oh that poor family! I first encountered that sort of thing way back in 1997 on my first trip to SEA. a mate and I flew BNE-DPS on Royal Brunei Airlines and the sheila at the check-in desk point blank refused to board us without an onward ticket from Indo. we had tickets from Bangkok to India but that was apparently no good.
so I was forced to pay for two expensive Qantas tickets from Medan to Penang. naturally we were stamped in to Bali without any nosy questions. it took 18 months to get the refund and I had to visit multiple offices in Bali, Singapore and Sydney.
it was a good learning experience I guess but geez I'm glad I don't have to go through all that <deleted> nowadays.