to their competitors or OTAs? Not too smart.