UA Refunds Ticket but Refuses to Disclose Where The Money Went
 

I recently refunded a full fare Y ticket. There had been several changes and add collects so the refund was split between three Amex cards. Two of them were accounts I hold and are still open and those refunds posted but the third was not. The refund confirmation from UA lists the last four digits of an Amex number for each account and Amex cannot find any account tied to me for the last card so they asked me to provide the full account number that UA credited. I emailed UA Refunds asking for this information and UA ignored the request and replied with the same information as they had previously, the last four digits. I emailed again and they ignored that message entirely. A third email has similarly been ignored.

Amex has opened a dispute but if United refuses to say where they sent my $3,200 it's not clear how Amex is going to be find it.

I've had some real head shakers with UA over the years but this one is in a class by itself. Anybody have a suggestion what to do next?

The refunds should go to the respective cards, are all the cards yours? in your name? Appears the third card was not.
Provide the full number to a non-card holder would be a non-no.

No way to know who's card it is. It could be one that I cancelled that is no longer in the Amex system or it could be UA messed up. But UA has an responsibility to give me my refund and it would be a lot easier if they would try and be helpful.

They know the refund hasn't gotten to me and they know the information they've provided is insufficient to find it. Their response? Stop responding.

Sigh. Anyone have a suggestion what to do next?

Is it possible that the third card was your card that was replaced with one of the other two cards (either expired or for security reasons)? In that case, AMEX should be able to find that refund and apply that to your current card - happened to me with Chase once.

That should also happen eventually even with no intervention. Either the credit will get applied to the replacement card, or if the account is closed they will send you a check.

:confused:

Don't you know who purchased the ticket? and what cards was used?

:confused:

Do you have any of the original receipts?

Did you book the $3,200 part with Priceline or similar?

Had issue with Hotel one time. Accidental booked wrong day. I was at hotel and got room directly and they showed me where they refunded Priceline for the room I accidentally booked the next month. but Priceline refused to refund me.

Your situation (multiple credit cards) sounds a little odd to me, but United's response sounds all too familiar.

I ran into this a couple years ago when I attempted to get a refund from UA on a fully refundable ticket. The phone number routed me to their website and vice versa. I filed a complaint with DOT and suddenly UA was incredibly responsive.

i find it odd that neither you nor AMEX has a record of the account you used to have but apparently recently cancelled (I presume “recent” based on the fact that the earliest one can book is around 11 months out, unless you booked way early and then made subsequent changes to keep pushing the flight later and later). But regardless, a vendor shouldn’t be giving out full credit card numbers to people anyway.

With all due respect, on what basis does UA know that the refund hasn't gotten to you? Just your assertion? UA claims to have refunded $3200 to an AMEX card that you used for a portion of the purchase. Presumably you know all of the AMEX cards you have used over the last 12 months, and if you don't, AMEX should (assuming this wasn't some prepaid card). I think your first step is with AMEX to ascertain what cards you used, and what one contains the original $3200 charge that you say has not been refunded. If the last 4-digits of this card are different from those stated by UA, bring this to UA's attention. That should start the correction process. If AMEX has no record of any card to which you charged the $3200, maybe this charge wasn't made to an AMEX card, and start checking your VISA or MasterCards. Until you can develop some documentation to show to UA where the refund was supposed to go, why should UA presume it went to wrong location?

How do you not have access to a closed/changed number? I closed an old Chase Visa card like 3 years ago and the account/#/info still shows up with my checking, savings and Explorer/Slate cards. . AMEX doesn't have something centralized as well?

The missing details here are what really confuse things.

OP says that he paid for the ultimately reissued tickets with three different cards, one of which is now closed. .

As to the third card which Amex can't locate, do the last 4 digits match the last 4 of your closed card?

Is that third card yours or somebody else's?

If this was your account and you don't have it, simply have Amex reverse the credit item and then ask UA to issue a check to the account holder.

I agree, but I wonder whether the mystery card could be a corporate travel agent, OLTA, or even a regular human personal travel agent.

Also, could it be a debit card or some sort?

Has OP searched for the original ticket receipt in his/her email? That should show at least the last four digits of the credit card, which would be a start in checking whether UA has made a mistake.

One place to find information about old cards (assuming it was a credit card registered to the OP) is for the OP to pull a credit report report from one of the agencies. (annualcreditreport.com). These contain information (including card numbers) of all of your credit cards since time immemorial.

First of all thank you to everyone for your responses. It's clear I need to provide some additional information.

