buying a cebu pacific ticket at the airport

HI EVeryone,

first, thanks to everyone who helped me with my question about currency.

I have another question.

My wife and I will arrive at the international airport on Monday the 9th (Eva Air from Taipei) and we arrive at 11:30 am.

We want to get on the Cebu Pacific flight to Bacolod at 4:30 or 6:30 (not sure of exact times) and don't want to overnight in Manila.

The Cebu Pacific website does not take Visa cards from US (or Canada) apparently. I should have gotten a Korean visa card, but it is too late now. So, I"m not able to book and pay online for either flight with either of my two Canadian visa cards.

Can we buy the tickets at the airport (I assume yes) and assuming they sell tickets at the airport - guess my question is how likely will there be 2 seats available on either of those 2 flights when we show up on Monday.

thanks
mark

Very simple.
Get your credit card "verified". clicked on the "visa" or "MasterCard" link at the bottom left of the Cebu Pacific homepage and follow the instructions. Only takes about 30 seconds, but adds an extra layer of security to your credit cards.

After you have completed this procedure you will find the Cebu Pacific site will readily accept your cards.

Sansai,

thanks soooo much

mark

Sansai,

thanks, but, it doesn't work

the verified by visa icon does not do anything when I click on it????

could i use the mastercard verifier for a visa card do you think?

it gives me the following message when i click buy

"We apologise that your transaction cannot be processed at this time, kindly retry your transaction using another credit card."

They are also stating on that page that at the moment they are not taking US based visa cards - so i'm thinking hmmm, maybe canadian visa cards as well.
thanks
mark

if still no luck. Go to domestic airport i am sure you can get a flight to cebu city. There is a cebu pacific office there.
Or you can book a flight for the next day and stay in townhouse for 1 night, 5mins from domestic.

so my original question stands

does anyone think there could be 2 seats on either the 4:30 or the 6:30 flight to Bacolod when we show up on Monday or do you think they are generally booked up

we don't really want to go to cebu, well not straight away anyways,

thanks again

mark

sorry my mistake, i said cebu-city i meant bacolod.
Still i think it shouldn`t be a problem if they have daily flights.
good luck.

nr1qwapo

thanks,

yes, they have two flights, (actually 3 but we miss the first flight) so we'll just hope we can get seats on one of them, if not, hmmm, well, we'll stay over a night then

thanks everyone so much
mark

I'm an American living in the Philippines and have always booked my Cebu Pacific flights online. But lately the website has rejected my credit card from the USA. I suppose they've had a fraud problem and are making it harder to do this so for my last two flights I've had to go to a Cebu Pacific ticket office and buy my tickets. They'll take my credit card there.

If you can't book online and arrive in Manila without tickets, just go to the domestic terminal. About 100 meters away Cebu Pacific has a ticket office. You might not get the best price buying on day of departure but it's still better than spending the night in Manila. Good luck.

aklan
thanks so much

that's what we'll do then,

pay more as you suggest, right now, if i could book and pay online it is about 3600 pesos for the two of us one way from manila to bacolod, that is pretty cheap, i don't mind paying an extra 20, 30, 40 bucks or whatever, i don't imagine it would be much more than that would it??

thanks so much
mark

Be prepared that there might be a LOT of people at Cebu Pacific airport office. Waiting until you number whill be served might take over an hour... It was very crowded before noon time when I was in there last time. SO head for their office ASAP if you want to fly same day.
Prices might not be so cheap anymore if the flight is well booked. The longer you book in advance the cheaper the fares are, I once booked a flight on short notice and well...it wasn't exactly cheap anymore. Roughly double than if I would have booked several weeks in advance...
*****

<blockquote>Quote
<hr>could i use the mastercard verifier for a visa card do you think?<hr></blockquote>

No.

