MKB

I booked the sale business class fare to Barbados, but had to use ebookers. Not one possible date was showing as available on flybmi.com in either business or premium economy at the sale fares, but a few were coming up on ebookers. Clearly the fares were loaded. I would guess there's some problem with bmi's booking engine not being able to find them, and the same was probably true of the economy fares.

Polk

You could report bmi to the Advertising Standards Authority. They can issue a public censure if they find that there was not sufficient availability of advertised offer fares.

12ellie12

Final word from BMI (Ithink) in response to my email below it.

I have been out of the office today so my apologies for the delayed response. Firstly may I explain that the sale fare was advertised FROM £349 and this fare was indeed available at the outset of the sale and also at the outset of the extension sale period. We did indeed advertise that travel was permitted from 12 June to 15 October and the dates that you require do fall into the UK high-season. Therefore, the sale fare offered for this travel period was £389 plus taxes.



However, as a gesture of goodwill for not responding early enough to your request for help in making the booking, we will honour the sale fare for the high season and offer you an additional 3000 miles.

To reconfirm, the total price of your ticket including tax is £618.90.

Your booking remains on hold. Please could you contact help desk, 0870 1266712, to make payment and to complete the booking.

22.07.08

Thank you for your email.

I am unsure if you are continuing to investigate this as per our telephone conversation yesterday. However I would like to add some pertinent points to our discussion:

· I don't recall this small print regarding travel Mon to Thurs & did actually check the entire date range, not just my dates. The promotional email stated “Book from 12 June 2008 until 26 June 2008, travel 12 June 2008 until 15 October 2008.” The price quoted was from £349. These were not available, each time I researched.

· The second mailing I received was still quoting the sale price from £349 when these had obviously all gone (if they were ever loaded). The first adviser, Helix in his apology to me stated these fares would have been gone already so not only is it false advertising but you now appear to be contradicting each other.

· My dates are for the low season to Barbados.

· I have discussed this in various internet forums and I am not the only person with these problems.It is clear from these comments, also mine and my friend’s experiences that there is a problem with your sales systems and your customers are rapidly losing faith in this.

I feel in light of the ongoing and lengthy communications I have endured that I should, at the very minimum, receive my flight at the advertised offer price, with double miles ( as per the offer I was also emailed for booking in June, as I would have done with a prompt reply from yourselves). I would very much appreciate a swift response as I would like purchase my ticket before I fly on Saturday, therefore please continue to hold my flight.


*Does anyone know what the taxes would have been in June on this fare because they are higher now.? How many miles would I have earned Man- BGI?
*Another query is that my Diamond Plus status runs from 25/07/07-24/07/08 so is it better for me to pay for this flight before it runs out & add to my status miles or restart the next year with these points?

Thanks again for your help.