Covid 19 Thoughts on the likely actions in the weeks to come

I have a similar question

Virgin cancelled my MAN-JFK flight and obviously can’t enter the US due to the advice.

Foolishly I booked the tickets via a travel agent who is refusing me a refund and also refusing a date change other than too June?

If VS has cancelled your flight you are legally entitled to a full refund, no matter how hard they or your TA try to persuade you to rebook or accept a future travel voucher.

The agent is, however, entitled to charge an admin fee which should be clearly set out in their T&Cs. That, I’m afraid, is a downside of not booking direct with the airline.

If they still refuse to refund you, assuming you paid by credit card you can lodge a disputed transaction claim with the card issuer and you can get a refund that way.

I’ve spoken to the travel agent against who are claiming “force majeure” and saying my only options are:
A) Credit Note
B) Defer Dates

I’m 99% sure I’m the entitled to a refund as Virgin have cancelled the flight.

Can they really claim force majeure in these situations and not offer me a refund?

Where do I stand if I raise this as a dispute with my credit card company?

The agent is wrong.

Force majeure DOES apply here, but all it means is you won’t get the €600 compensation you’d normally be entitled to under EC261/2004 if a flight is cancelled with less than 14 days’ notice.

It does NOT alter your right to a full refund (minus an admin fee).

The details are here: https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/t ... ncellation

So I would speak again to the agent and remind them of the law.

If they still play hardball, lodge a disputed payment claim with your card issuer.

The agent is wrong.

Force majeure DOES apply here, but all it means is you won’t get the €600 compensation you’d normally be entitled to under EC261/2004 if a flight is cancelled with less than 14 days’ notice.

It does NOT alter your right to a full refund (minus an admin fee).

The details are here: https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/t ... ncellation

So I would speak again to the agent and remind them of the law.

If they still play hardball, lodge a disputed payment claim with your card issuer.

Thanks gumshoe! The agent is being awful. They are claiming as my contract is with them and not Virgin they don’t need to comply and offer the refund and directed me to this link:

“ This link is for ABTA our governing body on which advice we follow in the UK. https://www.abta.com/news/coronavirus-outbreak”

Never have I dealt with such an awful company before!

I absolutely agree with gumshoe that your agent is incorrect.
Your agent, to me at least, appears to have incorrectly read and interpreted the ABTA advice.

The agent is NOT the travel provider that the ABTA advice mentions - the travel provider is VS. If VS is refunding, then you are entitled to that refund. Don’t give up...the credit card route is the simplest way of getting your money back if the agent continues to wrongfully refuse.

31/3 man jfk has been cancelled.

The app is worthless mess for info

Browser shows this, "contact Delta"

Direct booking with VS

App info

Update from Virgin Trade ;

COVID-19 Getting our customers home
Whatever happens in the world, our customers are always our first priority. We’re working day and night to guarantee their safety and peace of mind.

Due to increasing travel restrictions, our schedule is being updated frequently. Our priority is getting our customers home.

Because of the extremely high volume of customers needing our help, we are prioritizing customers who are travelling imminently, with a focus on those who need to return home.

We know that you are experiencing the same high volume of contact but we’re asking for your help by also prioritizing those customers and where we still have flights operating that it is possible for a customer to travel on, that those customers don’t makes unnecessary changes to their booking.

Below are the last flights that will operate in the coming days together with a reminder of flights that are operating that you can re-route customers to travel on with no change fee or fare difference.

Following the introduction of travel restrictions at the majority of our destinations, we have had to scale back our flying schedule, cancelling many flights and suspending some routes.

From Tuesday 24 March, we will be temporarily suspending our flights at Gatwick and Manchester and will be operating all remaining London flights from Heathrow.

The last outbound Gatwick flights departed today Monday 23 March:
VS89 To St Lucia (UVF) and Grenada (GND)
VS29 To Barbados (BGI)

The last inbound flights into Gatwick land on Tuesday 24 March:
VS90 From Grenada (GND) and St Lucia (UVF)
VS30 From Barbados (BGI)

From Tuesday 24 March the following flights will now operate to/from Heathrow:
VS147/148 To Havana (HAV)
VS133/134 To Antigua (ANU)

Customers should head to Terminal 3 at Heathrow at least two hours before their scheduled departure time.

Since our schedule is being updated frequently we urge all customers to check the status of their flight.

Updated flying schedule

Updated flight schedule;

Updated flight schedule;

Updated flight schedule;

Updated flight schedule;

[mitchja]

Just to summarise above, VS are essentially op’ing just 6 A/C a day now from Thursday all from LHR.

Having just gone through the process to cancel and re-book to an open ticket for a flight I had for the end of Apr, the whole process is very painless and you don’t need to ring or text VS to do this. I sent the request on Sunday afternoon using the rebook website page (it was initially a email request but now it’s a web form). I got an immediate auto-reply email confirming the request.

Today I received another email to say the change is now complete. The booking ref stays in your list of bookings but shows a date of 31 Dec 2020 with no flight legs in it (even though you have until April 30th to rebook and fly again).

You can rebook using the phone or SMS option which I will do once all this settles down.

We booked PE and used miles to get an UC return. Presumably all miles are getting refunded when you use the web form requesting a refund?

Additionally, we paid a change fee to VS (£200pp), presumably travel insurance wouldn’t cover this?

After a family meeting yesterday, we were due to pay in full for our June Orlando/Gulf trip tomorrow we have scrapped it and trans furred it to June 2021. Not able to go later in the year as we have contracts to decorate hospitals up and down the country. June is our month off besides odd days and Christmas shutdown. Dissapointed but feel its the safest thing to do. Hope you all get to do your travels. stay safe.