Here is the Verified by Visa USA site

and here is the Mastercard SecureCode site

Ok, TT wont let me post a message with a Https link, so here is the correct site for Verified by Visa USA - https://usa.visa.com/personal/security/vbv/index.html

cropduster,
thanks for the work,

i already had verified my visa with the website before i started on this ordeal

even with a password protected visa verified card it just does not work,

they just don't seem to be taking US based visa cards (or apparently Cdn visa cards) at this time

hmmmm,

thanks though for your help

mark

it is quiet season and bacolod is a quiet route anyway so i wouldnt worry. the cebu pacific office should not be too busy

great,

thanks for the encouraging post

mark

Just wondering if you can buy the tickets from a travel agency there in Korea. As I'm writing this it's about 1:30 PM on Friday here in the Philippines. Perhaps you could call the Cebu Pacific reservation center and ask them to book the flight for you and even if they won't take your credit card information on the phones, they should be able to hold the reservation for you until you can pay for it when you arrive on Monday. The res center phone would be your international access digit, then 63 for Philippines country code. then 27020888. At least you'll know for sure you'd have a seat that way. Ads in the newspaper say the number is 02 7020888 but I think you have to drop the initial zero when you call from out of the country.

I'm rereading my post number 16. I guess I left it a bit confusing. I meant to offer two different options. One, the Korean travel agency. Or, two, calling Cebu Pacific reservation center directly.

thank you thank you thank you

okay, i used a phone card (so it is cheap) and called cebu's reservation office from korea

the lady was nice - made my booking, gave her the credit card info - and, have already rec'd the e-ticket receipt (serves as the e ticket) by email

got a price of 3200 pesos (2 people one way manila to bacolod) - so, i'm sure i saved about the same amount by getting the ticket early AND we can relax

thanks all
mark

good deal. i payed 9600 peso today for a 1st class return ticket, bacolod to manila leaving next month... but i got a free return ticket from manila bangkok free ,included. (latest promo with philippine airlines)

I have also gone round the houses with the cebupacific website credit card however I have suceeded in booking from the UK by telephoning their cebu call centre. The bad news is that a week later my credit card had not been debited and on telephoning CB was told to contact my bank .
My bank told me CB had not requested the money
Another call to CB and eventually my money was taken however I never got an e mail so turned up at the airport with the reference on the back of an envelope. I did manage to get on the flight but chose to fly Tiger airways to Macau on my next trip instead of Hong Kong.

I have sent their customer services dept an e mail - no reply

I have sent their promotions dept an e mail - no reply

I have hung around their chaotic ticket ofice at NAIA for about 45 mins to get a printed off bit of paper with aforementioned envelope number on it !

I will be writing to Lance Gokongwei who is the CEO as the airline is losing good business and pissing a lot of us off - particularily as an ex emirates $1100 return and now an Oasis - $560 return to Hong Kong passenger I want to be able to make the last bit of my frequent journey to be as simple as booking on Oasis and Air Asia

i've had trouble with their admin folks too. i requested a refund for a ticket that i didn't use and was told it would be credited to my credit card account in 45 days. 2 months later i called them and it sounded like no action had been taken until i called. like maybe they were hoping i was going to forget about it. i had to make 4 more calls to follow up on this and finally in frustration sent an email. got no reply to the email but finally got my refund about 100 days from the original request. they can take my money in a second when purchasing but need 100 days to send money my direction?

i think part of the problem is that cebu pacific has just grown so quickly in the last two years. they recently switched over to the discount type airline with bargain fares. before then they had higher prices but lots of empty seats. they are probably overwhelmed with paperwork. that's still no excuse.

Today, 11 July 2007, I bought a CPA tix on-line using my USA credit card. No problem.

One possible reason for the easy purchase was that I bought a CPA tix with the same credit card last March 2007, when I first went through the credit card's new verification system.

As a side note, I bought the one-way ticket today, because over the telephone a CPA rep told me the cost of changing the date of my return flight on my bargain tix bought last March. While the cost of the one-way tix was about the same as the cost of the round-trip tix bought in March, the cost of changing the date on the round-trip tix was higher. Go figure why CPA has those kinds of fees and prices?

Also, I would have had to spend time going to a CPA office and wait in line to have my tix changed. Hint: A few years ago, I went to the CPA office along the side of Robinson Place mall, Pedro Gil entrance, at about 9 am before the mall opens at 10 am, and the CPA line was very short.

Now I have two return tickets for two different flights.