Aviasales is this a scam? Review and Customers Reviews

Aviasales – sizeable online ticket booking servicelaunched in 2008. It positions itself as a resource without hidden fees and imposed services. It operates in 233 countries, with a separate website for each country.

Let’s take apart the online site and see if it’s so safe and reliable, or if Aviasales is a scam aimed at stealing as much money as possible from a naive user. Well, let’s get started.

 

Why Aviasales?

Aviasales.ru – a convenient site that collects information from 728 airlines and, in addition, from 15 airline ticket offices. You can choose the most suitable option in terms of price, route and departure/arrival time. There are a lot of filters, and at the sorting stage you can set options for free luggage, length of transfer and even the method of payment for the order.

In addition, you can connect a subscription with information about discount offers to e-mail, as well as chatbot in Viber, Facebook, Telegram. This is convenient for those who plan a trip in advance and are willing to wait for the best price.

On the plus side we will also include:

• Loading search results in 3-5 seconds (by comparison, most analog platforms take 10-20 seconds).
• A handy mobile app.
• The function of saving passengers (so that you do not have to enter your passport data, name, etc. every time).
• Lots of useful background information.

All in all, a convenient and interesting resource.

 

How do I register at aviasales.ru?

To register for aviasales.ru click on the profile icon in the upper right corner and select the method:

• Through a social network account on Vkontakte, Facebook, Odnoklassniki, Twitter (you will need to log in and allow the booking service access to the contents of your personal page).
• Via Google, Yandex, Mail.ru (standard procedure with login and password).

We settled on the second option. The system requests access to the address in a pop-up window. We allow it and go to the personal cabinet.

Aviasails personal account

The user’s personal account contains 7 sections:

• “History” – your past and current bookings.
• “Tickets” – a selection of offers by subscription (see below).
• “Documents” – saving passengers and data of their documents, so that in future bookings you do not enter everything with the risk of error, and just select a person from the list (the fields will automatically fill in).
• “Contests” – promotions and competitions.
• “Subscriptions” – connection to a mailing list notifying you about new offers on the selected route.
• “Settings” – choice of currency (ruble, tenge, euro, dollar, etc. – a total of 14 options).

Convenient that the menu in two formats – tabs and drop-down.

Mobile application

The service has a mobile application for devices on Android (requirements are set according to the model of smartphone or tablet), iOS (from 11.0) and Windows. The emphasis is made only on air reservations – railway tickets and transfers are not offered, as they are essentially organized by the operator’s partners. Otherwise, the functionality and content of the profile does not differ from the large-format version. The mobile version has an average score of 4.6 out of 5. The main reason for dissatisfaction is the technical problems with receiving the purchased ticket.

 

How to buy airline tickets on the Aviasales site?

Let’s see how to buy tickets through aviasales.ru using the Moscow-St. Petersburg round-trip flight for two adults as an example. Enter the initial data into the form, also specifying the flight numbers and class (economy, business, comfort, first).

And look at the proposed options, in our case there were 9. But even if there are many, there is a handy filter by airline, departure/arrival/change airport, departure/arrival time, travel time, baggage allowance, number of transfers (from 0 to 2), payment method and cost range (from-to). As well as sorting by price (cheapest flights), travel time (direct flights) and the ratio of the two (direct flights). So set up your search, choose the right offer and move on to booking.

How to book airline tickets?

Clicking “Buy for … rubles” in front of the selected flight will bring you to the website of the Aviasales partner selling the ticket and set the fare including options such as carry-on baggage, luggage, exchange and refund.

We enter contacts to get the electronic document and information about it. And fill in the information about the passengers (when saving them in the Personal Area it will be enough just to select the necessary people from the list).

You can also pay extra for trip cancellation, accident, lost luggage, or flight delays insurance. We waive everything and pay for the order.

How to buy cheap airline tickets?

To buy a cheap ticket, Aviasales has a sorting option that displays bargain tickets at the top of the search. You can also compare prices for flights on nearby dates, which is handy when you don’t have a clear reference to a specific day of travel. Let’s say you’re planning a vacation but don’t have a hotel reservation yet. You can connect email notifications and wait for the price tag to drop slightly.

Ticket refunds

The possibility of exchanging and returning tickets depends on the airline itself – Aviasails will not interfere if you are denied this service. Usually conditions are specified in the fare description. However, in certain cases, when the cancellation is due to force majeure (illness, accident, etc.) or the carrier itself for some reason canceled the flight, it is possible to reschedule or refund money. However, these are still handled through the reservation service, as the funds remain with the carrier until your arrival.

Additional features of Aviasails.ru

In addition to online booking of airline tickets, Aviasales offers insurance for departing passengers, booking of car rentals and hotel rooms through intermediaries: Alfa Strakhovanie, Rentacars and Booking.com. Connection to corporate rates, when a prepaid debit account is opened for a legal entity, is not, as far as we can tell.

 

Payment and receipt of air tickets on aviasales.ru

There are different ways to pay for your order:

• By bank card VISA, MasterCard, Maestro, MIR.
• From purses. Yandex.Money, WebMoney, QIWI.
• In installments through installment services: RevoPlus, Moneywall, Paylate.
• Cash at Svyaznoy, Euroset, Contact, or Elexnet terminals.
• From the phone (Apple Pay).

The specific set of payment options depends on the airline.

How to pay for airline tickets online?

When you pay by card you will need to fill out a bank form (card number, name of the holder, expiration date, 3-digit CVV / CVC-code), and confirm the transaction by entering the code from the SMS, received on the phone, linked to the bank account.

