yams888

For everyone booking flights on BMI, be aware that the GBP3 credit surcharge is not applicable for itineraries which originate outside the UK. This has been confirmed to me by BMI staff.

Yet, for two recent award redemption flights I have booked (AMS/LHR/AMS), and despite being assured on the phone that only tax would be charged, my card was debited with tax+GBP3 credit card surcharge.

Just thought I would warn people in case this has happened to others...

In fact, if anyone here has recently booked an award flight originating outside the UK, then please do check your CC statements to see if you have been erroneously charged the GBP3 fee.

I'm curious to know if this is a general problem, or if I'd just been unlucky.



[This message has been edited by yams888 (edited 03-06-2003).]

MKB

Last year, bmibaby did the same thing to me. I paid with a debit card to avoid the cc fee. They charged the £3 anyway.

I called them up to get it refunded and they initially said they didn't do refunds in any circumstances unless I put the request in writing. An argument ensued after which they eventually agreed to refund the £3. They never did though.

Avoid these people. They are con-artists.

Martin.

yams888

Well, bmi are either just ignoring me, or they've realised I've dug up a possible can of worms. I'm still waiting for a reply from their credit sales department - it's been a week so far...

CT-UK

I think the dam 3GBP thing is stupid anyway. Don't they process it as a sperate transaction that cost money?
When I last picked up some full fare biz tickets at LHR I had to sign a seperate piece of paper agreeing to the charge.

yams888

In the end, I resorted to contacting their customer services manager who was in fact very quick to reply.

I was told that my refund had been completed, though given MKB's post above, I'll believe that statement only when I see the refund for myself on my card statement!

And I was also told that the CC surcharge issue had been forwarded to their "technicians" to investigate in order to prevent the same thing happening in future. We shall see...

Bond Boy

I wonder if they will charge the GBP3 on bookings made on their own credit cards?

If they do they will get paid their GBP3 plus a credit card fee of about 1% of the transaction.

They will still pay away a fee to their bankers for accepting the credit card in the first place though...probably about 1.4% to 1.5%.

Charging the GBP3 doesn't make a lot of difference to them - more like penny pinching - but charging it on their own Credit Card would be a bit of a poor PR gaff...let's see what happens !

YOWkid

I think they have actually promoted it somewhere that using their card will save you the 3GBP fee... Cannot remember where I saw it though...

yams888

yes, using the bmi mc to pay for bmi tix does mean that the gbp3 cc fee is waived.

the whole fee anyway is just another way for bmi to make a bit more dosh. prior to introducing the fee, they undoubtedly had already built in cc handling fees into their ticket prices...

and it's not like they've reduced fares accordingly since the introduction of the surcharge: they've in effect just tacked on an additional gbp3 revenue for (probably) every other ticket they sell.

YOWkid

That's why you should just buy the ticket from a travel agency...

CT-UK

and pay their fee. Most UK travel agencies no charge a handling fee because they dont get commission from some airlines

YOWkid

Good point... Forgot about that...

alexwuk

Expedia.co.uk's bmi fares now include the online booking bonus. They are absolutely identical to bmi in terms of price, but:

1) No Credit Card Fee

2) $6 back, per ticket (OW or RT, regardless of price), through cj.com

Regards,
Alex

JRF

Why don't you just call your credit card company and disput the portion of the charge that was made in error. Let BMI pay a dispute fine for the error.

yams888

I considered that, but thought it better to first try to deal with it through bmi. (Also, because the tickets were still 'live' - I hadn't travelled on them yet; I'd assumed the worst - that bmi might do something stupid like cancel my bookings before I had actually travelled - because of the cc dispute!)

In any case, the money appeared today on my cc statement - so that's now sorted. I'm just wondering if they've made any necessary changes to their systems to prevent the same thing happening again - guess I'll see on my next booking, which I'll need to make soon enough...

sjharte

I made an online booking today. There is an option to say that your card is a BMI credit card and then you don't get charged the fee. The only problem is that the system woulddn't recognise my card as a bmi card!!