The original ticket was purchased by me using an Amex card a couple of years ago. I bought a full fare ticket because I was concerned the dates might change. This turned out to be correct as the people I was going to meet kept pushing the dates back. Some of the changes didn't result in a higher price but some required an add collect. I used whatever Amex card happened to be in my wallet to pay the upcharge as they were modest, around $40-70 dollars. This went on for a substantial period of time. Eventually it became clear the trip wasn't going to happen. The ticket sat in my drawer until September when I got around to dealing with it.

When I received the confirmation for the refund from United it was split among three Amex cards, two for the add collects and a third for the bulk of the fare. When the refund for the bulk of the fare didn't appear on any of my current cards I called Amex. They attempted to track down the card from the last four digits of the number that United had provided but couldn't find the card. They said this is not unusual as accounts which have been closed fall off the system and they asked me to request the entire card number from United, which I did.

I have the ticket number for the ticket I refunded. I don't have a record of the original ticket since it never occurred to me I'd need it (lesson learned).

United knows the account they credited the refund to. They also know the reference number of the transaction. Unfortunately I am unable to get United to provide that information to either myself or to American Express. While in hindsight I can see why United might not want to provide me with the full credit number to which they credited the bulk of the refund that's what American Express asked me to request them to do. United could have responded that's they'd be happy to work with Amex to track down my refund but they didn't. Instead they told me to call Amex again knowing that Amex needed additional information from United to proceed. Not particularly helpful.

I've since asked United to provide the Reference number. So far they've failed to respond. Once again, not particularly helpful.

I'm not asking United to do anything more than provide the information they have which is needed to track down a refund that hasn't gotten to where it was supposed to. Supplying the reference number or contacting Amex and providing them with that and/or the credit card number would quickly resolve the situation.

I've opened a dispute with Amex but United has taken something that is would have been simple and making it extremely difficult simply just because they can't be bothered providing the reference number.

As I said any suggestions would be welcome.

That sounded like a great idea, so I tried it. Unfortunately the three agencies blot out the last few numbers of your credit card numbers on your credit report, probably so if someone gets ahold of it they don't have your full credit card numbers.

Nice idea though.

If you booked a non-refundable room with Priceline (as is primarily the case), then it doesn't matter what the hotel does. Priceline is under no obligation to refund you. You made a mistake, so you suffer the consequences. (And I doubt the hotel "refunded" Priceline. Priceline's procedure is to provide the hotel with a one-time-use card #, which is charged for room/tax only upon checkin. So there would be nothing to refund a month in advance of your original reservation.)

The ticket was booked directly with United. It was a full fare, fully refundable Y ticket.

But you know the last 4 digits. Look at the AMEX cards listed in the credit report. Toss out the ones for which you do know the whole number or which you know are still active. I assume that there should only be no more than 2 or 3 remaining ones. Then contact AMEX and say you believe the card number that received the refund is either XXXX XXXX XXXX 1234 or YYYY YYYY YYYY 1234 or ZZZZ ZZZZ ZZZZ 1234. That should be a narrow enough set of choices for AMEX to comb through.

As I said Amex can't find any card associated with me ending in the four digits United has provided however that would be the case for a card that was closed and fell off the system.

We know the refund was made to an Amex card because United says that's what they did and provided the last four digits for the card. There is no reason to start checking other cards as there is no dispute as to what account United credited. The problem is that they know the full account number and no one else does so there is no way to figure out where the credit went without some additional information from United.

United has never asked me to prove I didn't get the credit. That would make no sense. I'm not asking them to give me another credit, I'm asking them for the information necessary to figure out where the credit they issued went to. I'm sure they issued a credit. We just have to find what account it went into to.

I don't think that I ever said that United sent the refund to the wrong place. I certainly didn't mean to say that. I'm just trying to figure out where they sent the refund so we can find it.

I checked all three credit reporting agencies. I found 9 reported Amex cards on one of them and 11 on the other two so the list the agencies have isn't exhaustive. But in addition the numbers from each of the two agencies showing 11 cards don't fully agree with each other so it's clear that the history doesn't include all your cards. Not surprising given that if I remember correctly unlike Visa/MC every time you get a new card from Amex the number changes slightly.

This piqued my interest so I decided to see if my Amex Business Gold was shown on my credit report. It wasn't.

So while it would have been a good idea if all of your credit cards were there it isn't going to work. Besides, this whole matter could be instantly resolved if United would just provide the reference number for the transaction. That's the reason reference numbers exist, so one can locate a given transaction.

