The Flights Guru Ltd

Having received the below from VS trade, I'm wondering what on earth they've been doing?! I'd never heard of them before this email... Their Google reviews are interesting!

Dear Valued Partner,

As a trusted partner, we appreciate you and the business you generate. So when we hear of travel companies who 'bend the rules' it causes ripples through our trade world and upsets us that customers can be affected in a negative way.

We are emailing you today to inform you that Virgin Atlantic do not permit you to work as a consolidator or be associated in any way whatsoever with The Flights Guru Ltd.

The Flights Guru Ltd. have been highlighted numerous times for their fraudulent activities and this behaviour will not be tolerated.

With immediate effect, any agency found to be working with or on behalf of The Flights Guru Ltd. will be investigated and have their Ticketing Authority removed.

If you have any questions relating to this, please speak to your Virgin Atlantic representative or Account Manager.

[mitchja]

There’s been a few cases of this happening before, usually it’s because the company is/was scraping their flights off the VS website rather than actually linking up to the GDS system all travel agents /consolidators should be using. The website is for direct consumer sales only.

i.e. you make a booking via one of these ‘companies’ but rather then them instantly making the booking direct with the VS GDS system, they just record the details & take payment details then they make the booking manually using the VS website with the details you provided.

There have also been cases of these sort of back street flight consolidator staff using their own credit cards to make the customer’s bookings again using the VS website to gain points/miles etc for their own benefit then using the money received from their customer’s via their own website to pay their credit card bills.

All very dodgy practices which is why I always always avoid booking using consolidators. I either book direct or use reputable agents such as Expedia..

OOPS!!!
Update: Important information about The Flight Gurus Ltd – 20 May 2022
Further to a VSbulletin sent on 17th May 2022 regarding “The Flights Guru Ltd”, Virgin Atlantic is issuing the following important update –

We have erroneously identified in our previous communication that we had identified fraudulent activities being conducted by “The Flights Guru Ltd”, and instructed you not to work with them as a consolidator on any matters related to sale or distribution of our services.

The communication should in fact have stated that we wished you not to work with another entity with a similar name which is an entirely separate company.

We extend our heartfelt apologies to “The Flights Guru Ltd” for the confusion and any distress caused by the original communication, and for the avoidance of doubt, we confirm that we have no issues with you working with “The Flights Guru Ltd” in any ongoing capacity related to the sale or distribution of our services.

If you have any questions relating to this, please speak to your Virgin Atlantic representative or Account Manager.