There's 2 different issues here - refundability, and change fees.

No matter what you do, you're not going to get "refundable" tickets. The credit is from a ticket that was originally non-refundable, and any future tickets you put that credit towards is going to be (at least in part) non-refundable as a result - even if it's a full fare first class ticket. If that wasn't the case, this would be a trivial way to turn non-refundable credit into a refund, and thus it's not possible.

The next problem is that "refundable" is not the same thing as "no change/cancel fee". It's very possible that you bought "refundable" tickets, with a change/cancel fee that needs to be paid before the tickets can be refunded. I don't think I've ever seen a $0 cancel fee V-class ticket, so I'd be fairly certain that's what you've got.

When you add the two facts together, what you're probably being told is correct. There's likely a $200 fee to "cancel" the tickets. Once the tickets are canceled, you would normally be able to request a refund - but due to the grandfathered non-refundable condition, you can't get the refund in any form other than a credit.