XL holiday issue

[red]

I am caught up in the XL fiasco.

I booked through a 3rd party travel republic each component of holiday seperate – filghts with freedom flights (ATOL proteected), resort transfer and accommodation.

I was due to go on holiday Tuesday – flights cancelled and travel republic are saying if we cancel accommodation we will lose 100% of cost and wont re-arrange. We cant and wont pay £600 each for new flights to get to accommodation.

They are encouraging me to cancel accomodation which i have not done. They say they will try to get some money back though no suggestion of level i could receive. I personallly feel they want me to cancel and then will keep cash under their T&Cs

It seems we should get money back one way or another for flights. Though credit card capital one saying they wont cover and ATOL are saying claim off credit card.

The accommodation is main issue – as there T&Cs are separate for flights and accommodation.

Am I just relying on travel republics good faith to re-arrrange or refund or do we have some way of claiming this as unable to get to accommodation through the flights arranged through them.

[greatscotuk]

Hi Red

There is an awful lot of confusion over this. The appropriate body (ABTA? ATOL?) should advise all parties involved about their rights in terms of refunds etc. How much hassle would it be to create a dedicated webpage without trying to find information on the overloaded websites?

Anywho - that doesn't help you Red. I'm really sorry you're stuck in the middle of all this. Firstly, you're unable to claim through your credit card because you paid your money to Travel Republic; a third party. Credit card refunds are only made when you book directly with XL (or it's subsidary companies). On that note, Travel Republic should be advising, if not dealing with this for you - they are your agent!

It sounds as though your holiday was booked as a 'tailor-made' - an industry term for holidays packaged by the agent (as opposed to the Tour Operator). As such your holiday arrangements should be protected by the Package Holiday Regulations 1994. If my memory serves correctly (and do double check), then they have a responsibility to either cancel the holiday with a full refund, or source new flights for you (the difference in price, you will have to pay for). Contact Travel Republic's head office and simply ask. If this holiday is booked as a tailor made, you can wave that in their faces.

If not, then they are being incredibly cruel and greedy. If you do have to cancel, complain until you can recoup the money (they will eventually yeild). Put everything in writing and after four letters, contact ABTA and ask about the arbitration scheme.

So, for your flights - speak to ATOL about a refund and explain that you booked the flights through an agent and cannot claim through your credit card company. For your accommodation. Appeal to Travel Republic's good will. If you must cancel, complain to their Customer Relations department and make it clear that you will take matters further if you have to. You might want to copy ABTA in on your correspondance - they will automatically send a letter to Travel Republic to let them know that they're onto them.

Good luck and do keep us updated!

[red]

Thanks for the response, I'm as confused about this situation as I expect several thousand other people are.

Response
"Travel republic closed their phone lines so it is proving impossible to resolve the issue, thier standard response to every suggestion I have thrown at them is as follows:-
All Freedom Flights Ltd bookings are ATOL protected which means you can claim a refund from the Civil Aviation Authority. Further information can be found at http://www.caa.co.uk/XLLeisureGroup.html Claim forms can be downloaded from http://www.caa.co.uk/docs/1804/Freedom_Claim_Form.pdf You will now need to make a new flight reservation with a different flight provider. PLEASE NOTE THAT WE ARE TAILOR MADE AND EACH ITEM IS SEPERATE.IF YOU HAVE BOOKED ACCOMODATION AND TRANSFERS WITH US THIS WILL STILL STAND AS NORMAL AND CANCELLATION CHARGES MAY APPLY IF YOU WISH TO CANCEL"

ATOL say claim off credit card in their guidance, credit card says wont cover it. ie flight

Our invoice is from freedom flights which are covered by ATOL

If we cant get to hotel due to flight issue, does credit card insurance cover this??

Travel Republic have not offered alternative flights and as you can well imagine, prices with other providers are ridiculous. They have advised me by email that if I proceed to cancel the accomodation and transfers I will suffer a 100% loss. Profit and not compaasion is definitely winning this race.

It is a 'tailor made holiday'

Where do I stand and how can I recover 'some' of my costs??

[Tony]

Originally Posted by greatscotuk

...you're unable to claim through your credit card because you paid your money to Travel Republic; a third party. Credit card refunds are only made when you book directly with XL (or it's subsidiary companies).

Are you confusing this with ATOL protection which is not valid if you book with the airline directly.

You can make a claim under section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act irrespective of who the payment was to.

Tony

[Tony]

Originally Posted by red

ATOL say claim off credit card in their guidance, credit card says wont cover it. ie flight

This is outrageous, I would go after Capital One. Say you would like to make a claim under Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act and would like to speak to their Charge Back Department. If you have a problem ask which Trading Standards Office is their prime authority. See this advice from Tesco Credit Cards: Recommendations to Tesco Credit Card customers who purchased XL Airlines tickets

If we cant get to hotel due to flight issue, does credit card insurance cover this? Where do I stand and how can I recover 'some' of my costs??

