South African AirwaysReviews of flysaa.com

A380 First class flight booked with British Airways from LHR to JNB, then with SAA from JNB to CPT. Email from SAA informing us that business class seats had been downgraded to economy, with no explanation given. Then, a month later, another email from SAA saying that we'd been booked onto an earlier flight, giving us just 90 minutes for the transfer. Given the frequent delays with the A380 service, and therefore concern about missing the connection, we decided enough was enough, and we've rebooked direct from LHR to CPT, bypassing JNB and the hopeless SAA altogether.

Biggest mess around to change my last name on my flight ticket. Jumped through hoops going back in forth with your customer service team. Then was told I had to upgrade my flight in order to do that ?? and pay an additional fee to then do the name change. Ended up buying an additional ticket with my new married lastname, asked for refund of my other ticket. got to the SAA baggage counter on the day and the SAA staff were confused why there were two tickets and said I would have only had to pay an fee for the name change not upgrade my ticket.. then to get on the plane and its half full? Worst experience ever. Still waiting for my refund.

They are great if you want to get to your destination late, or if you want to reserve extra services... Like seat reservation, only to be re-assigned a seat at the gate and having to go through the admin of trying to get your money back. Complaining to them will just result in the staff shrugging... So they have accepted it

I was scheduled to fly from OR Tambo to Durban at 12:45. At 12:40. Just five minutes before departure, we were suddenly informed that the flight would be delayed by at least two hours. There was no prior communication, no apology, nothing. To make matters worse, while we were already queuing to board, staff began changing everyone’s tickets to new seat numbers, with the vague explanation that "the aircraft has been changed." Again, no apology, no courtesy, no explanation. This is not an isolated incident. In August, when I flew to OR Tambo, the check-in experience was just as poor. The staff were laid-back and displayed no sense of urgency. I had already checked in online, but still had to queue with my son for over an hour simply to drop off our bags. What should have been a quick and efficient process turned into a frustrating ordeal. SAA’s service is consistently disappointing! poor communication, lack of professionalism, and no concern or respect for passengers’ time, money or comfort. Based on these repeated experiences, I would not recommend anyone to fly with SAA. They simply do not care about their customers!!!

I flew on Sunday 29-06-2025. I was very impressed with SAA service. The flight attendants were very friendly. I used SAA after many years and will definitely use them again.

I booked a return ticket for my child from Harare to Melbourne with assisted travel, however, due to a change in circumstances I needed to change the dates on the ticket or cancel depending on which option was favourable. To change a return ticket to a one way only travel ticket, I was asked to pay R11 200 and when I asked to cancel I was told that the ticket (R28 000) was non-refundable including the money that I paid for my child's assisted travel. I was told that if I choose to cancel, only the taxes will be refunded which was a total of (R11 000). Given the struggles that I went through trying to resolve this issue with staff, i opted to cancel the ticket as I lost confidence in the service itself. I was told to email online refunds to request a refund and ticket cancellation, which I did on 27 May 2025. Today its the 24th of June 2025, I have not received any refund or any confirmation that my request is being processed. One way ticket has been cancelled and the return ticket still shows as confirmed despite my request to cancel both. On 27 May, I contacted the Johannesburg booking line where I was passed from one worker to the other and sometimes I was left on hold for more than hour. I spent three and a half hours on a call to the Airline staff where I was met with rudeness, lack of care, or urgency at all. I would recommend other airlines such as Emirates for international travel because their level of professionalism is worth every cent and the level of support and urgency is worth every cent. I do not recommend booking SA airways especially if you will require cancellation in future, of which in my case cancellation was unplanned. A friend recently lost a two way ticket (not refunded) and her experiences with the Johannesburg staff matched mine. Its a complete scam. SA023, SA 280, SA 281 and SA 022

BAD SERVICE SLOW baggage claim Damaged baggage as well!!!! REFUSED TO REFUND!!! Definitely not worth flying this airLINE

They won't offer "saver rate" on their website but it is available if you go through "Google Flights" this is discrimination against the UK. This is the response I got from their customer service department when I questioned it. Thank you for your further email. Please pardon our delayed response. Kindly note that as per the initial response the saver fare has sale restrictions and is not sold from London when tickets are purchased from our website and not google. We do hope we have your understanding in this regard. Warm regards, Zingaphi Ndima