But I'll pass the list of numbers to Amex. It can't hurt. Thanks for the suggestion.

Seems you have all the answers. All suggestions are rebuffed by you.

I had a good idea of where this was going even before I read the above, which sort of confirmed it for me. Eleven Amex cards? This sounds like one of those Reddit tricks where people sign up for credit cards to get the bonuses and then buy refundable airline tickets so they don't actually have to spend the required amount of money to get the bonus.

Even if my hunch is wrong, the story doesn't add up. There's no way Amex has already purged the records of a credit card closed no more than two years ago.

Isn't that what manufactured spending or churn n burn or whatever it is called?
11 CCs in a few years seems very excessive unless each one was issued a new number due to fraud...several times. But then I'd worry about my online CC habits.

I don't believe Amex is one of the very few issuers that creates a new account/new credit report entry after a card is compromised.

Nobody said over a few years. The suggestion (see post #14 ) was to check my credit report since that would "contain information (including card numbers) of all of your credit cards since time immemorial."

So those eleven Amex cards are over a much longer period.

Nobody said the credit card was closed less than two years ago. I don't know how long ago the card ending in the number United gave me was closed. We're still trying to figure out if that is one of my accounts.

As for as this being a trick I've been flying for business since the late 1970's, have got over a million butt in seat mile on UA, am a two million flyer with AA, have never purchased a ticket in my life that I didn't intent to fly and my flyer talk ID is my real name. If this is a scam I'm a pretty stupid scammer.

You are welcome to think whatever you like but your conclusion is based on two assumptions. One, that it's improbable for someone more than sixty years old to have eleven Amex cards in his lifetime credit report history and two, that I claimed that Amex purged their records after two years, which I never did.

Unless something strange happened across all three reports, your credit reports should show all opened or closed credit cards from the past 7 to 10 years. Any closed cards older than that should have fallen off your reports by now.

The average American has two credit cards, total, on his or her credit report, so eleven from one bank is well above average by just about any standard.

As for Amex purging records, you've lost me there. Just how long ago did you buy this ticket? If United refunded to a closed card that was actually yours, Amex assuredly should have a record of that old, closed card. And if United somehow messed up and refunded the ticket to some other person's card, then there's obviously nothing for you to find in a credit report.

Then I have well over the number of cards of the average American. Which I suspect is true of many, if not most, business people my age who spent a significant part of their working life on the road.

Your question of how long ago I bought the ticket is a good one. I didn't think it mattered since it was fully refundable but I'm going to search my emails for confirmations from United and see if I can find when it was initially issued.

Most tickets -- even refundable tickets -- are good for one year from the date of issue. UA must have continually cancelled and then reissued your ticket. I'm surprised that neither you nor they ever suggested refunding it in full and then waiting until your plans were more concrete before rebooking, if only to clear up the record.

Assuming that all of your Amex cards were in your name, I can't understand why Amex would no longer have access to that information. They should have noticed a large refund made to an inactive account and contacted you / issued you a check. Barring that, they should have refused the credit and UA should see that. There really shouldn't be any way for this credit to end up in limbo like you're describing -- although it wouldn't surprise me if it took UA a few days/weeks to figure out that the refund attempt failed.

Pardon the silly question, but is there any chance that your client / business partner / whomever you were to meet purchased the original ticket? That would certainly explain the situation.

Note that I would not expect first-level CS reps to have access to the entire credit card number even if they wanted to read it to you. If they're not able / willing to read you the reference number, I would send a fax or letter to the refund department and ask them to trace the refund. You can find their contact information on the refunds page.

Good luck!

I would source the original $3200 charge from old credit card statements, scan that in as a PDF, send it to United with the question: "Is this the account you credited my refund to? If not why not?"

Can you search your email archives for the 4 digits they gave you? It might pull up an old receipt (even if not the United receipt) that would give you a clue.

I did roll the ticket over. That's why there were the two add collects. I don't remember why I didn't refund it originally. Probably because I was traveling so much I figured I'd use it. Even now while I don't travel as much when plans change, which isn't very often thankfully, I just keep the ticket and apply it to the next trip. AS makes that easy because they're all visible in your online account. Habit I guess.

Hopefully you are right about Amex eventually getting the refund to the right place but the refund was processed the end of September (interestingly UA gives two different dates the 23rd and the 30th for the one that is missing which is odd) so it's been a while.

Not a silly question at all. No I would have paid for it. I work for myself and travel is always on my nickel. But a good thought.

Good suggestion. I'll try that next. Thanks.