Last October, we purchased two round class business class tickets from JFK to SVG via FRA on LH for vacation travel in June. Once COVID-19 hit, we knew those plans would not happen but we waited until LH officially canceled the flights. I knew the flights would probably not operate since they were no longer bookable. I checked online every few days for weeks. Finally, when I logged into my LH account in mid-May, I saw the option online to cancel my flight for a refund. Since I had not seen that option available before, I made the stupid mistake of clicking it. However, when I received the email a few minutes later and saw that it said that I will receive a refund "if my ticket allows."

I immediately called Lufthansa customer service and politely asked the agent for clarification. I told her that if my tickets were not going to be fully refunded then I did not want to cancel and asked if this action could be canceled and the booking reinstated. The agent was polite and said she would would check for me. She said that unfortunately, my ticket would only be eligible for a refund of taxes and fees. She then put me on hold and said she would see about reinstating the booking. After about 15 minutes of being on hold, I was abruptly disconnected without the agent returning. I suspect I was hung up on. I immediately called back and politely explained to the agent who answered what had happened and what the previous agent said she was doing. She said that it was impossible to reinstate a booking cancelled online and that I should not have cancelled my booking online. I explained that the previous agent claimed she was working on reinstating it. She said that it would be impossible for the other agent to do anything and she refused to do anything further. When I politely asked to speak to her supervisor, instead of being transferred, I was again disconnected. A third call gave me a agent who basically said the same thing as the 2nd agent. She said I would receive a refund of taxes of fees but she was unable to tell me how much of a refund I would receive.

Sadly, a few days after my interactions, our flights were "officially" canceled. I blame myself for not more carefully reading the fine print although Lufthansa was deceptive in their practices and their customer service was terrible. An expensive lesson learned. While I am tempted to file disputes with the airline and regulatory agencies, I'm not sure it is worth the bother and I suspect I would ultimately lose. Nonetheless, I decided to at least dispute the original transaction with American Express. Unfortunately, a week later I was given a merchant credit of only $135.98 x 2.

My question here is, does anyone know if this seems like what I should receive? Given that the Lufthansa agents on the phone could not tell me how much I was entitled to have refunded, I have no way of knowing if I am being further bilked by Lufthansa.

Our original two tickets showed the following breakdowns:

Ticket: $1165.00 x 2
Taxes and Carrier Imposed Fees: $1,377.59 x 2
Total Costs: $5085.18

Is it likely that we are only entitled to less than 10% of the "taxes and fees" originally charged???