Most insurance policies do NOT cover insolvency - only the most expensive ones. 'Free' policies with credit cards are unlikely to provide this cover, but worth a check. The amount of money you get back will depend on the terms, which I guess you have checked. If the hotel is transferable to someone else you may be able to sell it with a 5 day auction on Ebay.

I really feel for you and an sorry to hear that you got caught up in this Red.

Best regards,

Tony

[admin]

This is what your policy needs

Dynamic Packaging Protection enables you to claim back money if you are unable to travel due to one of the companies you have planned an aspect of your holiday with becoming insolvent, either before your holiday starts or whilst you are away.
With an increasing number of people putting together their own holidays, rather than booking through a bonded tour operator or travel agent, dynamic packaging cover is vital. If your holiday is not ATOL bonded you must make sure that you have sufficient cover in place, but be careful, many travel insurance policies do not cover insolvency. etravelinsurance.co.uk covers insolvency as standard under Section O – Dynamic Packaging Protection.

This is from etravelinsurance.co.uk

[red]

Must admit am a bit confused.

However, it gets better. worst travel operator

Spoken to ABTA, they tell me:

If i booked flights through travel republic - claim through credit card.
If i booked through freedom flights - claim through ATOL.

We paid all our money to our bad travel company

So i rang hotel up in Tenerife and spoke to manager who was very helpful. She said if travel company ie Travel Republic cancelloed today the accommodation they would charge, wait for it, nothing !!!

However, under travel republics terms and conditions they would charge us a 100% cancellation fee!!

So travel republic would keep our money and pay nothing to hotel - crooks!!!

No wonder they are so keen we cancel.

I have asked hotel manager to confirm this by email.

I have told ABTA the above and not interested their member is acting in this manner as it obides by their T&Cs we signed up for - what a joke. They said they would hope they wouldnt however would not support us as they have not legally done anything wrong. So much for ABTA.

Hopefully there will be a happy ending as hotel manager verbally agreed that if we do not cancel and they receive money from travel republic we can re-arrnage at a convenient time for accomodation with small charge if the time of year is more expensive. Good hotel service

Bad travel agents - hope thread gets indexed and cached pretty quick

[greatscotuk]

I apologise for that bit of misleading information earlier - I had my wires crossed. Thank you for ironing that out Tony.

Having dealt with Tour Opeartors in the past, they view terms and conditions "more like guidelines than actual hard and fast rules" - Consumer & Legal Affairs Manager for Cosmos Holidays PLC. Have you approached Travel Republic with this new bit of information from the Hotelier? Although they have got you by the short and curlys in respect of their T&Cs, it'll should be interested to hear their response.

[Tony]

Hey Red, this site gets indexed very quickly - xl holiday issue - Google Search. There were people on here from Travel republic within the hour of your posting this - I guess these have Google alerts set. It will be interesting to see if your Google bombing works.

Anyway, it is pretty shocking to say the least that the hotel would give Travel Republic a full refund and pass nothing on to you. The hotel booking services that I use generally have a 24 hour cancellation clause, not ten days!!! I am guessing Travel Republic have the same with the hotel you have booked.

I hope this works out and you should make sure that Travel Republic do pay.

Tony

Well finally got through to travel republic and sales staff tried to help though gave misleading information saying at first that I could transfer accomodation cost 100 % to another holiday. When i said i would do this though the information i had infront of me said different she asked manager and came back with no you will lose 100%. I asked again why when hotel wouldn't charge and I had email confirming this - she couldn't answer. Which conflicts the statement they have made saying they wont profit from this.

I asked to speak to manager, they refused - too busy

I aksed that I was given clear guidance on what would happen if I cancelled, couldn't give it, only that they would try and get some money back.

Then to round things off i looked at CSR (which is a support ticket) and they tell me
"We are sorry that your holiday has been affected by the failure of the XL Leisure group. Your accommodation (transfer, parking, car hire ) has been cancelled in accordance with your instructions........."

I specifically told them i didnt want to cancel as they had not clearly explain and quantified what would happen, though they did anyway. The operator who i spoke at Travel Republic read the ticket and confirmed a mistake had been made.

I have saved screen dumps of support tickets just incase they want to try and get rid of evidence

The best she could do was issue a support ticket to customer services asking them to contact me. I shall not hold my breath.

I hope am proved wrong and will comeback and say so if it is the case. However, it seems very much like Travel Republic are going to try to take our money and pay the hotel nothing. This type of thing sickens me.

If Travel Republic continue to go down this route i will make sure they pay the hotel as i have not cancelled and re-arrange direct with the hotel as they have agreed to do so.

The hotel obviously values customer service whereas Travel Republic appear to be looking for a quick buck. Travel republic will lose a client that had used them over and over.

Thanks TB for your help!!

Looks like it is Costa del sunbed for me.