We are in same position due to fly to Miami 21 June. Haven't been able to contact Virgin Holidays as holiday too far off yet only deposit paid and balance due very soon. I dont 'intend' to cancel but dont want to pay the balance on trip i'm convinced wont go ahead. If UK is ok by June (highly doubtful) then USA certainly wont be. How did you change your travel date? Dont really want to lose my deposit buy not paying balance but cant see anyway to sort this out??? all contact routes return to the 72 hours edict. June 2021 'may' be ok . Travel insurance doesnt help as the flight isnt cancelled. Any help welcome!

Just to summarise above, VS are essentially op’ing just 6 A/C a day now from Thursday all from LHR.

Having just gone through the process to cancel and re-book to an open ticket for a flight I had for the end of Apr, the whole process is very painless and you don’t need to ring or text VS to do this. I sent the request on Sunday afternoon using the rebook website page (it was initially a email request but now it’s a web form). I got an immediate auto-reply email confirming the request.

Today I received another email to say the change is now complete. The booking ref stays in your list of bookings but shows a date of 31 Dec 2020 with no flight legs in it (even though you have until April 30th to rebook and fly again).

You can rebook using the phone or SMS option which I will do once all this settles down.

Hi James, was this a cash plus miles booking.
I’m thinking about doing this for our upcoming reward seat booking but not sure if you can only rebook later if they have reward seat availability when you want to travel

[mitchja]

No sorry, it was just a standard revenue Z fare.

arghhhh Virgin Holidays Florida balance due 29th March, went to manage my booking, selected to try and rearrange booking, get a link to fill in a form (great!), get taken to the page that doesnt want to know unless holiday before end of April!!!! Virgin are impossible to contact!!!!

Head for points reporting all VS flights cancelled from Gatwick with consolidation at Heathrow.

https://www.headforpoints.com/2020/03/2 ... rt-closes/

Resigned to paying balance on June holiday to save deposit! what a ridiculous situation when all it take is a Virgin message that deposits can be mothballed for another time and an option under 'my booking' to do this. Would also reduce their refund issue for the future. Only upside is the money comes from a savings account gaining 0% interest so when repaid as cant see USA fit in June it actually earns the deposit element which would otherwise be lost if i decline to travel. Hellish situation for those with very expensive packages rather than a flydrive due to go in summer.

I can personally see the situation going on for some time - forget what Donald (who is of dubious intelligence anyway) says about having it all sorted by Easter as "it's a magnificent time".

In the last 48hrs or so I have had cancellation emails galore from various UK-based organisations...

CAMRA - Great British Beer Festival in early August - cancelled.
Nottingham Royal Concert Hall - closure extended indefinitely.
Glastonbury - cancelled.
Local village carnival in late June - cancelled.
Coaster (as in Rollercoaster) Club - entire trips schedule, UK & abroad cancelled for 2020.
Am just waiting for the email from Center Parcs to cancel our break there in late April.
Ditto for easyJet to cancel out flights to/from France in July.

Admittedly, some of the "not for profit" events above were coming to the stage where money had to be committed , so the decision was taken to cancel to avoid admin hassle.

It's certainly not a good time to be an airline employee for sure, worldwide - or employed elsewhere / self-employed. Some airlines and firms will go under. Norwegian will be the next airline IMO - and Virgin is certainly not out of the woods by any means. I suspect when flying resumes, all airlines will emerge in a very different shape from a 6 weeks ago.

Some advice required please.

Flights booked to Fort Lauderdale next Saturday 11th via Atlanta on VS109 from Manchester, then connecting on wards for a now cancelled cruise.
Return flights via JFK originally on 24th,
My Booking now shows only the connecting internal flights. No transatlantic not even through LHR .
Return on VS128 is still showing Back to !Manchester but has been put back 24 hours leaving us with a 29 hour layover at JFK.
Virgin at this stage are still refusing a refund, but won’t tell us how we get to Atlanta. Not that we want to.
I know from above that Virgin are only operating via Heathrow so why are they being so reluctant to help us. Don’t want a flight credit as next February’s long haul are already booked, through BA, and don’t want an afternoon flight anyway
Insurance Company is just a voice message saying unless you are flying in next 48 hours we won’t deal with you.
Any thoughts people ?

As all MAN flights are now cancelled, you are entitled to a full refund (including any connecting flights on the same booking I think).

However VS - and it’s not alone - is trying all it can to get people to accept future flight vouchers instead, in some cases refusing a refund outright.

That’s illegal under EU law so if, when you call them at T-48, they still refuse you can either lodge a disputed payment claim with your credit card issuer or, failing that, use Money Claim Online (formerly the Small Claims Court).

As all MAN flights are now cancelled, you are entitled to a full refund (including any connecting flights on the same booking I think).

However VS - and it’s not alone - is trying all it can to get people to accept future flight vouchers instead, in some cases refusing a refund outright.

That’s illegal under EU law so if, when you call them at T-48, they still refuse you can either lodge a disputed payment claim with your credit card issuer or, failing that, use Money Claim Online (formerly the Small Claims Court).

Airlines are simply doing that as they're trying to keep hold of as much money as possible given they must have little cash coming in at the present time with very few flights operating and many people understandably putting off purchases until the situation returns to normal. Without cash, you don't have a business.

Still, it will be interesting to see how this holds up in law.

Airlines are simply doing that as they're trying to keep hold of as much money as possible given they must have little cash coming in at the present time with very few flights operating and many people understandably putting off purchases until the situation returns to normal. Without cash, you don't have a business.

Indeed. But no-one is above the law and the EC has made it crystal clear that, while airlines don’t have to pay compensation for cancellations caused by Covid-19, they do still have to refund passengers who don’t want to rebook or be re-routed.

And that does not mean forcing them to accept a future flight credit, if that’s not what they want.