Originally Posted by
Often1
The best OP is going to do is to receive a refund for the original tickets via a CC dispute. But, even that will be heard as the opaque third-party ticket vendor will simply assert that it properly ticketed the passengers and that whatever it is that went wrong, went wrong as the result of somebody else's screw up.
OP won't recover the cost of the new tickets because a CC dispute won't help there.
OP is left suing the third-party vendor and that may well be -- depending on jurisdiction -- well above small claims limits.
This, unfortunately, was all avoidable. It took about 30 seconds to locate numerous websites with consumer complaints against this outfit. Any time you see any appreciable number of complaints, even if there are some satisfied customers out there, do like Nancy Reagan and "just say no."
In terms of what unfolded, as soon as OP no showed on the connection, the remainder of his ticket was cancelled. That happens with pretty much all carriers and their tickets. So, the sole question here is why the segment in question was cancelled.
Having dealt with that one segment, unfortunately it was on OP to make certain that the remainder of his ticket was still intact or reinstated.
Not sure that travel insurance would have helped here.
Indeed. A very expensive lesson learned to be sure. While I understand that the onus was on us and we're decently frequent travelers (certainly not nearly as expert as FT regulars) it still hurts to have this happen as the missed segment issue has never happened before with other discount online travel agencies. (In the many years' weve traveled between the US and Asia).
The crux is the missed segment as you stated, which if missed automatically cancells the rest of the ticket as is expected. In the heat of the moment, memories blur but I may have remembered a chinese agent saying there may be another flight on that airline in 2 days...which my mother in her big hurry did not want to do....likely a mistake here.
Needless to say your warnings are going to be taken WELL into heart. Full resesarch in business reputations will be done for nearly all future transactions (save for very small amounts...obviously) AND we are avoiding pretty much any of these discount 3rd party travel agencies as having information being handled between a 3rd party and the airlines creates another layer for mistake and issues that can be huge headache inducing.
I guess I didn't give an update but your summary is spot on.
I disputed with Chase and they refunded me half of the original purchase price (Great shout out to Chase customer service...outstanding) to my Sapphire Reserve (which should be expected for a higher end card). Since they did reasonably say that we did take about half the trip and the other half was not delivered.
I did speak also to a few lawyers here in-town and few wanted to take on the case due to little to no documentation (he said vs she said) and I did not record my conversation with the company during our troubles.
And as you said depending on jurisdiction, this may bring more legal headaches and not sure if it's worth the $3000 in our out of pocket cost to pursue this with time and money.
In the end I am in a very fortunate situation where a smaller 4-figure sum of money is not THAT big of a deal (if it only happens once....like this) and so eating this cost is fine as we attribute it to an expensive lesson learned in life....hopefully to never repeat again.
While I understand honest mistakes happen and I'm pretty sure this company is not just out to scam people....their poor service to address difficulties is clear and left a very bad taste in my mouth...and in many people's mouths it seemed.
Oh and yes I did look through terms of travel insurance and you're right in that in my critical reading of travel insurance terms...this situation likely would not have helped. Chase's CC travel insurance also did not cover this situation.