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Aren’t there rules governing this? There isn’t an agency that can compel KLM to be fair?
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Do you have receipts for what you bought or did you submit a credit card statement? If not, ask the vendor to email you the receipts. Resubmit to KLM. Note that KL will normally cover expenses that are reasonable. So a $500 suit you bought after the bag went missing would likely pass muster but a $2500 would not. Anything bought before the flight and delivered late would not be reimbursed.
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Originally Posted by NWplatinum
(Post 35436791)
What can I do now?
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Originally Posted by NWplatinum
(Post 35436791)
KLM has refused to honor the stuff we had to buy for the formal event, and the fuel to drive back and forth to the airport despite me saving the receipts. They were “denied” by their audit department. Also what if I paid cash? I wouldn’t have a bank statement.
If you are only supplying credit card statements, they may be denied because they do not show what have you purchased and whether it was reasonably required by you. You may be able to reach out to the stores where you purchased the items to get a copy of the purchase receipt, but that will probably be difficult from the US.
Originally Posted by macaron35
(Post 35436843)
https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizen...htm#next-steps
- complain to national authorities If you don't receive a reply from the airline within 2 months or if you are not satisfied with the reply, you can lodge a complaint with the relevant national authorityhttps://europa.eu/youreurope/citizen.../theme/pdf.gif in the country where the incident took place, within a reasonable timeframe. The national authority should provide you with a non-binding legal opinion on how to proceed with your claim. in your case: https://www.reiselivsforum.no/web/ho...umentName=home Those NEBs are EC261/2004 enforcement. They may be able to help in a baggage case, but more likely they wouldn't. Many of them are not empowered to hear individual cases in the first place, they are meant to oversee airlines for systematic adherence to the Regulation and fine them for systematic issues. |
I did provide receipts. They denied them with no explanation. The suit was 2k and the dress was 5k (approximately). And gas was $300 round trip (approximately). I saved all receipts in NOK. I don’t expect them to cover all that, but I do expect a fair settlement that at minimum covers the gas.
KLM wrote me a nasty email this morning saying it’s $225 or too bad. “Thank you for your message. I am sorry to read that you were disappointed with our previous replies to you. I am required to advise you that, despite our best efforts to bring this matter to a mutually acceptable conclusion, we believe we have now exhausted our internal complaint handling procedure. It is also my hope that you could put the matter in the past as any additional correspondence will not have a different outcome. For this reason, we are unable to respond to you again, and kindly consider this our final response. Once again, on behalf of KLM, I apologise we were unable to resolve your concerns to your satisfaction. We thank you for your loyalty and look forward to serving your travel needs again in the near future.” |
Originally Posted by NWplatinum
(Post 35440018)
I did provide receipts. They denied them with no explanation. The suit was 2k and the dress was 5k (approximately).
We recently had a poster in similar circumstances - travelling for a wedding and requiring to buy a suit - have his (reasonable) purchases refunded without quibble: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/klm-...ding-suit.html If your claim is in the order of thousands of dollars/Euros, I really don't think you are going to get anything more than what they have offered - so again, I would recommend you turn to your travel insurer and see what they can do for you. This thread is now 10 years old, but we did once have someone claiming to be a former KLM employee weighing in on this very topic. Something they wrote appears applicable in this case (with emphasis added):
Originally Posted by Mikke
(Post 20436223)
I used to work for Air France, KLM and Delta baggage compensation and I would like to give some advices regarding the compensation process.
<snip> Also, and airline is also NEVER responsible for more than a total of 1131 SDR (which today is about roughly 12-1300 EUR) per PERSON (so not per bag) with a checked in bag. So if you chose to put you 2000 EUR iMac in there, or your super expensive GUCCI dress - that is YOUR problem. |
Remind them of their liability under the Montreal Convention, and ask them to explain why they seem to think this doesn't apply.
You won't get all your money back, since your expenses were well over the 1288 XDR limit, but they should at least be held to their obligations. If you have anything to prove you had a destination wedding there, I'd throw that in to support your purchase of wedding apparel. |
Originally Posted by irishguy28
(Post 35440076)
I think the reason your request was rejected was because 7k is an unreasonable amount to have refunded under the circumstances (if the currency is USD or EUR. If the claim was for 7k NOK then it should have been refunded without further query).
We recently had a poster in similar circumstances - travelling for a wedding and requiring to buy a suit - have his (reasonable) purchases refunded without quibble: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/klm-...ding-suit.html If your claim is in the order of thousands of dollars/Euros, I really don't think you are going to get anything more than what they have offered - so again, I would recommend you turn to your travel insurer and see what they can do for you. This thread is now 10 years old, but we did once have someone claiming to be a former KLM employee weighing in on this very topic. Something they wrote appears applicable in this case (with emphasis added): I never asked for any amount actually. They asked for my receipts, I provided them, and they said they were rejected. She then said we’ll give you $225. I was hoping for $500-1000. But I never asked for a specific amount. As far as them explaining themselves, and why they rejected my receipts, I asked them to do so. But they’ve refused to do that as im sure they’ve been advised not to for legal reasons. |
Aside from for the fuel, how much did you spend on clothing ?
