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Rottnest Island Authority’s booking system crashes on first day February 2023 reservations open

Michael TraillThe West Australian
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VideoLANGUAGE WARNING: Cameron Winsor has reeled in the catch of his life off Rottnest Island.

A “significant technical issue” has been blamed for booking chaos among scrambling holidaymakers looking to secure accommodation on Rottnest Island in February.

The Rottnest Island Authority was expecting families to flock to their website on Wednesday morning to secure limited accommodation for the back end of the upcoming summer.

It was the first day tourists could lock away a spot in February.

Instead customers were greeted on the website with a message stating an unresolvable technical issue had crashed the Authority’s booking system.

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“Rottnest Island Authority’s online accommodation booking system suffered an incident overnight and unfortunately, the issue is unable to be resolved at this time,” the message reads.

The bookings will now be open from 8.30am next Wednesday, June 8.

A spokesman for the Authority would not disclose what caused the booking system to crash, only describing it as a “significant technical issue overnight.”

“Reservations for Rottnest Island Authority accommodation for February 2023 were scheduled to commence at 8.30am today,” the spokesman said.

“However, our online booking system was impacted by a significant technical issue overnight.

“We been working with our IT supplier since the issue occurred but have not been able to resolve the issue this morning.

“As a result, we have taken the decision to reschedule the Open Day to Wednesday 8 June.

“RIA apologises for the inconvenience caused to customers.”

One Twitter user mused: Ah Rottnest Island - the highs and lows of the booking panic scramble continue.”

Jean Perkins included the hashtag #PerthProblems.

Last April, holidaymakers looking to spend Christmas on the iconic island ran into a roadblock when the RIA’s website also crashed because of a technical issue, resulting in a virtual queue running into the thousands.

Desperate travellers were forced to sit in lengthy queues on the website as they scrambled to snag one of the sought-after accommodation venues for the busiest time of the year.

The Rottnest Island website has a long history of crashing during high demand periods.

In 2019, major technical issues resulted in several outages, leaving visitors queuing for hours.

“I’ve spent more than an hour and a half trying to book for a holiday 18 months away,” fumed one traveller at the time.

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