Successful booking and confirmed eticket via cheap flights fare.
Gave three stars as the process worked, but not without fear given past reviews and the fact that I had to call and wait for an eticket issuance.
The story:
I saw the fare on Kayak, which took me to their site. So I booked the flight (Toronto to Vancouver)- 2 travelers- after seeing a cheaper fare than the other online booking sites. I saw the green banner "free cancellation within 24 hours" so that encouraged me, but I doubt they make it easy to cancel or if that's even possible given the reviews. But since I was certain I would be traveling, I secured the booking, which was in USD. My currency of use: Canadian. Tip: Taken a screengrab of that free cancellation banner. If it's clickable and there's more details, take a screengrab of that as well for dispute purposes, including with your credit card company.
I immediately received a text and an email of the reservation. But on the document they said I may have to wait a few minutes for the eticket. It may take a few hours in certain circumstances. OK, not a problem because with other reputable OTAs (Expedia, Priceline, booking.com and even the airline site that's the case... usually minutes to an hour, not hours upon hours). I read some eticket reviews where an eticket took forever to come through. And that waiting period makes me nervous because if I have to book another way, who's to say the fare will be around the same price?
While waiting for the eticket to be issued, I started looking at reviews. Probably should've done this beforehand, which I usually do.
The reviews were horrible, both on review sites and the company's Facebook page, with many mentioning that it's a scam, they will up charge, they will say the price changed or you'll show up at the airport and the airline doesn't have your reservation. That when the fear came in. So I called them and they said the eticket hasn't been issued, but it will be via email in about 15 minutes. The rep was helpful in finding the reservation and providing details.
At this point, I waited for an hour and nothing so I was getting nervous. I see that the same flight on Westjet's site is a total of $80 more (for two tickets). With the uncertainty, I called my credit card company who said that the charge is pending so they can't do anything and I should work with cheapflights to cancel it since I provided my credit card info to them. I had a feeling that would be a hard task- a cancellation via cheap flights fares. They added that when the fare is no longer pending, I can call back the credit card company and they can dispute it, but I should wait to see their eticket and when the charge goes from pending to confirmed. They can't guarantee my success with a refund. They also recommended that for the time being I lock the card in case they charged the card more than once to give me peace of mind. Something I can undo when all is well.
Cheap flights said they wouldn't charge the card until an issuance of an eticket. But my card was already showing a pending charge and still no eticket. Notably, while cheap flights quoted me $402 USD I did the conversion on google's exchange and it would work out to $585 Canadian. But my card was charged $602 Canadian. The credit card company said that's because there was a conversion/exchange rate hence the difference from what I see online (even though the online exchange rate was lower) given that their card exchange amount may be different (higher). So keep this in mind if doing conversions. Still, it was cheaper than booking directly through Westjet. $602 versus $668, which will help for my $50 bag fee. Speaking of bags, cheap flights was charging $115.65 round trip to add a checked bag. So I didn't go that route. I can pay for the bagged directly on Westjet's site ($101.70)
About 2.5 hours after, the eticket was confirmed. I went straight to Westjet's site to make sure it's a verified booking with my reservation code and it was! Cheap flights issues a numeric 7-digit code. But Westjet's is a letter code (which also cheap flights provides when the eticket is issued. There were two reservation codes issued (one to go, one to come back).
Bottom line: They offered a cheaper fare than other OTAs or if booked directly via the airline.
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