Not just in Oz, here in UK too I'm having to battle Flight Centre. Booked via BYOJet, I never book via OTAs and know better not too, but foolishly did so on this rare occasion (tempted by a lower fare & CX doesn't have a price match).

Anyhow, flight was cancelled by airline (CX in this case). CX have been amazing, automatically emailed flight cancellation "certificates" to be used in travel insurance claims, made clear refund for flight costs was due etc. However, impossible to get through BYOJet, phone disconnects after an hour of hold and no reply to their webform (they don't have an email). Forced to do a refund via Amex, and Flight Center are fighting Amex leading to my refund to be reversed during further investigation! Their claim is I have to take a credit, because they have chosen that is an appropriate remedy for the involuntary cancellation for me. If i want a refund, their (absurd) claim is this goes from involuntary cancellation to voluntary cancellation. The do not dispute that CX have cancelled my flights. Their own T&Cs say in this case i'm due a full refund (hence a strategy to claim somehow this is a voluntary cancellation). Looks like they aren't going to back down... not sure how long this will rumble on even if Amex make a "final" decision to award the money back.

Lesson learnt, the savings was definitely not worth this hassle (need to not cave again in future and stick rigidly to the no OTAs policy).

Hello,
could you also send me their terms and conditions?

i booked with TU and received a void ticket. i raised a dispute with my bank to claim a refund. now, they are disputing with me by offering voucher minus admin fee.

cannot believe that is what a travel agent would do

[email protected]

the terms and conditions are on their website - you would have been promoted to confirm you had read and understood them when you booked
https://www.travelup.com/en-gb/terms-and-conditions

You agreed their t&c’s at the time of booking not later revised ones( which they did even mention what they have changed)

Has Cathay confirmed they have refunded BYOJet though (who i've never heard of?). The overwhelming issue is that airlines may say to you 'Refund is due' very quickly, but they are taking an eternity to refund back to the agent themselves causing monumental backlogs of refunds due (and of course, may aren't refunding anyway).

The cheaper the ticket, the lower the level of support will be on the other end. But it's also sadly a fair point, almost every travel company furloughed the vast majority of their staff - including support staff as there is no money coming in, it's the only viable way to keep staff employed. But some overseas airlines have abandoned UK Sales Offices with all staff furloughed and / or made redundant - i've hear tales of 8+ hours on hold, but yet legal teams are being kept on to ensure chargebacks are contested as some sums mentioned would destroy companies overnight if all approved. Amex are now taking a more measured approach i've been told.

BYOJet is the trading name for FCM's OTA. Not even a separate legal entity, your contract is with FCM directly if you book via the site.
No, Cathay are saying it is available, but it's up to the agent to request it. Agent doesn't dispute refund is available nor disputes the airline cancelled flights. They are basically trying to claim they have the right to choose between refund or credit for me, and their choice for me is credit. (Implying I don't have a choice in this). If it want a refund, it would move from involuntary to voluntary cancellation and they get to charge fees. Likewise, if keep as credit, they get to charge fees to rebook. So basically, they are trying to somehow find a way to charge fees. Their own T&Cs say if airline cancellation, they should refund in full and make no provisions to charge admin fees. Hence this desperate attempt to somehow turn an airline cancelling flights to equate to voluntary cancellation.

Hi there
So any flights that are not happening - one is best to NOT cancel and trial with refund with the agency.
If they don't play ball / are being unreasonable - then ask travel insurance?
Also anyone has screenshots of travelup terms and conditions before and after (they seem to have included new section)
Regards

The terms and conditions currently on their website refer to a small administration fee. I'm not sure that charging approx £75 on a £100 ticket would be viewed by any reasonable person as a 'small' adminitration fee.

I have a couple of flights in the coming months booked with travelup which now looks like they are cancelled so unfortunately it looks I'm going to have to deal with them. To make matters worse it was the same price as booking direct with BA, but as it was multi city I couldn't book through the app and the BA website was really playing up. As there was no chance of me needing to change or cancel the booking it seemed safe enough at the time to use an OTA.

I have looked at a few alternative dates in the future with travelup for BA and it appears for my flights anyway that travelup are significantly higher in price than BA direct. I'm not sure therefore that taking a voucher that can only be used to book BA flights on travelup is any better an option.

A few people have PMed me in the last few days - I have responded with a link the datestamped T&Cs I have.

By way of update, I received a letter from Amex saying TravelUp had responded with documentation. As this "appears to support the transaction", the disputed charge credit has been reversed.

The T&Cs provided to Amex (and included in my letter) are their revised ones and not what I (and probably many others) signed up for.
Have tried to re-open the dispute online but it says to call us, so on hold now....
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...9f3c5187e2.jpg

I'm quite peeved now. Changing the T&Cs is reprehensible behaviour and I certainly will be devoting my efforts to fight this.
​​​​​​​I urge anyone that booked with these clowns to not back down.

That is really annoying. I think I will have to upload the T&Cs that you have to my Amex dispute before TravelUp respond - will PM you now...

Now travelup is on the papers and there is a Facebook group link in the first article as well
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/travel...efund-21950728
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/n...cancellations/

I have a similar issue with Fly Sharp, a subsidiary of Southall Travel.

Trading Standards have confirmed their behaviour is illegal in charging me a fee to get a refund.

ST/FS claim they are not bound by EC 261 as they are not an airline.

All I know is they have thousands of pounds worth of my money and won’t give it back to me. Even though BA already refunded the money to them, and even though I’ve been requesting a refund for over 7 weeks now.

The flights I was supposed to be on were all cancelled by BA. It’s not like I cancelled it through choice, the flights never happened - how could I fly on them?

Debit card company don’t want to know and won’t chargeback for me.

It seems to me a lot of these companies think they can just ignore the law and do whatever they like. So far I haven’t seen anyone take them to task, but I hope it’s coming soon from Trading Standards or the CMA.

Have trading standards really confirmed it's illegal for an admin fee to be levied for a refund? Provided that there was a provision for an admin fee in the OTAs T&C's at the time that you made the purchase then I query that a reasonable admin fee isn't valid...

From FlySharp's (and most OTAs) point of view

• They are mostly operating on minimum margins to get your business to book an airticket
• They are not the airline, it's not their fault the ticket was cancelled by the airline, and they have to do stuff to administer the refund
• This costs them money, both in time for their staff as well as bank charges for another card transaction
• It involves the processing of PCI (payment card) which has to be handled sensitively and the systems to store such data are not cheap, and correctly linking this back to your customer records.
• Also processes and procedures might usually prevent homeworkers working with PCI data but under the circumstances these restrictions might have been relaxed.

What is a reasonable fee is another question, something of the order of the low tens of pounds for each PNR transaction seems reasonable for what for the vast majority of refunds should be relatively easy process to administer, on the basis that most will be quick but in the law of averages some will go wrong and take more time.

I'm not defending sharp business practices of which there are plenty of examples around at the moment. But not permitting an OTA a small admin fee to process a refund that wasn't their fault doesn't seem right.

I’m sure if these agents were charging £25 per booking to refund in a reasonable time and explain costs they incur, then most would just accept it. Charging £75pp is profiteering, even if in t’s and c’s.

.....