Originally Posted by
darch1
I experienced the contrary of your situation. I received an email from my home airline telling me that my flight was cancelled and they had rebooked me for the next day. However when I checked the airline website, the flight was still available for purchase. I phoned the company and was told that the flight was still scheduled and they couldn't see that it was cancelled. Several days later, the flight disappeared from the website. I think this could be an illegal practice since they can collect airfare knowing that the flight would not be operated. Also they are very slow to reimburse cancelled tickets, it takes 2 to 6 months...
A delay between a website inventory and behind the scenes route planning is unlikely an "illegal practice." You certainly weren't injured by it. Fraud requires intent.
whether 8 weeks to issue a refund is "illegal" depends on a number of factors, but I think you'd be hard pressed to obtain any relief in any scenario simply because it took 8 weeks to obtain a refund in a pandemic.