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Originally Posted by macaron35
(Post 35440249)
Aside from for the fuel, how much did you spend on clothing ?
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Originally Posted by NWplatinum
(Post 35440215)
I never asked for any amount actually. They asked for my receipts, I provided them, and they said they were rejected. She then said we’ll give you $225. I was hoping for $500-1000. But I never asked for a specific amount.
How much of the backstory did KLM know when you first submitted the expenses claim?
Originally Posted by NWplatinum
(Post 35440215)
As far as them explaining themselves, and why they rejected my receipts, I asked them to do so. But they’ve refused to do that as im sure they’ve been advised not to for legal reasons.
Originally Posted by NWplatinum
(Post 35432659)
I wrote them back and demanded they follow the law, and they wrote back they want to see my bank statement now for the transactions. Our cards were in our checked luggage so we used cousin’s cards. I don’t have direct access to the statements without jumping through more hoops. I don’t want to do that if they’re just gonna sent me again. They seem to be sending me on a wild goose chase, and won’t answer my questions on why their audit department denied my receipts. They are legitimate receipts.
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If someone told me they absolutely had to buy a $2000 suit and $5000 dress, for a wedding that was not even yours, could not find in the country of Norway anywhere else that would sell or rent the items at a more reasonable price, I would throw out their claim as well.
Combine them with supposedly packing all own methods of payment in the checked baggage and I would, dare I say, start to suspect attempted fraud. I'd say you should have a claim for the gas to drive to the airport, but you claim that cost you $300 somehow? Even with Norwegian gas prices, that's still like 700km each way, with a fairly uneconomical car. That's almost as far as from Kristiansand to Trondheim. I call bull. Even if you were that far from KRS in the first place, KLM would not send the bag to KRS just to be overlanded for two days... They would send it to closest airport instead. Oh wait.... So my cousin and I drove three hours round trip to the airport and got the bags ourselves. From where I'm standing, the offer of $225 is more than fair, your ideas of enriching yourself at the expense of the airline had backfired spectacularly, and given the tall tales that you try to spin in this thread... can't help not feeling sorry for you in the slightest. |
Originally Posted by irishguy28
(Post 35440350)
Perhaps it was a mistake not to mention an amount; just filing an otherwise unannotated receipt with no explanatory note can only otherwise be interpreted as an expectation of a full refund. If you'd referred to the statutory limit of 1 288 SDR each under Article 22, paragraph 3 of the Montreal Convention, then at least they'd know you weren't expecting/demanding a full refund. Did you mention that you had to buy (or rent?) formal wear for a wedding, explaining why a single item alone maxed out the maximum possible compensation payable per person?
How much of the backstory did KLM know when you first submitted the expenses claim? Reading between the lines of your original post, I suspect that they doubt the veracity of the receipts and/or that you personally incurred these expenses. From what you've written in your OP, you've stated that someone else paid for these items; is that somehow apparent/obvious from the receipts submitted? They should know the backstory. The letter explained why it was so bad that our bag was sitting in Detroit for three days. Not to mention this wasn't just a wedding. There happen to be a wedding, but that wasn't the reason for the trip. My wife's mother passed away from cancer approximately eight months ago. This trip was a family reunion of my wife's family because her mother's side hails from Kristiansand, Norway. There happened to be a wedding, but that wasn't the reason for the trip. The receipts have the items, the shop where it was purchased, the address, and the totals in NOK. |
Originally Posted by Fabo.sk
(Post 35440423)
If someone told me they absolutely had to buy a $2000 suit and $5000 dress, for a wedding that was not even yours, could not find in the country of Norway anywhere else that would sell or rent the items at a more reasonable price, I would throw out their claim as well.
Combine them with supposedly packing all own methods of payment in the checked baggage and I would, dare I say, start to suspect attempted fraud. I'd say you should have a claim for the gas to drive to the airport, but you claim that cost you $300 somehow? Even with Norwegian gas prices, that's still like 700km each way, with a fairly uneconomical car. That's almost as far as from Kristiansand to Trondheim. I call bull. Even if you were that far from KRS in the first place, KLM would not send the bag to KRS just to be overlanded for two days... They would send it to closest airport instead. Oh wait.... Yeah, so somehow you managed to burn 1500kms worth of gas in just three hours... What does your cousin drive, a 40t tipper lorry that happened to be full of gravel? From where I'm standing, the offer of $225 is more than fair, your ideas of enriching yourself at the expense of the airline had backfired spectacularly, and given the tall tales that you try to spin in this thread... can't help not feeling sorry for you in the slightest. At this juncture I just am looking for specific agencies I can file complaints with against KLM. Any help from all would be greatly appreciated. |
Originally Posted by irishguy28
(Post 35439082)
Claim on your travel insurance.
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