You will be required to provide an individual reservation number at the point-of-sale and terminals.

And in the case of wallets, go to your account and make the payment online through the cabinet. In some cases there are additional fees. For example, when buying in the office or booking (the order will be reserved for a long time).

 

Aviasails bonuses

The Aviasales bonus program is limited to two areas: airline flight discounts and contests. Under “Specials”. aviasales.ru (transition from the footer) there is a selection of “hot” flights at a discounted price.

And in your personal cabinet, you can find a list of valuable gifts. For example, tickets to Azerbaijan.

Referral program

The Aviasales Affiliate Program allows you to earn up to 70% cashback on other people’s purchases. To do this, you need them to become your referrals. It goes like this:

• You register in the program and receive an individual (referral) link, which you place on your website, blog, social network page and other public resources so that as many people as possible can see it. The main thing is not to break the law and not to send spam.
• Every click on your link to Aviasales.ru is logged by the system. And the clicked user is considered as your referral.
• If one of your referrals buys a service on the site, you get up to 70% (depending on the payment method and total amount) of the money they paid.

Payments are made from the 11th to the 20th of each month.

The company also cooperates with the CPA network ePN. The seller pays remuneration for bringing new customers to his site. From each order the partner receives 53.84% of income from the sale of the airline ticket.

 

Complaints about Aviasales

The total number of complaints on Aviasales is about 30%. And the main reason is the problem of paid reservations: someone just does not get a document in the mail, and someone can not get on the plane because he is not in the lists.

There are also those who have encountered discrepancies in the description of the ticket at the booking stage and after its purchase: different prices, lack of free baggage, etc. In general, everything is as usual with online booking services.

If there are any reviews about the Aviasales service, we’ll be sure to post them on social media. Sign up so you don’t miss anything!

Please keep yourself informed about news and complaints. We copy the most valuable information to social networks, so please sign up!

 

Supervisory bodies of Aviasails

The rights for Aviasails belong to the company Go Travel Un Limited, registered in 2011 in Hong Kong – as noted in the user agreement, with certificate number 1656681. The service itself has existed since 2008, because at the beginning it had the format of an RSS feed. In Russia, the organization is represented by LLC “Aviasails Media”, entered in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities of the Federal Tax Service of Russia in 2018 (record number – SE9965-20-13044798). As the domain name of the site is -.ru., it is regulated by the legislation of our country and falls under the definition of “information resource”.

As the main activity of Aviasails Media, the registry lists data processing, posting services and related activities. All of the above leads to the conclusion that the company is not obliged to provide any guarantees regarding the reservations provided to the client.

Check the registration of Aviasails Media LLC in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities by name/INN

Aviasails.ru User Agreement

The aviasales.ru User Agreement (“Terms of Use of the Aviasales flight search service”) is a very short document (it contains only 5 points) establishing the nature of the legal relationship between the owners of the platform (Go Travel Un Limited) and its users. Thus, clause 1.4 states that any legal disputes between the parties must be resolved in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

The operator also reminds that it does not sell airline tickets, so it does not guarantee the quality of the services provided by the carrier and the accuracy of the information displayed on the site, as it is taken from the official resources of the airlines (paragraph 2.3).

The owner of the resource at any time and without giving a reason may terminate the site or change its functionality (clause 2.5). About possible compensation for losses incurred by the user as a result of these actions, for some reason is not mentioned.

In general, the service is provided on “As is” terms, with no guarantees or obligations on the part of the provider (clause 3.1).

You, on your part, must comply with the laws of the country of residence (clause 3.3) and be liable to third parties for actions taken within the framework of the platform (clause 3.4).

Security of aviasales.ru

As the information service provider promises us, all our payment data is protected by the PCI DSS payment standard. The resource itself supports 256-bit encryption – this is an additional barrier to fraudsters.

With regard to personal information (phone number, e-mail, etc.) there are obligations spelled out in the privacy policy: the operator has no right to disclose it to third parties not related to the organization of your order, except as required by Russian law (for example, requests from law enforcement agencies).

Aviasales Customer Service

There are several ways to contact support:

• By e-mail: [email protected] (from your mailbox or via the feedback form on the website).
• For users of the application, you can write to e-mail or Vkontakte from the “Profile” section.
• In social networks (message to the administrator of the official community Facebook, VK, Odnoklassniki, Instagram, Twitter).

There is also a detailed FAQ guide. The service does not have a call center. The support service is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

 

Is Aviasales a scam?

The unpleasant thing about pitching AviasalesIn the process of booking, we were repeatedly confronted with offers to pay extra, because after selecting a flight, the user gets to a third-party resource that is not bound by advertising restrictions. However, we did not notice any other serious deviations from the truth with the provider.

The question of registration in Russia has also been resolved successfully. It is only unclear how to check the information about the parent company, allegedly registered in Hong Kong, because we did not find any open sources confirming or denying this. As for the reviews, they did not surprise us: practically every booking service has complaints about unreceived tickets. This is always a risk. And whether it is worth it is up to the user to decide. In general, in our opinion, Aviasales is not a scam, but simply a typical representative of its segment.

 

Conclusion

AviasalesIn general, it cannot be called a market leader, and yet its popularity is understandable:

• Convenient booking system with many filters and an extensive search base.
• Set up information about price reductions and other options to help you find the best price, unless it’s an urgent purchase.
• Interesting articles and reference materials to help travelers.
• A handy mobile app.

The prices here, in our humble opinion, are not much different from what competitors offer, but the service is suitable for reducing time costs. Especially if you just use it as a search engine and buy tickets directly from the airline.